Pissed off over photos

[ChubbyBoobs456]

DD's first birthday today. No one could be bothered to take a good photo of me. I have a handful of photos, either me talking, or in just a terrible pose, DD crying, DD not looking at camera. Not for lack of effort from my side, I tried but no one had the patience to take a good one. Fuck sake. I made an effort with everyone. Everyone has at least one excellent shot. Not me. It's ruined my night. I'm not normally this self centred but I literally gave birth to this human a year ago. I don't know why it's made me feel so ugly and unappreciated.

I am now refusing to send out photos. And I have deleted the best ones (not best ones of DD, but some excellent ones of other people). If they want photos, they can take it themselves.

Surely you just go ‘hey DH take a photo of me and baby’ and hand him the camera. Then you say ‘let me see!’ and then go ‘oh thank you! I look great’ or ‘FFS I’ve got my mouth open, take another!’ And repeat until you are happy with it. Why be such a wet wipe in your own life? If pics are important to you (they are to me!!) then insist someone takes a nice one. Speak up!!

Alternatively, I got a selfie stick that turns into a fairly sturdy tripod which is great for group shots and means no one is holding the camera. It was £20 on Amazon. Highly recommend!!!

I am now refusing to send out photos. And I have deleted the best ones (not best ones of DD, but some excellent ones of other people). If they want photos, they can take it themselves.

Good! How did they react to that?

I always get asked by tourists etc to take pictures, and I always try to take decent ones. It's sad that your family wouldn't put in some effort for you.

I don’t even need to read the replies to be able to tell that perfect mumsnetters who don’t have a vain bone in their body will be telling you how unreasonable you are.

Sorry you didn’t get a good photo, I get it, maybe you’d have framed a nice one, but it in a memory book etc and there’s not one of you to use. It’s easy when you’re the one who makes the effort with photos to find that there’s never any of you. Next time there’s a big event task someone who you think will get it with the job of taking some good photos of you and DC.

Whenever my DW gets asked to take a photo of someone in the street she turns in to a professional photography, gets different angles takes multiple photos and people love it lol. Everyone wants a nice photo and the best way to achieve that is through options

Or he could have some patience and take a range of pictures? Why does it fall onto OP?

Funny how everyone is asking OP for pictures and not each other.

You are being ridiculous, lovely. It's just a picture. Take a few minutes to navigate this forum and you'll see what a real problem is. You sound utterly petty and unhinged.

Is there something else going on @ChubbyBoobs456?

Because it’s important to her. If something is important to you, speak up. Everyone else seems to be doing that no problem - why isn’t the OP?

my husband isn’t David Bailey and probably wouldn’t sit there adoringly snapping pics of me if I didn’t ask him to. But I have some pretty amazing pictures because I’ve gone ‘hey - take a photo of me! No, I look shit, do it again’.

it is really really not that difficult.

Maybe others took photos on their phones and will send them on when they have time.

Sounds like you put a lot of effort into the day but so did your guests by turning up. I think it’s unfair to criticise when you were unclear of your expectations. If I went to a party I would bring a gift,chat, drink wine and sing happy birthday.

Enjoy your baby, one is a great age x

I was overweight, sleep deprived and stressed at my one year olds birthday party but the photos of me there (“bad” ones) are some of my most cherished pictures now when I look back on them 6 years later because they remind me of the hard times and what I got through to get to this point. They document the chaos. I have no desire for perfect posed - I want to remember the reality. Don’t delete them.

I would feel the same as the OP as husband is useless at taking decent photos of me and babe, whereas I take a tonne of good ones, but your comment hit! You’re right, makes me think

You've misunderstood. Yes, she should ask him to take a picture. But when he's taking the pictures, he has eyes, he can see when dd is crying. Why take a picture of a crying dd and hand over the camera as if he's done his bit?

I really haven’t misunderstood anything. The OP can clearly see the kid is crying too and didn’t speak up to say ‘take another - that will be bad’. The OP also complained that on OTHER photos of her she was talking. People ARE takng photos of the OP, she just doesn’t like them.

my advice is genuinely marry someone you can hassle into being a ‘boyfriend of Instagram’ if that is your thing (it’s kind of mine tbh), use your words and tell people if it’s important to you to have nice photos. I even wrote a script for the OP to use. Otherwise, get a divorce if you truly can’t talk to your husband about something so small and ridiculous. And a selfie stick tripod. They really are great.

