What is the worst/dumbest thing anyone has ever said to you about parenting stuff? II - Page 30

[pear-shaped]

I just heard one this morning that made my blood boil. It's really more about my being an immigrant where I live than about parenting advice, but I have to get it off my chest. MIL was talking to a hairdresser who lives just a couple of doors down from us. The hairdresser told MIL that she could hear my dd crying sometimes and figured that since I'm a foreigner, I must need help with the baby. I guess only people born here know how to be parents. Sorry rest of the world!

I'm sure everyone here thinks I'm weird and they probably feel bad for dd. I mean, I don't wheel her around in a stroller all the time, overdressed and with a pacifier clipped to her shirt and I don't feed her rice cereal in vegetable broth with powdered meat it in at noon and at six in the evening, like everyone else here does. I could go on and on and on...

[kmb9906]

Originally Posted by amberskyfire

I hate it when people tell me that I'm spoiling my baby by holding her all the time. My mother is especially bad at it, but I really love when random people in the store and on the street tell me that.

I just look down at their baby who's strapped into an expensive stroller with a vibrating heat pad, a million dangling toys, a music box, a sun shade, and a bottle prop and think to myself:

"Ooookay. MY kid has no toys, just me to interact with. YOU on the other hand run out and buy every single expensive thing you can find to keep the child happy and entertained - and MY baby is the one that's spoiled?" :

:

DH and I went to a friends' house for a dinner party this past weekend and I was wearing DD in my ring sling. I cannot tell you how many people told me that she was never going to learn to sit up by herself or walk as long as she was "always" held in the sling.

DH's grandmother also thinks we hold her too much and wants to know why we didn't just put DD in the floor and go about our business. Um, yeah, 'cause we decided to have kids just so we could ignore them and let them lay in the floor ... Honestly, I feel bad for people who comment on my holding DD too much. I love holding her, especially now that we've gotten to the age where she will place her hands where she wants them. I love the feeling of that tiny little hand on my shoulder or the sight of that tiny hand grasping the strap of my nursing tank.

[sapphire_chan]

Originally Posted by amberskyfire

I hate it when people tell me that I'm spoiling my baby by holding her all the time. My mother is especially bad at it, but I really love when random people in the store and on the street tell me that.

I just look down at their baby who's strapped into an expensive stroller with a vibrating heat pad, a million dangling toys, a music box, a sun shade, and a bottle prop and think to myself:

"Ooookay. MY kid has no toys, just me to interact with. YOU on the other hand run out and buy every single expensive thing you can find to keep the child happy and entertained - and MY baby is the one that's spoiled?" :

Well, at least it shows that they know that time interacting with mom is more valuable than all the expensive toys. Be nice if they could take that understanding one step further, of course.

[yasinsmama]

I was talking to a good friend of mine who does not BF. I was telling her about how I ned to buy a nursing cover, after DS was very upset in the mall one day, so I was trying to nurse him. I was in the food court, and my niece was trying to hold the blanket to cover me, but he was just thashing around, and didn't want to nurse. It was a clumsy effort, b/c I had never tried that (I can't just pull my boob out, hence the nusing cover).
She says:
"Well you don't want any freaks who get off on that type of stuff looking at you bf'ing" (I can kind of understand that one). But then she said "Then you have the other freaks who stare at you like, awww, what a beautiful thing". I was like, umm, I am one of those freaks!
This is the friend who says "are you STILL bf'ing". I think she figured I should have quit a long time ago when I was in a ridiculous amount of pain with mastitis, thrush, etc.

[yasinsmama]

Forgot this one:
When DS is really fussy, I always offer the breast first. Sometimes he takes it, sometimes not. When he won't nurse, but I keep trying b/c I know he's hungry, my mom always asks "you didn;t bring a bottle of milk with you?".
Umm, no, why would I do that when I have boobs full of milk?
I just look at her with no expression on my face and say "no".

[CowsRock]

Originally Posted by kluella

Mine does. We supplement a little as needed and when that formula lid comes off, Wyatt is at my feet waiting. He will jump up on the counter and lick up any powder that I drop on it. After DH made a bottle and left the scoop on the counter, I found it licked clean and hidden in one of my shoes (where the cat likes to keep his things).

He can't get enough of the stuff. When I'm nursing DS he's nowhere to be found, but if someone's giving him a bottle you can bet that the cat is on that person's lap, trying to shove the baby out of the way.

That is too funny!

[bvnms]

Originally Posted by LiLStar

once, out of curiousity, i expressed a little bit of milk into a bowl and offered it to the cats. They absolutely would not touch it.

We had a cat who had 2 kittens once and she refused to take care of them so I tried to give them some of my breast milk and they would have nothing to do with it. I've had cats that would sit in the stroller that we had but only when the baby wasn't in it.


