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October 2011 Moms
LCass
member
A MIL Tale (long)
LCass
member
Fortunately, she's not my MIL, she's my brother's (but I'm going to use "MIL" to refer to her just to keep it simple). But she provided a few WTF moments back in August when we met for the wedding, and I kept forgetting to share the stories until yesterday. So here are the stories, plus the new one from yesterday. (Sorry it's so long, but as you can probably tell, this woman has been irking me for months now and I need to get it all out.)
"Come to Mama"
The day we all met and arrived on the island where the wedding was taking place, we went for lunch as soon as we got there. While we were waiting for our food, MIL reaches out to Lily who was in my arms, so I start to hand her over and this woman who we just met says "Come to mama!" My dad saw my eyes flash red and tried to calm me by telling me that "it's just a saying." Um, no. When you're at a casino and you're trying to win a lot of money, "come to mama" is just a saying. When you're reaching out to a baby who is just learning about who's who and what's what, "come to mama" should be reserved for the MAMA and not a flucking stranger!
Milestones
MIL was immediately asking about Lily's talking. At that point she was signing and communicating very effectively, but hadn't said any words yet. MIL said that by the end of the week she would have my baby talking. Yeah, she lost interest in that almost immediately. When Lily did start talking ("ow" for cat, "oof" for dog and "ba" for ball), I posted about it on FB and MIL commented that I shouldn't worry, she'll start saying REAL words soon and then told me what her kids' first words were. I replied that these ARE Lily's first words, since they were consistent and understandable. She also commented about how Lily had almost figured out her "pincher grasp" - I had to correct her and told her that Lily had been able to do the PINCER grasp for months already. (Yes, these two are minor complaints, they just irked me in combination with all the other stuff.)
"Hot"
During the wedding reception, MIL came up with her mostly finished cup of coffee while I was holding Lily. She took Lily's hand and held it to the cup and started telling her it was "hot". K, weird, I stopped that after a second and walked away. A little while later she came up to me holding a fresh, steaming cup of coffee and held my poor baby's hand to the side of the cup while saying "hot" - WTF?!? She started to tell me that this is how they learn and I just said "Or not!" and walked away. I was fuming! All that teaches a baby is that the mean lady tried to hold her hand to something that hurt her! She couldn't even have pulled her hand away if she'd tried!
Mother Theresa
There was other minor stuff, mostly rude/inconsiderate to my mom or brother. But then MIL graduated from nursing school a couple of days ago. Yesterday she posted a LONG thing on FB about how a fellow student had called her to tell her that they thought she should have gotten the Outstanding Student award and how someone else whispered that to her during the ceremony. She went on to say how she agreed with them and thought that the criteria for the award must not have been very clear and that the dean seemed to be stretching for reasons why the winner got the award. She quoted the peer who called her as saying that the winner only got the award because she kissed the profs' asses. MIL then said that she wasn't worried about not getting the award, because her greatest reward comes from the good feeling she gets from helping the less fortunate (I noticed it wasn't about the fact that they get the help they need) and so she'll keep doing it. And my new SIL commented on her mother's status comparing her to Mother Theresa! Seriously?! All I know is that I sincerely hope that the student who won the award never sees/hears about that post.
BFP #1: July 12, 2010 Natural M/C: July 26, 2010
BFP #2: January 30 ,2011 Born: September 29, 2011
BFP #3: January 5, 2013 Born: August 25, 2013
This discussion has been closed.
Re: A MIL Tale (long)
Burned by the Bear
This is the bright side for him. She lives in Florida and they are currently in London, England for a couple of years, but when they go back to the States it's to Seattle.
The bright side for me is that it makes me very appreciative of the fact that my biggest complaint about my own MIL is that she keeps tidying my house while she watches Lily even though I've asked her not to.
BFP #1: July 12, 2010 Natural M/C: July 26, 2010
BFP #2: January 30 ,2011 Born: September 29, 2011
BFP #3: January 5, 2013 Born: August 25, 2013
The bolded would be my MIL if she lived closer. I feel bad for your brother. If I were you I would just keep Lily away from her when you all are together. I've known plenty of people who think that they know better than (baby's) mother. It's like they just correct something you're doing or they just need to show you the right way to do things. It's annoying but it's usually a tell that they actually know nothing useful at all.
The wedding was beautiful. A bit chaotic and disorganized, but it was still lovely. I forgot to post pics like I promised! I'll have to do that after I finish making our lunch.
BFP #1: July 12, 2010 Natural M/C: July 26, 2010
BFP #2: January 30 ,2011 Born: September 29, 2011
BFP #3: January 5, 2013 Born: August 25, 2013
My mother tried to pull the hot thing with Alastair while she was here. Seems like that is how I learned hot. Great, isn't it?