Is this normal behaviour from PIL

[PeachShark]

I’m really struggling with how my PIL (mainly MIL, but more recently FIL also) are around my DS (11 months)

My MIL has become fixated on the idea that she wants to be able to rock him to sleep, rather than let me feed him.
I breastfeed and cosleep so he is still very much being fed to sleep, I am fine with this and I’m taking things at his pace.

We visit them once a week. He usually has one nap during the visit. He is essentially whisked away the moment we walk through the door. This is fine, I let them get on with it, they want to play with him, feed him, fine. My issue is when he starts fussing and it becomes clear he wants a milk feed and is getting tired but they seem to do everything in their power to comfort him themselves. Then I politely interject and say “ah I think he needs a milk feed”… MIL usually ignores me and will continue to try rock him until I physically take him off her and recently FIL has actually started responding with “oh I think he just wants a cuddle” or “oh let MIL rock him off” - the cuddle comment was when he was holding DS who was pushing him away crying, so yeah definitely wasn’t looking for a cuddle.

Yesterday he was crawling to me starting to cry, clearly coming to find me as he wanted milk/comfort/mummy/getting tired, and they were physically stopping him and pulling him away, to which I stepped in and said “I’ll feed him” and then FIL said, “MIL can rock him” and I said “I’d rather respond to his needs”.

I could tell MIL was not happy, there was a really tense atmosphere in the room and nobody spoke for ages afterwards.

I can’t stand how I feel judged and am challenged when I just want to respond to what my baby needs/wants. It’s exhausting that they seem to turn it into a strange competition of who can comfort DS best, and it’s just really getting to me.

Is this typical behaviour for grandparents? Curious to know what the dynamic is like for others. There are honestly a million other things in addition to this that are just getting on my nerves and I don’t know if it’s me or them that’s the issue! One example of every time we visit FIL take loads of photos of MIL with DS and posts them in our WhatsApp group. It just feels unnecessary and over the top. We see them weekly if not twice a week and every time we get an influx of these photos. I’m actually considering speaking to a therapist about it because it’s all getting to me so much.

I wouldn't be sending DH and DS without you. That will not make them back off at all, quite the opposite, you won't be there to put your foot down and DH will allow her to try becuase she'll guilt trip him.

Go to a softplay or park while the cleaner is there and reduce your visits. And quite frankly, if they ask why say "I've started to feel uncomfortable becuase you refuse to give me my child when he's crying and when I ask for him, so I don't enjoy our visits at the moment." They don't care how they're making you or DS feel, so don't protect them from their own behaviour.

@PlayingDevilsAdvocateisinteresting

"Anyway, knowing that my DiL was exhausted for most of the time made me wish that I could give her a helping hand - well two hands really - but sadly my personal logistics made that impossible. However, if I was able to offer my help, I might well have tried to rock my DGC to sleep for daytime naps, so that my DiL would be able to trust me to look after her dear little one. So I think it is entirely possible that your MiL, Peach, was actually and genuinely, cack handily trying to help you."

in this scenario wouldn't you ask "how can I help?" Isn't that a normal response? Or "how do you usually settle him?" Not refusing to let the baby have the comfort it clearly wants. You wouldn't refuse to acknowledge a baby's mother as the one the baby wants most, and the authority on what her child needs, would you? Because that would be very undermining and hostile. If you wanted to be respectful and genuinely helpful you'd ask her for direction.

What absolute shite! All my DC were breastfed for extended periods of time. None of them have a single filling and their teeth are excellent.

As a matter of fact, we’re going to the dentist this week and I’m going to ask him, but I’m very confident his reply will be a politer version of my comment above because what you’re saying is untrue. Breastfeeding is best: for health, for speech - and for teeth.

Why not just express milk so she can feed him. You do seem to be weaponising your decision to keep breast feeding in order to appear to be your sons favourite. I breast fed all three of mine so I'm very pro, but you do seem to be using it as a bit of a power move.

