How to prevent grandparents from smacking our child

[Newparent101]

Sorry for the long post, seeking your wise advice!

My partner's dad (aged 70) uses smacking as a way to "teach", which I'm totally against. My partner, however, thinks I'm being unreasonable and that smacking is an effective way to discipline. I just don't agree.

We have our first baby, who's 4 months old. My nieces are 7 and 3, and the grandfather smacks them to "teach" them when they've done something wrong. My sister in law told him she doesn't want him to smack her kids - the grandfather (her father-in-law) stopped speaking to her for a year. Now they have made up, but he smacks her girls again.

I want to find a way to prevent it from ever happening in the first place, and have already told my partner that if his dad (or he) smacks our child I'll immediately take our child away and she won't be seeing her grandfather again.

But of course I want to prevent this ever happening in the first place. I suspect my father-in-law won't listen to me if I state this boundary (given he ignored my sister-in-law for a year and now smacks her girls again). My partner refuses to "lay down the law" with his dad. What's more complicated is his parents don't speak English (they're german) and my german isn't very good.

Anyone have any advice on how to make sure this doesn't happen well ahead of time? Would really like to prevent being in situation where I need to keep our daughter away from him, and also want to ensure that first "smack" never happens. My partner says it's up to me to speak to his dad, but I know his dad won't listen to me. But also struggling to get my partner to acknowledge just how damaging smacking can be (he's also defensive, since of course he was smacked by his dad as a child). My partner and I have had numerous conversations about it already but I can't seem to get through to him.

Op get loads of information about damaging it is to hit children.
When you see them and your partner is not on the room tell him in German via Google translate on a more chatty way how differnt things must have been when he was a parent and now rules around food have changed with new science and rules around hitting.
Id say id anyone dared hit my child id hit them !!
And don't leave the child alone with hkm

I'm actually floored by your posts OP. I can't believe you're debating things like "do I wait until the first smack".

I wouldn't see this man EVER. I would never put my child in a situation where they might get hit - because let's face it, this man is going around hitting children. There is a very strong possibility he will hit yours.

And I wouldn't stand for my husband being a useless arsehole either.

This would never be up for debate for me and I'm shocked that it would be for anyone else.

If you don’t think he’ll listen to you, write him a letter in German using google translate. Make it clear this is not a discussion. He will not lay a hand on your child. If he does you will report him to the police, divorce his son and make sure he never sees either you or the baby again. Tell him you have written this down to start a paper trail, should it be needed in the future and so he can re read it as many times as it takes for it to sink in.
And make sure you mean every word. Protect your child from this nasty bully.

you write a letter to your FIL. explain that what happened to your SIL will not be happening in your case - there will not be any "making up" if you lay a finger on this grandchild. You will report him to the police and that will be the last he sees of his grandchild.

Yes you need to very clearly say at the start that one of your ground rules is nobody is to smack your children. Don't make it personal. If he doesn't agree he doesn't get to see them. He is not to ever have them unsupervised ( because you know there is a significant risk he will smack them whatever he says) and if he smacks them when you are there, or any other time, immediately leave. Tell him why later and that he has broken your trust. If your DH can't be trusted to stick to the rules that's a bigger problem.

"Hi FIL, if you ever so much as think about hitting my child you'd better call 2 ambulances first. One for you and one for your spineless son."

Maybe get someone considerably bigger than him to give him a smack to teach him and see how he likes it.

Never go to stay with them again. He knows there is a problem, he has been battled for a year and has WON. He will want to win with you too. I think he will engineer a situation and I bet you he will be alone with her. Your DH will be too wet and you too nice to say anything because "nothing has happened yet". If he's a hands on GF then of course there will things that you can go to, maybe he books you tickets for a show and it would be embarrassing for you to back out because nothing has happened yet.

If they come to stay with you, say you will call the police if anyone lays a hand on them.

He's not a nice guy - the one year NC and he's back to smacking tells you that.

