Grandparents problems am I right?

[Secondtimemum123]

Hi,

I'm a mum of 2 under 2's and it's been a stressful couple weeks, and just wanted to see other opinions on here, we went away with the grandparents (every person paid for themselves) recently and we had a couple of disagreements along the way i.e swaddling (they didn't agree as he didn't look comfortable) white noise (they didn't think it was warranted but when it's not on he doesn't sleep at all) baring in mind our 12 week old suffers bad with reflux and is under investigation for a milk allergy, so he's quite a grizzly baby and we do everything in order to try and help ease and calm him, he's also on omeprazole. But anyway we managed to push through the holiday and tried to ignore the comments. However on the last day, they were watching a movie in the living room which is linked into the kitchen (it was a large room) and my boy was getting a bit fidgety and quite restless due to being constipated for a couple days so me and oh decided to put the radio on and try and calm him with music (not using white noise as we knew it annoyed them) so just general calming music, and it seemed to work whilst doing his massages too. Bare in mind other ds was in bed fast asleep as it was evening. Anyway, they bypassed me and asked Alexa to turn down to basically a volume you couldn't hear very well, but we could hear there movie over it so we decided as he was getting restless again to turn it back up, then they asked for it to be turned down again so OH gave up and relented turned it off and said to me let's go upstairs to listen to it in bed and we can try and calm him there. So as we were packing up, grandparent 1 came over to get a drink and acted as though 'we were only going upstairs as I had a mood on me because we couldn't have the music on' so I just basically said no we are going up because he's getting restless and the music was calming him down and you wanted it turned down so that's why. For some unknown reason it kicked off and although nothing more was really said. Grandparent 1 and 2 went to bed. Grandparent 3 and 4 upon realising it was for the baby and to calm him down said that it made sense to keep it on if it was helping. We've been home a few days and I messaged when we got home to see if they had got back and got ignored the next day I had a message but just asked how the boys were and then nothing since. I'm a horizontal person really, dont like confrontation, I've been stressed alot recently as ds 2 cries a lot due to the reflux and ds 1 is still really reliant as he's only 17 Month's and it's really upset me. But oh keeps saying I've done nothing wrong at all just sticking up for our boys. I just need some advice really. It's the longest I've gone without really talking to them.

Personally I wouldn’t have gone on holiday with 12week old and a 17 month old…sorry.

@Gall10 it wasn't abroad, it was in the same country so via car.

This

I think their comments and digs at you were uncalled for as it’s up to you how you parent the children.

However, the Tv vs the radio thing sounds a bit daft. If I wanted the radio on to settle a baby I would take them upstairs to settle them rather than compete with the tv - you sound unreasonable there.

They have text asking about the children. What would you rather they had asked?

I think there is unreasonable behaviour on both sides.

All sounds ridiculous tbh.

Older people cannot hear things as easily as younger people can - so just because you could hear their programme doesn’t mean they could. And why would you settle a baby in what is presumably the ‘family area?’ The world for others doesn’t stop just because you’ve had a baby…you should have settled him upstairs. Then you could have rejoined once he was asleep - that’s what baby monitors are for.

You all could have addressed it like adults instead of just trying to out score each other by turning things up/down. None of you come off particularly well, but really you most of all.

Still wouldn’t do it!

@HateThursdays I understand completely what you mean, however ds1 was upstairs asleep and therefore we were trying not to wake him as he's not the deepest sleeper. I don't mind them messaging about the children I'm grateful of this, however I just expected a text to say they were home okay after our message.

Agree with this. The GPs sound a bit annoying, but who puts on music in the same room as others watching tv? The baby should have been taken upstairs immediately.

I dont see anyone having a ‘dig’ at their parenting.

@Gall10 it was actually the grandparents idea as obviously they were all with us, and also OH said to not waste our leave together as a family. Either way it would have been stressful with 2 under 2s at home or away a couple hours.

If I was watching tv and someone put a radio on I’d be annoyed. It was a bit passive aggressive to turn it down via Alexa but maybe it was too loud.

@LadyDanburysHat completely agree however ds1 was asleep and not a deep sleeper. Also when I say it's a large room it's basically a kitchen/lounge, however it was a very large room

I was going to say you were not unreasonable after the comments from them but then you put the radio on in the linked room to where they were already watching TV. Entirely unreasonable no matter your reason. You should have taken the baby upstairs or to another room with a door to do this.

If I wanted to listen to music with my baby, and someone else was watching TV in the same room, I’d go somewhere else.

@MagpiePi it wasn't very loud at all, we could definitely hear the TV over the music so it was just loud enough for baby to calm.

Agree with the other posters that turning on the radio was ridiculous. And the fact that your other child was asleep seems silly - I assume there were multiple bedrooms. for the purpose of settling neither my parents nor my in laws would have any issue with me using their bedroom for a few minutes.

But lesson learned - a family holiday with a newborn is a terrible idea.

My comment was in reference to the Grandparents being critical of the swaddling and white noise.

@SJM1988 but we literally didn't have any other rooms other than upstairs rooms and ds1 was asleep up there, the only room downstairs was this massive kitchen come living room which was literally huge and like I said we could still hear the TV from where we sat even with the music on.

Oh, and older people tend to have the tv very loud. And their chidlren seem to be split into two groups - those who understand and those who don't. My parents like watching tv at my house because BIL and DSis get very annoyed about tv volume. I just close the door and leave them to it.

@JadziaD we literally realise this now and have said we will be going on our own in future just the four of us.

Why didn’t you ask the GPs if they minded you taking the baby into one of their rooms to settle? There are so many other things you could have done than putting music on in a room where people are watching TV.

you sound exhausted but I don’t think the GPs were unreasonable.

You could hear the tv but grandparents hearing probably isn't as acute as yours and it would be very distracting.

Did you not have your own bedroom where you could settle the baby?

@FuzzyPuffling our bedroom was linked to ds1 and he was fast asleep so we didn't want to wake him as he's a light sleeper

@bunnypenny the rooms upstairs were all in a row, so not really the best layout, we probably could of in hindsight we were really just trying not to wake ds1 as he's not the best sleeper

But your DS1 wasn't asleep in every room upstairs? I'm sure using a separate room your DS was sleeping in to listen to music on a low volume with the door closed wouldn't have disturbed him (I had really bad sleepers for babies to understand now wanting to distube him)

Its so annoying someone plays a radio or even scrolls videos on their phone when you are trying to watch tv. Just becuse you could still hear the TV over the radio doesn't remove that annoying undertone of music coming from the radio over the TV.