Do you let you children hold infants?

[bloomsnlooms]

I sit with my daughter when she wants to hold her brother who is 10mo. It’s never unsupervised and my husband told me he doesn’t want her to hold him. She is 8 I didn’t think her holding him for a while would be an issue.

Of course I did when they were little, dd1 was only 2 and I have photos of her holding her dsis

Is he her df?

Do they have the same Dad? Very odd to not want older siblings to hold the younger one.

What does he think the problem is?? I have a lovely photo of my then 6yo holding her 2 day old brother and reading him a story. I think she held him more than I did in the first few months

Of course it’s fine - she is 8 and it’s supervised. And the baby is 10 months so has head control etc.
What is he on about?

Yes, my 2 year old held my newborn, it’s a lovely way for them to bond. And at 8 I was carrying my baby brother around totally unsupervised, changing his nappy, getting him dress etc! Your partner is being very weird imo

I think an 8 year old with a 10 month old is fine.

I thought you were going to say a 2/3 year old with a newborn.

No. I came into the relationship with a child.

Of course she should hold her brother if she wishes. I had two under two and have tonnes of photos of my then one year old holding my newborn! (Obviously with close supervision)

Of course an 8yo can hold a 10mo.

Eeek I hope this isn’t a thing, my daughter has picked up friends’ babies to put them in swings or help them move if they’re not crawling by ten months (with a lot of supervision). Not with tiny tiny ones mind you.

I’m not sure. I tried to reassure him he’s safe. She loves him and always want to him. I don’t see the problem

I think that’s really, really mean of your husband. I just knew he wouldn’t be the biological father.

Not allowing your dd to hold her sibling is likely to cause a real issue in their bonding and her acceptance of a new baby in the house.

She’s holding her while supervised, not taking the baby out clubbing.

You really need to get to the bottom of it and nip it in the bud. Very worrying behavior imo.

My older kids were 11 and 8 when their little brother was born. My 11 year old would hold him whilst I made tea had a shower and my 8 year old did require supervision but also held him a lot.

What have you been doing for the past ten months? Not letting her hold him?

Or has something happened that has caused his concern?

Makes sense now

If you are supervising very closely, as I am sure you are, then it's fine.

I have clear memories of holding my younger sister soon after her birth back in the sixties. I would have been three. One parent was always right there on the armchair or sofa with me, arms around both of us so that it was secure. My mother still has photographs of it.

I did similar with my own three DDs. The golden and unbreakable rule was that they were never allowed to just go and pick the baby up. I always did that and they could only hold them under very close supervision by me. Otherwise, they were to leave baby totally alone.

Your DH is probably being a little bit overprotective. He might relax as things progress and he gets that close supervision is key, even if your older child isn't his.

Ah, has he got PFB syndrome?

And yes, ours have a 6.5 year age gap, our son held his littler sister a lot, sometimes he would sit nicely and hold her for a minute or two when I needed the loo once she was about 6 months old. By ten months old he would pick her up quite a lot, they’re supervised at that age apart from the odd minute or two, so unless you think they’ll be swung around by an arm its fine.

Your husband is being extremely unreasonable. What's his problem?

I worked NICU for a couple decades and we had kids younger than that holding their medically fragile siblings.

@Topseyt123The baby is 10 months old! OP, I think since DD is your daughter you need to stick up for her. She needs to feel part of the baby's life, not an outsider whilst you and DH and the baby are a unit. I think it's lovely she loves him so much. Unless she has deliberately hurt the baby, I don't even think it would require supervision. He's not a newborn. And she's 8.

Of course I let them, its part of the sibling bonding process!

Very few protectors more fierce than an older sibling! Your DH needs to respect that and let it flourish.

She’s been holding him since we’ve came home. I’ve always watched closely especially when he was very small. This is something we’ve always done. Yesterday while talking he asked why do I keep letting her hold him.

I told him I couldn’t take that from her and I won’t. Which caused him to stop speaking to me and I’m ok with that. She’s not hurting him and she enjoys holding him. I honestly didn’t see a problem with it.