If the child is crying surely all consideration of any photos from anyone is stopped anyway? If you get a chance later try again but if not never mind!

Again, you're putting all the onus on OP. No one has to tell her to take a decent picture because she has the sense to do it herself. Yet when it comes to OP, you're saying she has to fight for a decent picture. Why is it the onus on OP to realise her dd is crying, does the picture taker not have eyes?

Why should she divorce her husband when she can just stop taking pictures of people until they start returning the favour and taking decent pictures of her? Overreaction much.

That's true.

And all that is supposed to happen during a party? We have to check everyone’s phone and let everyone check ours to ensure we have a ‘good’ photo? That sounds like a shit party. If someone made me stand there with my own phone telling me to delete photos I took I’d tell them to piss off.

Regardless, OP it sounds like you had lots of photos taken of you. You just didn’t like any of them. You will still look like you in them - everyone will know it’s you and everyone will think you look absolutely fine.

Others have said that "nice" is in the eye of the beholder.

If someone made me stand there with my own phone telling me to delete photos I took I’d tell them to piss off.

Neither OP nor anyone has suggested this so not why you're making it up.

It wasn’t the only option I gave. I also said speak up! If you can’t speak up, what’s the point in being married?

The onus is on the OP because it’s important to her. My husband doesn’t really care if he’s in pictures or not. My mother actively swerves photos and would take a terrible photo of someone else because the elements that make a good photo just wouldn’t really enter her head. Perhaps it’s the same for the OPs husband?

I totally get it! There are barely any photos of me and the kids when they are young because I was always the one taking them and the same as you, if I asked someone else (side eye DH) they'd be terrible or blurry etc. I remember crying about it once because it was upsetting and frustrating and did bother me.

Now I have one of those little remote things on my phone so I can set it up and take photos myself by pressing the button so I just take tons of them and then keep the nice ones 🤣

I don’t know - doesn’t seem like someone who gets over things…

And yet they're all asking OP for pictures she took, so it's only important to them when it comes to their own pictures, which is pretty selfish.

If pictures aren't important then no one should care if OP deletes them.

Are they really asking OP for pictures? Where did you glean that from? My understanding is that she decided not to send them out to 'teach them all a lesson' (one that will most likely be lost on them because they didn't care in the first place).

You sound hard work. I would be absolutely fucking baffled if one of my family members deleted a load of photos from their own child’s first birthday because they didn't get a good one of themselves. Luckily in my family, if something is important to us, we speak up! If I don’t like the photo of myself I say ‘take another, that’s shit’. And as a result there are some cracking pics of me out there and there’s no passive aggressive deletion idiocy either. You should try it sometime. It’s a much more cheerful way to live.

Gently, because I have been there and I get it, I think your feelings about this are quite raw and they will mellow in time.

At my DD’s 1st birthday, I got my DH to take pictures of my DD with me. I knew by then I had to ask/make sure. I made him take pictures and show me till I was happy with them (I don’t care what anyone thinks about how important I should or not should not see this).

I took loads of pictures through the day. About a week later, my phone crashed. All my pictures for the previous 6 months had gone. I asked all my family if they had taken any pictures on DD’s birthday - nobody had taken a single picture. I was quite hurt. My DD is the 6th GC for my parents, but the 1st for PIL. Not a single picture taken by aunties or uncles or GP.

Anyway, I have one picture that I happened to send to a friend on the day. So they sent it back. That’s all I have of her whole 1st birthday. I was devastated. Although 5 years later, I have “gotten over it”, it took more than one day, and I still wish I had backed up my phone that week!

All that said, if you have a way of recovering your deleted pics of your family, I would get them back. If someone dies, you’ll wish you had the nicest pictures you’d taken and not been so resentful about it (I’m assuming you still love these people, even if you’re angry at them right now). It’s not the end of the world - there will be more opportunities. To be honest, I hardly look at the kids baby pictures now - I have better memories and pictures of days out or things they did that were funny and show their personality as they’ve grown up. Time heals all wounds ❤️