One of my brother's and his girlfriend are having a baby in December. They have some odd ideas about how things are going to work out. She is 16 and he is 21. She did finally say she's going to try breastfeeding but I imagine that she won't do it for long. Also, when I showed her the sling that I made she said "I have to get a stroller because I'm not going to carry my baby around all the time and make it spoiled."

Victoria has gotten into this habit of telling on everyone which all my kids have done and I usually just ignore it. I know that she'll grow out of it and it's not a big deal. So, my brother's girlfriend says " When we were growing up we got punished when we tattled." I told her that was fine for her parents but this is the way that I raise my kids.

Beverly had a tantrum one day while we were sitting in the car waiting for my mom to come out of work and she ended up tearing off a piece of the car seat. It was already loose and I knew my mom wasn't going to see it as any big deal because it was already loose. Well, my brother and his girlfriend made a huge deal out of it. My brother told my kids that he was going to ask them all day till someone admitted doing it. Naturally this was scaring my kids because they're not used to anyone treating them that way. I ended up yelling at my brother that the way I raise my kids was none of his business and he didn't know the first thing about raising any kids. We got into a nasty fight about that. His girlfriend tells me later that they were both upset because they didn't see what kind of punishment Beverly got for tearing that piece off the car. I told her "It's my mom's car and she didn't even worry about it, yet you two are just mad because you figure I didn't do enough to punish my child. That's real intelligent."

I don't especially like his girlfriend. We were talking about the new babies and I said I wasn't getting this one circumcised if it's a boy. She had an US done and she says there's no doubt that she's having a boy and she's getting that nasty piece of skin cut off of him. I told her that first off, it's not a necessary surgery and she did understand that our other brother was 100% a girl and then he was born. She will be one of these girls that wants to sue the doctor if she has a girl.

I was so glad when they moved in with her parents though I do feel sorry for their baby but I told my mom if they moved back in here I would move out.

[veganone]

Originally Posted by yaseensmommy

Forgot this one:
When DS is really fussy, I always offer the breast first. Sometimes he takes it, sometimes not. When he won't nurse, but I keep trying b/c I know he's hungry, my mom always asks "you didn;t bring a bottle of milk with you?".
Umm, no, why would I do that when I have boobs full of milk?
I just look at her with no expression on my face and say "no".

That's funny! I recently went out of town with my parents and DD. They are VERY supportive of my parenting and my dad watches DD one day a week. But, I mentioned that I was not bringing my pump and my dad was totally freaked out! Um, I don't need to pump when I am with DD!

[veganone]

Originally Posted by pear-shaped

I just heard one this morning that made my blood boil. It's really more about my being an immigrant where I live than about parenting advice, but I have to get it off my chest. MIL was talking to a hairdresser who lives just a couple of doors down from us. The hairdresser told MIL that she could hear my dd crying sometimes and figured that since I'm a foreigner, I must need help with the baby. I guess only people born here know how to be parents. Sorry rest of the world!

Nice! DH is an immigrant as well and I swear MIL thinks I can't parent because I'm from the US and not South America. Oh, and because I didn't have DD on 3 full "meals" a day at 7 months. And that she's not getting formula, because once they're six months you can't possibly make enough milk for them. :

[veganone]

Originally Posted by angela&avery

i have a friend who tells me

#1 my kids are so much EASIER than her one kid bc they have each other to play with... (ok it would have NOTHING to do with how hard I have worked with them for the last 3 years on sibling rivalry and all of the books I have read about sibling rivalry and GD Parenting and how hard I have worked to change my reactions to help lesson the rivalry they had at ages 1 and 3 when I thought I was going to LOSE my MIND.... nothing to do with that...)

#2. my house is always clean bc its small (bull crap, smaller houses have lesser places for things to go ... i still have two kids, and it must have nothing to do with my dedication to having a clean house)

#3.my yard looks nice bc its smaller than hers and not as much upkeep and my floors are clean bc they are tile and bc I see the dirt im motivated to clean them more often!!!! (seriously????... I know this one isnt parenting but i had to vent)

Um, having just moved from a small house (900 sq. ft.) to a larger house (2100 sq. ft.) in the last few months, I can tell you that a bigger house is MUCH easier to keep clean. I am astonished at how much so. Small houses are WAY harder!!! Especially if you have pets. (Although, would agree on smaller yard being eaiser, but still not maintenance free - it takes WORK either way.)

Same with the concept of "good" kids. I have people tell me how happy/easy/"good" DD is all the time now, but she was one uber high needs baby for months and months. I did not put her down for the first 4 months of her life. Then her caregivers didn't for another 2 months until she could sit independently. Some people have easy babies - great! But some of us have happy kids because we work our butts off!

