My husband drew on my baby!

[FEJ2016]

I need some perspective from someone who isn’t me- I’ve just gone to change my 5 week old daughter and my husband has drawn in black sharpie marker pen on her stomach (he has drawn a big sun around her belly button). I am incredibly upset with him. I can’t believe he would draw on our child honestly I’m dumbfounded. It looks hideous. And how am I now supposed to take her to clinic to get weighed? It looks terrible. When I have challenged him (woke him up- it’s 3am and I was changing her before her feed) he just said ‘why is there a pen there’ and ‘I was just a bit drunk don’t overreact’.
I didn’t know he was drunk or I wouldn’t have let him anywhere near our child for a start, but seriously, am I overreacting? I think it’s the most irresponsible thing I’ve ever seen I actually feel sick.

I probably would have gone mental about something like this when mine were babies.
Now, I do think it's a bit funny...

Actually, I would be taking her to the health visitor and showing her. Telling her exactly what he did. He may well be an abuser so best to start collecting evidence now.

I’ve been away from MN for a bit and this is the first thread I’ve read upon my return.

I’ve not been disappointed. The utter fucking hysteria is incredible.

Yes, it’s a fucking strange thing to do, but the ridiculousness about abuse, carcinogens and having a few drinks when you have a baby in the house are equally fucking strange.

No wonder Mumsnet is laughed at

Some threads induce widespread MN hysteria...this is one of them

Calm down everyone

"No wonder Mumsnet is laughed at"
I agree.

"You and others wanked on about the possible death threat from a fucking pen, which doctors use to draw on people in hospital. "

Except I didn't wank on about any such thing. And yeah, your "point" that doctors use sharpies for operations is exactly the same as a drunk parent using sharpies for his own amusement. Except it's not.

Doctors don't only use pens for operations to be fair. They might do it to see if a rash is spreading etc.
Just saying.

It is quite insanely over the top I agree. Recap:

New dad has a couple of drinks at family party and draws cute symbol on baby's tummy with pen used routinely in hospitals.

Abuser! Disgusting! Collect evidence!

Honestly

As someone who grew up in an abusive household I would respectfully suggest that those who think this is abuse have no idea what abuse actually is.

Being worried about 'people laughing' really depends on whether you respect the people doing the laughing

I'm not worried about people laughing. It's just that threads like this one make it understandable as to why people would. I'm laughing at it.

ergo...

Ergo what?

You are doing the laughing. I don't respect your view.

And yeah, your "point" that doctors use sharpies for operations is exactly the same as a drunk parent using sharpies for his own amusement

Wrong again. my point, for the supremely hard of thinking amongst you, is that the pen doesn't fucking harm people, and one way (of many) you can tell this is that people who are much smarter than you (not hard, clearly) use them in hospitals.

Are those words too long? Pen no bad. Better?

Oh. Well, I'm not worried about that either so it's all good.

*"For a product to be used on the skin, it must be FDA approved. None of the writing instruments in the Sanford line are FDA approved,"

• quote from sharpie

The testing that has been done is 'under normal writing conditions' not people drawing on their skin.*

The testing hasn't been done because Sanford aren't making pens with the express purpose of being used to draw on skin, therefore they can't bothered to jump through the expensive FDA hoops to get approvals for use on skin.

They recommend people don't use them on their skin, because "we haven't tested for that use." Not because they think it's actually a particularly unsafe thing to do, but because legally that is all they can say without getting an FDA approval. They can't legally say, "Well, they're not designed for use on skin, but it won't actually do any harm".

Read the Material Safety Data Sheets for Sharpies. There is absolutely nothing in there to cause alarm.

My DH gets very upset when I refer to "my children" instead of 'our children" perhaps OP's husband feels the same way and thought he should mark their baby in the same way as a farmer does his lambs?

Hang on a second, if drawing on a newborn in permanent ink isn't an indicator of abuse, then why are you all advising the OP to avoid getting her baby weighed until it wears off?!

The normal protective instinct fathers are supposed to have clearly isn't there: he's already demonstrated that a few drinks can make him believe she's a beer mat to be scribbled on, rather than the brand new, precious human being that she is. Red flag.

We're not all advising her of that.

You're nuts.

existential That's not an argument and you know it. Do you think she should get her weighed then?

I think she should get her weighed if she feels the need to. A bit of fucking pen is neither here nor there, and the HV won't give a shiny shit about it.

@CatWithKittens are you serious?😂

OK. I guess time will tell. Having gone through safeguarding training myself I'll have to respectfully disagree with your 'shiny shit' opinion though.

Oh, the magical safe guarding training that makes every little thing a huge issue. Recent, was it? Get a bit of experience and hopefully you'll gain some perspective, and look back on your naive hysteria with some embarrassment.