Grandma telling ds he is 'disturbed'...

[moomina]

I am so bloody furious with my mother. She has always overreacted to the simplest things where ds is concerned but today I feel she has gone too far and I'm not sure how to handle it.

Ds is 14 months and going through a bit of a fussy stage. I'm putting it down to mainly separation anxiety as he only really seems to do it to me and I have recently started a new job which means I leave early in the morning and my mum looks after him. He is fine with her but the last few days has been very fussy/clingy when I am around. He is starting to have the odd mini-tantrum sometimes when told 'no', for example. I think this is part and parcel of him growing up, finding his independence etc. I don't like it but I don't think it's a big deal.

Anyway, this afternoon I took him upstairs to have his nappy changed after lunch. He screamed blue murder, real throaty, growly yells and going red in the face, going rigid, etc. My reaction was to basically ignore it/laugh it off and he settled down after a couple of minutes and was quite happy.

My mum's reaction on seeing this was to tell me that she thinks he is 'not normal' and 'emotionally disturbed' - after all, neither me or my brother ever made a noise like that when we were young... There is, apparently, 'something very wrong' with ds.

I am livid. I think this is an appalling, nasty and downright ridiculous thing to say about a 14-month-old baby. I had to leave the house and take ds to his dad's just to calm down. I can't actually get down the words to describe how upset this has made me. She seems to go out of her way to find things 'wrong' with ds and has done since the day he was born. I'm not sure I want her looking after him anymore if her reaction to baby tantrums is going to be to start flinging words like 'disturbed' around.

He may not understand now but one day he will. I want her to know this is not acceptable but can't seem to get it through her head. Or am I overreacting? Should I just ignore her? How should I handle this?

thinking of you not sure if I have any advice but sound quite normal dd went tho a super clingy stage -

I always find my mum points out things Im doing wrong or things that seem to be wrong with dd. I think its their way of trying to help, and Im sure Ill be the same when dd has kids when she's older.

Your ds sounds fine to me. Dd went through SA when I went away for a few days, she wouldnt allow anyone to change her nappy, she would scream everytime I left the room but fine when anyone else did. She also throws a wobbly when she's told no.

Try explaining to your mum how you feel and that she shouldnt say things like that. It's hard I know. If I try talking to my mum, she either doesnt listen or thinks she's right. But just try explaining that you are ds's mum and you do things your way, and know that ds is fine. Not every baby is the same, so he wont be like you or your brother when you were babies. But Im sure you two probably caused a riot back then just the same

oh moomia,that's terrible,how could she say such things???you can't just ignore it,you have to tell her, her comments are really upsetting and she should never ever say those things about her granchild,both my mum and MIL always say that we never had a tamtrum,i think they just forget and although my MIL always blamed me for my children's tamtrums she would never in a million years say such things about them
is she finding looking after your ds very stressful?no that is any excuse

poor you moomina that is an awful thing for her to say - second wm thats out of order and you should tell her you think so
my mum blames several of ds' (naughty)character traits directly on me (like he wont take no for an answer) and it really pmo
but i think your mum is way out of line(without being rude)
good luck with it hope she understands an says sorry

Well, she has just come in and apologised but it's the usual 'Oh, I'm just concerned' etc. I've told her that her comments were way over the top and I'm sick of being told that there's always something wrong with ds when any fool can see he's just playing up and testing the boundaries.

She now reckons it's a reaction to MMR that he had on Monday. I do agree that it's possible he may be extra grumpy because of that but that's not the point. Why can she not just therefore say 'Do you think he might be having a reaction to the jab?' rather than 'He's disturbed'??? I am so fed up with having to justify every move ds makes.

I agree with you, moomina, its a ridiculous label to pin on anyone, let alone a baby.
FWIW, grandma's always say their children never did x or y, or always did x or y, depending on the scenario

I take it you've raised it with her? How did she react?

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If your DS is disturbed,then my DD is too.She always cries when having her nappy changed .

I hope you & your mum can sort this out-I wouldn't want anyone making comments like that about my child.

He sounds exactly like my 14 month year old. You would think I was torturing the fuss he makes over nappy changing. He screamed the house down this morning when my partner stopped him opening the fridge constantly.