To be fed up with comments on the size of my baby at DH family party

[arabicaqueen]

My 9 week old was 9lb 15 when he was born and has been tracking the 98th centile since so he is a big baby. I think he’s perfect how he is, but I was at my husband’s family Christmas party yesterday and the constant comments about DS size really started to get to me. Especially because his cousin has a baby boy who is 9 months old and is tiny for his age, so the comparisons were endless with how big DS is compared to his cousin’s baby. If it were one or two comments then I get it but it felt like it was all night. Comments like “what must you be feeding him?!”, “you’ll be passing hand me downs to cousin’s baby, not the other way around!”, “how big was he when he was born again 😱”, “just look at them next to each other”. I was trying to move the conversation on and away from babies and their sizes but they kept going back to it and I ended up just hmming to all the comments and looking forward to going home. DH thinks I was over sensitive and that’s just his family (who are big, loud and opinionated), and baby is big so they’re not wrong. But it was really getting to me how they kept on gong on about it, like there was something wrong with my baby.

Are we body shaming babies now?

Given some women have skinny babies and are quite happy with them...

Why do some people always feel the best way of supporting what someone is is by criticising what they are not?

Its not body shaming...babies who are chubby or chunky are viewed by many as healthy. Calling a baby big is totally different from calling an adult big

No body wants a skinny baby - your chunky chubster is ideal

How about people just get used to telling people what they are/have is OK without criticising the alternative?

DD was scrawny at 5lb. I worried about how tiny she was. DS was a chunk. I was much happier for people to tell me how chunky he was than how tiny she was. A small baby is always a worry.

I’m sure the poster meant “no one wants their baby to be skinny” (due to the general but not always applicable health concerns around underweight babies) rather than no one wants a skinny baby! It was also obviously just a flippant comment to cheer OP with the giant baby up. Everyone needs to calm down on this thread and grow a thicker skin and stop looking for reasons to be offended.

In a nice way you probably going to have to get used to it. Iv 2 that were always tall for their age, it was constant all the way through toddler years, all the way up to high school.
Only downside is people expect them to behave differently as they think they are older

Nah, it was all about looks, not health.

Otherwise she wouldn't be praising the 'chubby chubster' due to the possible health concerns there.

It's a bit like when someone wants to compliment someone who's overweight but feel the need to put 'skinny' women down at the same time.

"Men love curves hun, not a bag of bones", you know that sort of thing.

I’ve had a skinny baby who was just petite and was always on the lower end of the centile chart, I have also had a chunky baby too who had rolls of fat and the chubbiest face ever. Honestly people make comments on both regardless.

as it turns out my chunky baby is now 5ft 7 and a size 6 in clothes! 😂

Yes my 4lb baby was very wanted, but I would have wished her fat, wouldn't you? Chubby babies are the preference for the majority. It has always been this way.

No. Tbh, I was just glad she was alive because she very nearly wasn't.

I didn't care whether she was chubby or not 🤷🏻‍♀️

The poster was saying the OPs female family members were body shaming her baby for being fat and commented on people not wanting skinny babies. It was about body image.

No I didn’t wish my 3lb baby ‘fat’ I absolutely wanted her to be healthy but I never thought oh I wish she was fatter like one of those chunky babies. Can’t say it ever entered my mind. Clearly it does for some but not all.

No.

Your problem is your own.

All I wished for was healthy, which my 'skinny' baby was.

My first born was 9lb 7, he seemed enormous to me! He still is. He's 6ft 4 and 19st

And people like you need to stop being deliberately goady and trying to hurt people's feelings for kicks, then doing the "oh everyone's so sensitive" bit. "Giant baby"? Just fuck off. That's someone's child.

My god, you lot can literally row about everything, its so funny!!

My daughter was 9lb 15 too.
now at 4 she’s in age 6 clothing and very athletically built. She’s perfect.
she was also pretty perfect when she went through her Hulk phase. People love big babies, I very much doubt they’re being mean about it.
we constantly have people commenting on how big she is, as long as it’s phrased in a positive way we don’t mind. It’s factual.

My DS1 was tiny when he was born and I got all the other comments so it works both ways. It gets a little wearing but I used to smile and say “the most expensive perfume comes in small bottles” and leave it at that. I don’t think people mean any harm. I love chonky babies and neither of mine were 😂

Bless you 💙 constant comments about your baby can be tiresome, that mixed in with lack of sleep and hormones all over the place can be grating, perhaps you were being over sensitive but like I say with a big change like a new baby etc of course your feeling a little sensitive. I would take it as a compliment that you carried and birthed such a strong baby, your obviously doing a fantastic job for your lo to maintain weight so well :) Healthy strong mum and healthy strong baby! Well done you xxx

Oh I went through all these emotions and more. My 9lb first born (22 years ago!) was on the 98th percentile for everything, and was also born with 3ins of hair all over his head. Visitors and nurses kept popping in to see “the lovely big baby with all that hair”. I ended up dissolving into tears and shouting that they’d just “come to make fun of the comedy baby” and they looked genuinely shocked. DC wasn’t very well and ended up in NICU for one night and then I cried because I felt like a fraud as my gargantuan child filled up the incubator! I smiled as a PP said she cried “at Iggle Piggles boat going out to sea”. I did too, and don’t get me started on RSPCA adverts… It was an emotional time, and now my 9lb chunk is a strapping 6’2” man. And he still has amazing hair! You want to protect your brand new DC from the world and any comment is going to get your senses reeling. I now know nobody meant any harm (quite the opposite!) but for a vulnerable new mum it’s quite unbearable.

This is just what people do with babies. Sad to say most babies are fairly unremarkable and a bit boring so people latch on to any features that they can make small talk about. It's boring and annoying but we all have to endure it about something to do with our babies.

Also, my 6ft5 16yr old has to constantly endure comments about his height. It's very tedious but it will never stop - he's very charming at diffusing it and moving on.

Ds was always on the 99th centile for both weight and height certainly until he was about 12. He also had really big feet. He's now 21 and is a perfectly proportioned average height young man, 6 foot tall and only takes a 8 shoe!

Ds was very tall for his age when he was young and someone at the post office once, started commenting why he was still in nappies and in a pushchair! He had just turned 2!

I wonder if your relatives hit a raw nerve because you are not as comfortable with his size as you are making out. Perhaps you secretly fear that you are overfeeding him and creating a 'fat' child? Have you had any real proper high quality support with feeding and what is appropriate?