Do some people have a comprehension problem? Since when is suggesting it’s a good idea to brush your babies teeth in any way controversial ? please see attached ! https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8067957/

I think your husband needs to take your DS to visit, for a set time, say 2 hours max. It doesn't sound as if you visited with him that he would challenge his parents, so better let his visit without you. Your son will be safe, and i imagine will be brought home quickly if he cries.

@BreatheAndFocus for those like yourself who are hard-of-reading “Breastfeeding until one year of age is not associated with an increase in caries; it can even offer protection compared to formula feeding. However, recent studies have observed that in babies who are breastfed for more than 12 months, the risk of caries is increased. In addition, there is a direct connection between prolonged breastfeeding beyond 24 months and the severity of decay in deciduous dentition 19].”

This is how my in-laws make me feel too. They think I’ve made my baby ‘needy’ by letting her stay in our room until 9 months. MIL has been fixated on her bedroom arrangements since she was about 4 months old. It’s really really frustrating and I get it completely. I also think my little girl gets tense at their house as she picks up on my stress.

when they go pin holiday I have such a feeling of relief it’s like I’ve taken annual leave from work.

No advice but I do get it @PeachShark

She is trying to prove that they can look after him without you there so that they can babysit or have him for longer by themselves.
I would stop visiting so often and not without DH. Once a fortnight is still generous.

I hope others have jumped on you.

Why should anyone express to appease others.

I currently have 8 month DD feeding on me to sleep as we speak. I tried with different bottles but DD prefers feeding from me. Should I teach DD life isn’t fair and that she can’t have what she wants or should adults learn that life isn’t fair and you can’t always have what you want. Some members of my family want to baby DD, they can’t because I don’t express. Life isn’t fair.

The only person who gets to dictate how the baby is raised is the parents. Also, shouldn’t be pandering to a woman who doesn’t respect the mother’s wishes.

You also shouldn’t advise mothers to express unless they need/want to as it can fuck up their supply. Just because it works for you, doesn’t mean it’s correct.

Here’s my first

You sound as though you get yourself upset every time you visit them @PeachShark . It's a shame that you are letting them spoil what should be a happy time for you and your baby.
l think with there being two of them telling you what you can and can't do, you are feeling quite bullied by them.

Your MIL has had her chance to rock a baby to sleep when her own children were babies! Now it's your turn to look after your baby in a way that's best for you and baby, remember the old Mumsnet saying "Your baby, your rules"!

If it were me, I wouldn't send baby & husband there on their own, MIL would then get entirely her own way, and you would have more problems in the long run.
Nor would I prepare bottles so that MIL could feed baby, your baby isn't a play thing to enable MIL to relive her younger days.

I'd cut down seriously on the visits to them, and with the weather improving, this is just the right time to do that, instead go to a park or sit in the garden, go to a baby class of some sort. You can visit them once a month or every six weeks. I'd keep things friendly with the InLaws, but fill your week with things for you and baby to enjoy together.

Once baby is a toddler, the InLaws could well be less smothering, and you can judge if you want to more of them.

Sorry you’re having to deal with this too. It’s extremely frustrating and unnecessary. Your sleeping arrangements are none of their business! I’ve actually had to lie about ours and not mention cosleeping as I know what their reaction would be and I can’t be bothered

This is exactly it. DH actually said that FIL mentioned something along those lines, about MIL rocking him to sleep so we could go out together and have a break - hence why DH thinks it’s coming from a good place.

Thank you for backing me!

I find it really crazy that it could be taken as me ‘weaponising’ breastfeeding because I want to respond to my baby as he is crying and crawling to me. He also won’t take bottles, so expressing wouldn’t work for us either. But funnily enough MIL actually did suggest I should express because what if I ended up in hospital - however she breastfed both her boys for 2 years and never once expressed or used bottles

I definitely am getting way too upset by it, it’s just like a pressure cooker and everything’s been building up slowly over the last year. And that’s exactly what I said to DH, with the two of them challenging me it feels like they’re ganging up on me like bullies when he’s not there.
I’m not going to go round as much, as I can’t go on feeling this way every week after we visit. I don’t mind DH going for a couple hours between nap times and hopefully that’ll keep them happy without us having a massive confrontation.

