Please or to access all these features

Add post

Watch this thread

Save thread

Start a new thread

Flip thread

Hide thread

My feed

Active Unanswered threads

Getting started FAQ's

Unanswered threads Acronyms Talk guidelines

Hide shortcut buttons

Talk

Infant feeding

Get advice and support with infant feeding from other users here.

Flip

1 2 3

Original poster

Bit upset that SIL let my DS taste formula

66 replies

StefkaSnowAngel · 26/12/2008 21:22

I am posting this here in the hope that someone out there might understand why I feel upset by this.

I had a hellish start to breast feeding, it was very painful for the first three months and I came very close to giving up. I made it through and breast feeding is very important to me.

My SIL mix feeds which is totally her choice, I don't have an issue with it, it is just not for me. We have been staying with them and this morning she told me that my DS had been drinking her DD's formula while I was out of the room.

I feel really upset by this. Logically I know it doesn't matter that much - apparently he threw it away after tasting it anyway. I just don't feel good about it. I didn't want him to have formula ever. It also feels a little disrespectful. I would never let her DD have something that she had never had before without checking it was ok with her mother first.

OP posts:

pgwithnumber3 · 26/12/2008 21:50

She sounds a crank. She obviously doesn't see how important it is to you. I am a bit more at her telling you to hit your 14 month old on the hand to be honest. I have a 15 month old and if someone said this to me, I would whack them hard on the hand and ask them how they liked it. Bitch.

Original poster

StefkaSnowAngel · 26/12/2008 21:51

Thank you all btw. I tried to tell my DH but he didn't get it and I really needed someone to hear me.

OP posts:

WewishyouaBUMPERLICIOUS · 26/12/2008 21:52

That's ok stefka, if you can't be emotional and irrational on here, where can you?

Of course it matters to you, the same way that when DS goes to school what book he's on will matter, and by the time he is 18 it will be about whether or not he is going to uni and when he is 30 it will be the woman that he is marrying who you don't think is good enough! That will put everything into perspective!

She sounds like a loon though!

franch · 26/12/2008 21:56

Don't blame yourself Stefka. You sound like a fab mum. No it is not the end of the world but there is a principle at stake here and you may have to have a nice-but-firm word with your SIL at some point.

Re the shouting, I am still fuming (several weeks on) about our next door neighbour who put DD2 (only just 3) on the 'naughty step' for knocking down neighbour's DD's tower of bricks. We don't do the naughty step in our house and I really would've thought a reprimand would've been enough. DD2 was distraught and still talks about it. Not the end of the world either, but if it happens again I may have to take my own advice above ...

pgwithnumber3 · 26/12/2008 21:59

franch are you joking?! Naughty step for knocking bricks over? FFS!

WewishyouaBUMPERLICIOUS · 26/12/2008 22:01

Surely you don't put someone else's child on the naughty step?!

franch · 26/12/2008 22:03

I wish I was, pg!!

franch · 26/12/2008 22:04

Sorry to hijack, Stefka but glad I'm not alone in thinking that was out of order!

pooka · 26/12/2008 22:04

Franch, that would have seriously annoyed me too. If someone else used naughty step with ds (for something like knocking over some bricks) then it would be completely out of context for him, he would be confused and upset and it would not make any point apart from to make him him cry.

We were in same ante-natal group here weren't we? (didn't you pip me to the finish line and have exciting bathroom-birth?)

franch · 26/12/2008 22:06

Ooh hello pooka - well remembered!! Yep, the very DD2 I'm talking about was the one that popped out on the bathroom floor

pooka · 26/12/2008 22:07

I do know however that my childminder has maybe once had to resort to time out with ds and her son who is the same age. They were hitting each other. But then that was in the context of her rules for kind behaviour and he (and her ds) know where they stand with her. And she is in loco parentis and was faced with whirling ball of boys scrapping.

pooka · 26/12/2008 22:10

I know probably shouldn't have been but boy was I envious at the time.

DS is immensely stubborn (with me in particular) but that hides a genuine sensitivity when it comes to other people chastising him. You were right to be shocked at your neighbour.

franch · 26/12/2008 22:13

Yeah, to me that sounds acceptable pooka. You know, your point about your DS being confused by that kind of discipline would be a good tack to take if I ever do have to have that conversation with my neighbour. I don't want to judge her parenting methods any more than I want her to judge mine, so what you said would be a tactful way to approach it I think. (Rather than 'You have no right to punish my daughter for knocking over your precious child's sodding bricks!' which is what I feel like saying...)

Original poster

StefkaSnowAngel · 26/12/2008 22:14

Bloody hell french I would be furious at that!! Gosh - looks like I have a lot more of this sort of thing to come.

OP posts:

franch · 26/12/2008 22:14

Sorry x-posted - 'that sounds acceptable' was a response to your post about the childminder

franch · 26/12/2008 22:18

Yeah there's a lot of it about Stefka - I don't think you're being oversensitive at all, just a good protective mum

I have brilliant memories of DD2's birth pooka - no pain relief of course (no time), but the most exhilarating experience of my life, bar none

pooka · 26/12/2008 22:21

So it wasn't acceptable of me to feel envious at your dd arriving before my ds?

Think that emphasising confusion caused (and sadness too) by sudden introduction of naughty step would be a good way to approach your neighbour.

And I'm also not judging naughty step. Time out did work with dd. DS is a different character though (completely) and what worked with dd can have absolutely the opposite effect with him (and vice versa). Time out with dd seemed a gentle and non-combative way of dealing with potentially explosive issues. With ds it is completely counter-productive and ends up escalating tension.

[I'm making our house sound like a warzone - it isn't, honestly)

pooka · 26/12/2008 22:22

Oh same here - while it ended up being hospital birth because of no midwives, my goodness it was fantastic! And home within a couple of hours, so all good.

franch · 26/12/2008 22:29

No, totally unacceptable pooka

Your house definitely doesn't sound like a warzone - I suspect ours frequently is much more so - still, I try!

Glad you had a lovely birth too in the end Having had a horrible traumatic time with DD1, DD2's birth felt like a huge triumph and laid a lot of anger and sadness to rest.

Sorry again Stefka, enough about me!!

foxytocin · 27/12/2008 05:49

Can it be that you know she doesn't like/respect some of the choices you have made? she sounds like she expects you to do s she does and if you don't, she doesn't like it.

franch · 27/12/2008 09:10

Yes some people can feel threatened/insecure about their own choices if you don't follow suit - or at least by not doing things her way you're saying her way is wrong?

Original poster

StefkaSnowAngel · 27/12/2008 10:21

I think it is exactly that foxy. The day before she had been ver quick to stop DS from drinking her DD's juice, so I don't understand why this would have been any different.

OP posts:

Wisknit · 27/12/2008 12:41

foxy and franch have said what I was thinking. Some people seem to feel that anyone not doing things their way are critising them somehow. I don't see why she felt the need to tell you.
I would have been furious btw. I still would (ds2 is 18 months) as all my family know my views on formula and my children having it (or not).

pantomimEDAMe · 27/12/2008 12:47

I wouldn't feel particularly wound up by a 14 month old grabbing someone else's cup and having a taste but it sounds as if there's a whole lot of other stuff going on here.

CrochetDivaMadeTheElvesNewHats · 27/12/2008 19:56

tbh Stefka, knowing the history of your utterly bizarre SiL, I'd be fuming!

I think I'd be getting to the point by now where she's told to either shut up, or you'll not be seeing her!

She's just a very sad competitive mother who is living vicarously through her child ...

Flip

1 2 3