[cabbitdancer]

Originally Posted by ilovebabies

I can vouch for the small house looking messier. There is no place for the clutter to go and it clutters so much faster BECAUSE it's small.

Yeah. We live in an apartment, and the lack of places to put things is really frustrating. We've even gone through everything once and donated two car loads of stuff to Goodwill, but there's still too much! I can't figure out where it's all coming from!

[edensmama]

Originally Posted by sapphire_chan

Have you tried saying this to your mom? Or are you still trying to be polite and not tell her you think her parenting was lousy?

Oh yes! We have had this dicussion many a times. It doesn't matter how much I tell her, she'll just be caddy. Ex; If she goes to discipline dd and I have an upset look on my face she will say something along the lines of, "Oh that's right we are a better parent."

[Awaken]

Originally Posted by amberskyfire

I hate it when people tell me that I'm spoiling my baby by holding her all the time. My mother is especially bad at it, but I really love when random people in the store and on the street tell me that.

I just look down at their baby who's strapped into an expensive stroller with a vibrating heat pad, a million dangling toys, a music box, a sun shade, and a bottle prop and think to myself:

"Ooookay. MY kid has no toys, just me to interact with. YOU on the other hand run out and buy every single expensive thing you can find to keep the child happy and entertained - and MY baby is the one that's spoiled?" :

[capagrl]

Originally Posted by Juliacat

People have said to me, "I could never cloth diaper, it's too much work." I'm like, "You can't use a washing machine?" and they're like *blink*

ROFL, I got this one when DS#4 was only a few weeks old from a family friend. Her response was that she'd looked into cloth (yeah, right) and decided the added cost and such wouldn't make it worthwhile.

I always wonder about what this mysterious, obviously expensive "and such" is... I seem to hear it a lot! lol

I could write a novel on the stupid comments I've heard through pregnancy - everything from, "Wow, you're HUGE!" to when I was working and having people come by my desk almost daily saying, "Are you still here?!" (um, no, jack@ss, I'm a figment of your imagination - I'm actually laying on a beach in Tahiti right now sucking down Mojitos as my cabana boy fans me with palm fronds!)

I don't get a whole lot of parenting comments, but I have been getting some ODD looks when nursing my 25 month old son. I guess him coming at me squealing, "Ninnnnnny!!" then trying to lift my shirt as he makes sucking noises and wiggles his tongue back and forth :nana: is a little disconcerting for those who do not know my gorgeous little boy is actually a heat seeking ninny monster :

[shelley4]

i have had comments since my babe was 6 DAYS old about her never learning how to walk because i carry her in the sling (mostly on the way to drop the big kids off at school and pick them up again)... and i've been getting them pretty constantly ever since. i mean, come on! 6 *days*??? she's not going to learn how to walk any time soon anyways! and it's not like sticking her in the stroller on the way to school and back is going to encourage walking either!

and they act all shocked that yes, in fact, she did learn how to roll, sit up, crawl, heck, she was *pulling up on furniture* before she was 7 months old! obviously, the sling is not harming her development.

i am trying, ever so hard, to smile and wistfully say "well, gotta hug her while she's young, they grow up so fast.. sigh!" to get people off my back. i sincerely doubt that when they are all grown up and moved out of the house, that i'll sit back and say to myself, "gee, i really wish i didn't hug them so much when they were little!".

[TopHat]

My mother told me one. When she was feeding me after my birth, the nurses in the hospital told her that pulling up her shirt to breastfeed was unsanitary.

[LiLStar]

what the.. if you dont pull your shirt up to breastfeed, then HOW do you breastfeed? THROUGH your shirt?..confused...

[TopHat]

Originally Posted by LiLStar

what the.. if you dont pull your shirt up to breastfeed, then HOW do you breastfeed? THROUGH your shirt?..confused...

Maybe they meant for her to pull the neck of the shirt down or to use button up shirts or specifically breastfeeding tops?

Meh. I pull up all the time- don't even own a breastfeeding top!

[njbeachgirl]

Originally Posted by aurora_skys

I think the confusion around our "newfangled" baby carriers is weird too. Didnt all Americans learn about Native Americans and Inuits in school? In like every picture there was a woman with her baby in a papoose. Its on the freaking Sacajawea coin for heavens sake! How can they possibly fail to make the connection that all generations (somewhere, sometime) have carried their babiess?!?

LOL. I get the "wow, I wish they had those when I my kids were babies" from people whose kids are like 5 years old! I'm pretty sure slings have been around since then!

[amberskyfire]

Originally Posted by TopHat

My mother told me one. When she was feeding me after my birth, the nurses in the hospital told her that pulling up her shirt to breastfeed was unsanitary.

Heh, because God forbid we release our belly button cooties into the air for others to catch