What?
She is the mother.
She can feed a baby any way she sees fit.

I was mix feeding my first DS and no one expect me and DH coould bottle feed him in first year as it was my decision. If you look it up, children should have one or at most two people bottle feeding them.
MIL can get a dog and feed it for fun. Children are not fucking toys.

Absolutely right - don't let them spoil it for you. The baby is yours, not some shared possession that they have an equal or greater right to play with.
Whatever your DH thinks, mil deserves a major, major bollocking for calling you "milk machine".

Of course I absolutely agree with you @ladycarlotta. However, my reply to the OP was already far too long, and I wasn't judging the OP at all, I was just trying to remind her that all the PP's who were telling her exactly what her MiL's motives were, couldn't actually know that for sure.

In fact, my own MiL - may she rest in peace - had a very good heart, but from the very first time she visited us after her Grandchild came home, she told me that I was making a rod for my own back, because I would pick my newborn out of their carrycot as soon as they started crying. Which immediately made me feel confused and inadequate as a mum, as my natural instincts didn't agree with her at all. I still remember 40 odd years later, thinking to my self at that time, that I would rather have a rod in my back than try to teach my little baby that their only way to communicate with me, wouldn't work.

Nevertheless, I do know that my MiL would have felt heartbroken if she had ever thought/realised that she had sent that message to her own children when they were little ones. She just didn't think of it in that way at all. So, I do have enormous sympathy for all young and/or new mums (I was 21 when I had my first one) who have MiL's who think that they know what is best for both their DiL and their new Grandchild. I do hope that most - well all really, but I doubt that that is ever going to happen - new Grandmothers really are saying and doing what they say and do, from a very warm and caring place. But as you pointed out ladycarlotta, they should be asking then what they can do to help, rather than pointing out what they think the new mum is getting wrong.

I am very sorry OP if you think I wasn't supporting you, or on your side, as I very much was and am. If between you and your DH, you can't get your MiL and FiL to stop with their tiring and demanding ways, then you might feel that you need to go low contact, at least for a little while, until the message to not interfere gets through to them. I was just asking in my previous post, and I am still asking now, that you don't take anyone else's opinions to heart, as your own, and your DH's opinions, are the only ones that really matter. 💐

There’s always one! Not everything is dig at formula feeding 🙄

OP, it sounds exhausting, I just wouldn’t go and let DH take the baby. From experience though my breast fed baby who would absolutely only settle on the boob for me, would happily be rocked to sleep by anyone else if I wasn’t in the house so you may find they can get him to nap!

And that’s exactly what I said to DH, with the two of them challenging me it feels like they’re ganging up on me like bullies when he’s not there.

and yet this limp lettuce has done bugger all but get the dog lead and leave you alone with them.

Why the feck are you visiting them?

I see their son doesn't fancy it so why do you?

I can think of some pretty crappy things I'd rather to than vivit people like this!

Don’t see them every week. You surely don’t need to? Go to the park or the library or a cafe while the cleaner is at your home. Be more blunt when they are resisting you taking your child back.

Why should the op express milk when she’s there to feed her baby?
She’s not a cow.

@EnglishBluebell you come over as projecting your insecurities onto the op here.
Of course milk is milk from a nutrition pov.
Of course formula fed babies bond with their mums when feeding.
However at 11 months most ff babies can take a bottle from a grandparent.
The op breast feeds, nobody else can do it and therefore it will be distressing if her baby is being stopped from going to his dm.

Don't see them as often. You and your baby would have much more enjoyment at a playgroup , park , library , walk