At 70 GFather is completely outdated, & therefore has nothing to teach young children.
As a child I was smacked, the only thing it ‘taught’ me was that being smacked hurt. Why do people think the pain is connected to ‘learning’ ??
We once rescued a deaf dog, he’d been very badly beaten as a pup because the idiot owners hadn’t learnt that he was deaf… this poor dog would shake like a leaf if a person picked up anything that looked like a stick, he didn’t even attempt to run away 😢😢 just stood shaking, waiting to be beaten even if a pencil was picked up.

No it doesn’t work that way. You can’t stop someone having custody of their child because of another persons actions.

i wouldn’t take my kids to visit smacky grandpa sorry. You need to protect your children

My partner, however, thinks I'm being unreasonable and that smacking is an effective way to discipline.

How on earth is this going to work, OP? It’s not solely his father you need to worry about, is it? Your baby’s father thinks smacking is okay.

What have you done?!

Yanbu to not want your child smacked. Only way to prevent is to not let him around your child and if you do watch him like a hawk and stop him if he goes to slap your child. If he hits his other GC he will definitely hit your child too.

Tell him you will not just remove visits with your child but report him to social services, which will stir up a load of shit for him, much more than anything you can do on your own.

Tell him now, at the start.

Don't leave him alone with them ever (preventative).

If/when it happens, remove child and report.

I wouldn't let them be alone with the kids at all and I'd tell them why.

Glad to see the sane, non abusive consensus re hitting children is back. A few years ago there was a tide of people who thought it was a great idea, never did them any harm except for now advocating for child abuse, etc etc. I made a huge mistake though; in arguing against it (couldn't believe it was still a question), I pulled up a study that showed that hitters tend to have lower IQs. One hitter got absolutely enraged and said she was very clever and now she would hit her children more to prove how fantastic it was. I don't think she was a troll, but obviously I hope so.

Don't leave your children alone with these people.

Doesn’t Germany have really strict laws about hitting children? Why aren’t the police called when the nieces get hit?

Learn and deploy any of the following:

‘Wenn du mein Kind jemals wieder schlägst, breche ich dir die verdammte Nase, Opa’

or

’Kindesmisshandlung ist in diesem Land illegal’

or

’Lass die Finger von meinem Kind, sonst breche ich dir die verdammten Finger.’

Here’s the thing: the smacking is absolutely not acceptable, but neither is the mindset that lies behind it, because he isn’t listening to his daughter who didn’t like it and is smacking her kids again. This is controlling behaviour to the whole family. Myself? I’d say very very minimal contact and only when I was there myself (not your DH).

My DF was smacked as a child by his DF (despite his DF never being smacked and this was the 1920s) and he said all it did was if he was in trouble he did worse because he would end up smacked anyway. Or he would get his uncle to protect him. My DPs and DGPs never smacked me. It doesn't work and it's assault.

I would be very clear to him now. His pattern of behaviour is assaulting children so he will never be unsupervised with your child. He will miss out on an amazing relationship with his DGC.

I remember when I was trying to get pregnant we used to talk about all kinds of scenarios and I asked DH if he'd smack our child and his response was 'probably, I got smacked as a child'. When I asked if he's hut me if I did something wrong/he didn't agree with he was horrified and said no, if course not. I asked why it was ok to hit a child but not an adult. He pretty quickly changed his mind. He just had never thought about it like that.

I would put this to your DH and see his response.
And I'd also never leave my kids alone at grandparents. If there was ever one move to smack they would never see us again.

What an unpleasant man.

He values his principles on physical violence towards small children more than he values his relationship with his own children. That fact he started smacking his grandchildren as soon as the relationship with his daughter was repaired speaks volumes.

In your situation I would never leave my child alone with this man. I would be clear with my DH that this is an absolute non-negotiatiable and if FIL did ever smack my child he would never see them again.

I wouldn’t consider letting my child anywhere near them unless you had their agreement your child will never be hit. I certainly would not leave the child in their care.

You have another big problem if your partner thinks smacking is ok.

No contact and report to the police.

You never leave your child alone with him. Make sure that either you, or your DH (provided he is willing to physically step between them) are in the room.

Your poor nieces.

Even if someone was absolutely convinced that smacking their child to teach them was perfectly fine, why on earth would they think it was OK to smack someone else's when the parent has told them it is not acceptable.

It's illegal to smack children in Germany.