Older children at baby group

[Finnishline]

Prepared to be told I’m being PFB here!

I take DD, 10 weeks, to a little mother and baby group. It’s normally very quiet and DD can just lay on the mat and look at a few toys. Obviously this week it’s the school holidays so there were a few older children there and most were just colouring in and watching their tablets.

One boy who was about 7 or 8 was there, his mum has a baby. He was being pretty boisterous (annoying); pointing at the BF mums and making comments, throwing toys at the babies, throwing himself round on the mats etc. I turned my back to get a muslin from my changing bag and suddenly this boy was all over my DD, poking her face, pulling at her clothes and then he kissed her on the mouth! I was trying to get him off but his mum was totally ignoring him and someone else had to step in and tell her.

AINU here that if you bring older kids to a baby group you need to watch them? I’ve been careful with DD to try and make sure she doesn’t get ill and I’m also worrying myself with what she might have caught.

It's nothing to do with older children in baby groups. It's children full stop wherever they are shouldn't be left to run riot.

Yanbu, mum should've had him under control! The good news is that given he's 7 or 8, he's probably a lot less germ infested than a preschooler or 4/5 year old, but definitely NOT appropriate of the mum to not have him under control.

All young children should be properly supervised regardless of age but they should be allowed to go to a baby group.

YABU to name this thread ‘older children’ rather than ‘annoying parents!’

Of course older children should be allowed to access play groups with their younger siblings. But their parents should manage their behaviour.

YANBU to be pissed off that your baby was poked, kissed and harassed…I’d have poked him back 🤣.

This is my worry about having my baby this June- when I want to take her to baby groups after her jabs they’re going to full of horrific older children due to the summer holidays! Should be banned IMO, should be babies only.

I think I'd give the baby group a miss during school holidays. If older children have to be dragged along the least that their parent should do is supervise and make sure they are on their best behaviour. Or else find them somewhere else to go.

The summer holidays will end by the time your baby has had their eight week jabs (and allowed another couple of weeks to have built up the antibodies from them).

Just think, it won’t be long until your June baby is a horrific older child either.

One day you might be in this situation so I would not be so quick to judge.

Babies do grow up you know, and it tends to happen quicker than you realise. Unless you are not planning to have anymore, try to be a little more understanding.

Older child may have sen and parent may have had no choice but to bring them to the group. It may have been their only outing that day, they were trying to look after their younger child and couldn’t supervise older one at that point etc etc.
Like PP said, this could be you one day if you have more children, instead of rushing to judgement maybe try some understanding.
Also as soon as your baby can move independently it will be touching and putting a million different things in its mouth every time you blink.

It would depend on how she handled the situation after the other mum pointed it out.

if she apologised and dealt with older child I would prepared to forgive and forget.

If she just shrugged her shoulders and let the behaviour continue then that’s quite shitty.

I wouldn’t be so quick to judge tho, she is probably just trying to get some adult conversation, it’s hard with a second as she will be missing out on a lot of baby groups because of her second. You may also be in this situation in a few years.

I bet if he was sitting in the corner engrossed in a tablet people would also be judging.

Be grateful that your baby group even runs in school holidays as a lot don't!

I would agree that it's not appropriate. Can the mum not skip the group until the child is back at school?

Agreeing with Sunshine.
It’s difficult to find baby groups that run in school hols for exactly this reason. I used to think it was so unfair especially for new mums that there would suddenly be nothing for them to go to for 6-7 weeks, possibly quite a substantial percentage of a very young baby’s life, until things restarted in the autumn.
Can you think outside the box, take a baby sling so you still get the company and she’s safe. Pop her in her pushchair crib, etc. I know it’s a compromise but will probably make you feel happier. It would be a shame for you both to miss out if you’ve got a group that runs in the school hols.

How about the baby groups continue but older children are not allowed to attend? After all its a baby group.

When I had my dc, the baby groups were very strict about older children attending. Which was awkward for me when I had a mixture of different aged dc. Parents of the tiny babies complained when I brought my 6 month old with development delays to breastfeeding group though so we weren't allowed to go anymore. I agree that 7/8 year old's should be supervised properly at a baby group.

Did I read that right, mums complained that you brought a six month old to a breastfeeding group?

This is really unusual on several fronts.

1. that the classes permits an 8 yr old in a newborn class private/ paid for don’t ever really have this that I’ve seen… if you go it would be a class for the oldest (eg I’d go to a preschool class and my newborn would be there too) government classes tend to be grouped by age eg under 5: under 3s, walkers, non walkers.
2. a 7 or 8 year old thinks this is okay / their parent says nothing / the class organiser didn’t intervene
3. you didn’t directly address the mum and very directly tell her it’s unacceptable
4. there is a baby class that runs in summer hols!!!

if I lovvvvved the class I’d speak to the organiser and insist they resolved it.

But really I can’t imagine any class would be worth this hassle and nonsense to me so I just would stop going and get a coffee / go for a walk and listen to a podcast instead

Yes. It wasn't just me they complained about, there were 3 or 4 of us with babies around the same age. The other babies were starting to sit up/roll but mine wasn't even smiling yet. The HV asked some mums of tiny babies why they weren't coming to the breastfeeding group and they all said it was because they felt uncomfortable going to a group with older babies and experienced mums when they were still at the stage where they were getting breastfeeding established. The health visitors who ran the group then decided it should be strictly for babies under 4 months only.

When I was going to that group 3 years before with my 3rd baby there were a few of us with little ones, some mums with one year olds, a few in between and my ds2 who was 3. Apart from ds2, all the children there were currently being breastfed. I thought it was brilliant that there were older babies there as well but over time there weren't many new mum's joining and the feedback from the new mum's was that they felt uncomfortable going when there were older babies/toddlers there. So they changed it to non mobile babies only. The two breastfeeding peer supporters asked if they could still bring their 1 year olds and were both told they couldn't so they had to leave too. Which I thought was awful as they had been amazing and so helpful to me when I was struggling.

Isn't a breastfeeding group for new mums who need support to establish feeding, though, @elliejjtiny ? I don't think I'd personally have an issue with older babies, but what's the purpose of bringing a one year old?

It's not always possible though, as either the organisers (who may well be volunteers in groups like this, doesn't sound like it's an expensive Baby Sensory franchise type thing) have their own older children, so wouldn't be able to run, or enough of the other mums have older children that they wouldn't then be able to attend and the group wouldn't cover its costs. Or the venue is taken over by other, paying, holiday activity clubs

I've done the whole school holidays with a tiny baby thing, and it's tough - I know how hard it is to find places that aren't overrun with these GIANT RAMPAGING school age kids - but I understand why some of the groups close for summer. The situation OP describes is crappy parenting, but there's no easy solution to the problem as a whole.

The mums of one year olds were mostly there to support the new mums, although some of them had breastfeeding problems that they wanted help/support with. My first and fifth babies latched on like industrial vacuum cleaners from the beginning and I had very little problems but I struggled for a long time with my 2nd and 3rd and my 4th I exclusively pumped because he couldn't breastfeed. I thought it was nice to have mums breastfeeding older children. One of the breastfeeding peer supporters had a 1 year old who had reflux like my baby had and she was brilliant with helping me when I was struggling. I'm still in touch with her now, and some of the other mums from that group even though our children are all teenagers now.