to be pissed off that my MIL is annoyed that my 15mo can talk?

[Spottedmirror]

My 15mo is becoming a chatty little thing. Lots of new words by the day and happily starting to sing the odd word on a song “quick, quick, quick” in Polly had a Dolly or “inkle!” in Twinkle Twinkle, that kind of thing.

LO is our PFB after over a decade of trying so we are VERY proud, but I’m very careful not to be too overbearing (I know how wearing that is on other people) whilst still remaining encouraging. Lots of “yes that’s right shoes” when she points at shoes and whatever else - surely just normal parenting?
(and if anything I think I consciously keep my voice down when parenting outside our home because I’m always so aware that I might hurt someone who wants a baby but isn’t where we are now).

SIL is coming back from Australia for an extended stay. We have yet to meet her little one who is 3 (due to being mid-miscarriage when they were last here). Her 3yo is a very active and happy child by all accounts but as yet doesn’t speak.

MIL is very annoyed that my LO can speak and is picking things up rapidly. Each time we FaceTime she is outright annoyed that my child is chatting away with us.
She sighs, rolls her eyes and says things like “she doesn’t stop talking!” and makes snide remarks like “maybe Mummy talks too much!” or “mummy should turn your pram round so you two aren’t always chatting!”

On Boxing Day via FaceTime she hinted that when we visit her house and DIL is there, we should try not to encourage our child to talk.
She was insinuating that our 15 month old was showing off.

I understand that BIL and DIL are possibly concerned about potential issues but that shouldn’t be taken out on our small child.

I was a bit shocked last night by the hints on the phone call and I was working last night so I’ve stewed over it a bit.
Surely I’m not unreasonable feel pissed off by this?

EDIT: should add if I wasn’t out the door to work as the call was happening, I’d have probably told her to repeat what she had said.

I’d be disgusted with her eye rolling at a little child. It’s beautiful with children start speaking, what the hell is wrong with her? I hope your DH can get through to her.

I kept a list of all my (miracle after losses, so I GET it!!) baby's first words. Still gutted that the first was dada and not mama and he's at school now. I've just had the list printed onto a photo tile and stuck on my study wall, so obvs you're not unreasonable.

I'd assume MIL is just worried about the non-verbal gc and is demonstrating this in weird ways. Your Dh will have to say something, or tell him you will and it'll be much less diplomatic.

DIL here @Spottedmirror the children are 31 and 29 now! The sun shines from SIL's backside too and many a time I've had to bite my tongue when MIL has gone on about all her dc going to uni and being talented when they were at school, blah, blah, and it's amazing how I am so practical.

When DN was three he had few words, his mother didn't actually pay him that much attention - too busy lying down and reading a book. In MIL's eyes she remains a talented artist and perfect mother - hasn't had a proper job, but sells the odd card for a quid. She's 61 now.

The children are now all grown. SIL's do not stick at a job and none went to uni. They had no example of work ethic. MIL is remarkably silent about them.

Ours are doing well, both went to Cambridge, both went to school reading, I've got 44 years of NI contributions. I keep it zipped and MIL is far more silent nowadays.

Don't pander to it op. Yours is how she is; theirs is how they are. MIL should stop comparing - it does no party any good.

“15MO won’t understand she’s not allowed to talk, so we’ve decided it’s best not to visit this year as we wouldn’t want to further offend you”!

I’m actually the mum of a child with learning difficulties, she has a cousin who is just a few months younger and my heart used to inwardly break whenever they were together. Same cousin absolutely adores mine now. Very hard as a parent though.

Weirdly, my gran played an odd game with her children (my mother and her brother). When with my uncle's family, she enthused about us kids. When with us, she enthused about my uncle's kids. I'm not sure what she was playing it, perhaps some heavy-handed notion of fairness (????), but it resulted in years of resentment among the parents until they realised what she was doing!

I actually agree with this. Trying to prevent a child speaking is really terrible behaviour, and doesn't bode well for her attitude towards your child.

It can be really heartbreaking to witness children younger than your child talking when you have a non verbal child. Maybe show alittle compassion. It doesn’t need to take anything away from your child, Infact it’s probably not about your child at all.

You can see that very very very deep down, this comes from a good place, in that she loves and is concerned for her 3 yo grandchild and her child and wants them to be ok. But the way it’s coming out is really bad. Hope you can spend time with your dd’s little cousin without this nonsense coming out, or at least finding a way to squash it hard if it does.

You don't try and stop another child from speaking and developing their language skills though. That is where it crosses the line into batshit territory.

Is there a back story here?

It seems odd to me that when his sister was last here from Australia your OH didn't make an effort to meet their child for the first time when there was clearly going to be limited opportunities to do so. I understand you were mid miscarriage (and ive had many) but still ...... Surely they were here for more than a few days? He couldn't spare half an hour to go and meet his new family member?

My guess is there is a lot more to this.

My eldest was a late talker and then selective mutism. Her sister (18mo younger) was an early talker. It was strange having the youngest talk for the elder one but the younger one also helped with the elder one. It did will make it obvious our elder DD did have additional needs.

Hopefully your DN is getting language support. However its possible to be proud of one child while supporting another.

I would make her explain her ridiculous comments so she hopefully sees how completely batshit she sounds.
"Sorry I missed that can you say it again?"
"Why do you think it should do that?"
Hopefully she will get the hint.

If she carries on I wouldn't be face timing or calling her anymore just step back and let your husband deal with her

Bloody hell OP, you need to understand how seriously messed up that is.
Why are you doing so much for a woman who is snide about you and your child?
Eye rolling is seriously nasty.

You need to realise how toxic and nasty that is.
I wouldn't be lifting a finger for her.

Unbelievable that you have allowed this to go on to such an extent that she wants you to shut down your child.
You waited so long to have her, but are allowing such snide remarks to go unchallenged?
Seriously weird.

Loyalty to your child from birth is so important.
Your child is depending on her parents to protect her from toxicity like this.
Have you really no idea how damaging it is for a child to hear snide remarks as they get older?

I couldn't look at person who could be so nasty about a small child.

No child needs a grandmother around her who feels so comfortable being so nasty to, and about her.

Let your husband meet his nephew, but you really need to step up and protect your child.

Absolutely no more facetime.

You now have 24 ? hours to teach your little one some Shakespeare! You sound lovely so please don’t let mil control everything.

I have so much compassion for them, I hope I haven’t displayed otherwise in real life or indeed in these posts.

It must be hard, confusing and a number of emotions I can’t imagine, to have that worry hanging over yo.

I have never even mentioned she’s speaking to anyone, she’s just in the background cracking on with her voice. There is nothing I can do to make it easier for them, other than not be there, which when you think about it is really very sad for my daughter.

My daughter has a medical condition herself which makes life hard for us and most importantly her. In that element of life, their child is fine and for that I’m just grateful.

Good grief. That is a really toxic attitude from your MIL; she must be projecting onto her DD and from there onto her DGS, and so is taking his slow progress in speech very personally.

You are doing nothing wrong; of course talk as much as you can to your lovely DD. This is the only way children learn language and to suddenly change your manner will be distressing for your DD, even if only for a short while. A young child will experience a stress response if they seek interaction from a caregiver that's not returned, and this will be stronger if it's out character.

Montessori identified 'sensitive periods' for child development - language and movement start at birth, and a sensitivity for order starts about 6 months. If you suddenly change what your child is used to, this will unsettle them and potentially affect the bond you have.

Your MIL should open up about her worries and WNBU to ask that you spare her DD's feelings as much as possible, but she should be celebrating your DD, not asking that you curtail her development. What good will it do practically, anyway?

Suggest your MIL takes a vow of silence in solidarity with the non-speaking three year old?

On Boxing Day via FaceTime she hinted that when we visit her house and DIL is there, we should try not to encourage our child to talk.
She was insinuating that our 15 month old was showing off.

It doesn't sound like she was insinuating that to me.

It sounds like she's asking you not to go on about it too much incase it looks like you're rubbing it in to your SIL and BIL.

You can tell her if it ever comes to it that not speaking at 3 years can actually be a sign of high intellect. Apparently the really clever ones wait to speak until they understand properly and can create full, correct sentences. This is what I was told anyway by a bunch of doctors so she should try not to worry.
On the other hand she’s being bloody rude.

She sounds bonkers!

My 3 children all had delayed speech, seriously delayed, of both sexes.
They have completely caught up.
All 3 were excellent high achieving academic students.
Its surprisingly common.
It definitely was a worry for my first but by 5 he had caught up and I was far more prepared with the other two.

This is absolutely toxic on the part of your MIL and you absolutely shouldn't have to reign in your pride toward your children in front of their own grandparents, that's completely not normal. It should be the grandparents who fawn the most.

Sorry you're dealing with this, does your MIL prefer your SIL over your DH? I find that's usually the root of this sort of thing. Sometimes the golden child produces the golden grandchildren.

You should probably follow SIL's lead and put some distance between you and MIL, at least emotionally. If you get in the right headspace, you can view her behaviour as something rather silly, and a little pitiful, something which you observe rather than react to - like watching someone else's toddler having a tantrum because they're overtired.

Well no, as the person who was in the conversation she was in fact insinuating that she was showing off. I didn’t feel I needed to give exact examples but:

”That’s a rather big song for a little girl!” (for shouting “more” to a Mary Poppins song)
other things along those lines did exactly that.

Yes this. Maybe your interpreting that shes trying to stop your child speaking but when it comes down to it I don’t think that is what she’s “insinuating” at all.