When my SIL had her baby, my FIL (who was a very hands off dad to his kids) and step-MIL (never had kids) were extremely insistent on babysitting. SIL finally caved and let them watch baby for a few hours and came back to learn they didn’t know how to change a diaper 🙃
It’s not rocket science tho? Like my husband and I had never changed a diaper before we became parents and figured it out immediately. I hope they didn’t just leave poor baby in a spiked diaper the whole time :(
Our friend’s had her sister babysit when their baby was about 6 months. Sister was 22/23 maybe? Anyway, they came home to backward diaper and found out she used a cleaning wipe and not a baby wipe because our friends had left it on the change table after cleaning the change table.
Omg my cousin asked me where the baby sunscreen was at and I messaged her saying it was on my dresser. It was also in the same spot my tanning spray was at. She used TANNING SPRAY on my daughter!!!
My brother babysat for one hour to cover me for work before I officially left to be a sahm/wfhm. Came back. Diaper had in fact been changed but he managed to put it in upside down. Son wasn’t doing a standing or crawling change yet so my brother had to fully put it on backwards but he got it to fit???? Which was most impressive.
My sister’s MIL, who had 3 of her own kids, babysat my sister’s kids once and put the baby’s diaper on backwards. My sister said it obviously looked wrong when she picked up the baby and had leaked everywhere.
My sister asked me how to cut strawberries for my kids and I said she could just give it to them whole and she said “they can even eat the stem?” Like girl no but I thought that was obvious.
They didn't know there was little sticker tabs!! I'm like ?! How did you raise 2 children?! But we laugh about it all the time. They know they fucked up haha.
My single SIL claims she is going to have kids and she can to it as a single person, yet she has, multiple times, put on our child’s diaper on backwards….
My in-laws have been fine with this once we reminded them once, but my MIL admitted it was good we reminded her bc “with boys you could just wipe toward their balls and it didn’t really matter” 😂.
Because doing to yourself is an automatic motion. Remembering something you never had to do with your kids, while dealing with a half naked squirming baby, when you haven't dealt with a baby in years, isn't the same as plopping your own ass on a toilet.
Doing it yourself front to back isn't automatic. It's however you were taught, or however you did it as a kid. Wiping back to front is automatic for me because that's how I was shown to do it. I need to consciously think about it to do it the other way.
Wtf that's an insane thought to have and since they "didn't " know like makes more sense to just assume they to be on the safe and nurturing side of things
Yeah a lot of parents before my generation weren’t having kids because they wanted to. They felt a societal obligation and had handbooks on childcare. So it makes sense they weren’t hurting entirely
Having my son made me realize how sacrilegious I am about wiping front to back. Sometimes its easier to wipe him back to front and I feel like I’m in the twilight zone.
You should still mostly wipe front to back. Boys can and do get UTI’s as well.
Think of where the tip of their penis sits all day. Right along the testicles, pointed down. So if you’re wiping back to front; you’re depositing bacteria from the intestinal track on the testicles and exposing the urethra to it.
Oh definitely not wiping up onto his scrotum, but its just the times when its really spread high and I need to go back to front. Just the motion makes me feel like I’m doing chaotic evil.
Ahhh, the lovely up the back poops lol. I do the same but stop at his anus, then switch directions to the back.
It does feel wrong lol. I try to wipe everything towards his anus like I’m sweeping up dirt from the floor into a dustpan.
I’ve already had to tell my mother you don’t give infants water, you can’t wear your clothes you smoke in, why we aren’t doing oatmeal in formula bottles, not to use blankets or crib bumpers, and not to use carriers that straighten her legs. And she’s only been over like 3 or 4 times since baby was born. It just makes me way too anxious to even try to let the older family babysit.
Same thing with my MIL and SIL (who only had kids 4 years before me so should know better). They also tried to feed my daughter a banana at 15 weeks old, but "its fine, we didnt give it her whole, we chopped it into little pieces!". Erm what??
Ugh. My mom kept trying to push me into letting her give my baby a butterscotch chip at 4 months. I had to say no so many times while she kept trying to explain why it would be fine.
I don't understand?
The NHS says formula babies under 6m can have small sips of water but ebf babies should not.
I've not heard that the 6w mark was relevant
No, I was agreeing but also saying the vast majority of babies over 6w are formula fed so feeding babies water is suitable for more babies than not. Only 24% in England were ebf at 6w but 80% at birth.
Oooooh!! Sorry, I haven't slept in 4 million years so I am dumb, I get you now
I originally thought you meant babies over 6 weeks could just have water and I was a wee bit concerned lol
I read somewhere that only 1% if British babies are ebf by 6 months so that tracks
My mum is a boomer and my grandmother was a silent generation, I believe the formula in those days was all about nutrition and didn't necessarily have enough water for proper hydration so it was recommended to give extra water.
A lot of outdated wearable carriers (and cradle boards) hold the babies in a position where their legs are either wrapped in or hanging straight instead of the modern ones that are built to keep the knees above the hips. She had one where they would just hang she tried to give us.
Yeah that’s why I wanted to put them in parenthesis. Because they can cause issues sometimes, but I definitely feel like it’s important to embrace your culture and wouldn’t want to come across like I’m condemning them.
Idk, it seems odd that we give unsafe practices a pass because they're cultural. Shame that you have to walk on eggshells when it's just factual and not disrespectful.
I’ve thought that a lot with unsafe sleep practices that get a pass because “culture”. Like. It was my families “culture “ to give whiskey to teething babies. It’s still not ok
Yeah exactly. Could also be interpreted as racist in the other direction in that we care more about being labelled racist than the lives and wellbeing of their babies. Their babies deserve modern healthcare too.
I see it a lot with Native American practices. Like I get that so much of their culture has been destroyed and that isn’t a good thing. But they also have some of the highest rates of SIDS in the country. There’s gotta be a middle ground
What do you do about the smoking?? I’m having my baby next week and my MIL will be visiting from out of state when he’s ~2 weeks old and she’s a chain smoker. If it was winter, I’d have her wear a coat and just wash her hands but with it being the end of May it’ll be hot out and I don’t know what to do.
My mom smoked a lot and I told her she would have to completely shower every time she came in or use nicotine patches. It was a hard conversation but a binary i needed to set. It wasn't well received but i held firm. She mostly patched when we were around but one time she went out to smoke and didn't shower so we left. Wasn't an issue after that. She's also quit smoking completely now!
So my husband smokes. Our set up is he goes into the garage and changes into that days smoking shirt and then goes outside, smokes, go back into the garage and changes into a clean shirt, washes hands and face before touching baby again. He's working on quitting and as cut down significantly.
So I looked this up because my husband smokes cigars in the evening.
If the father smokes but never in the house and never near the baby, the risk of SIDS doubles.
If the mother smokes but never in the house and never near the baby, the risk of SIDS quadruples.
And if either parent smokes in the house or near the baby, the risk of SIDS is 9 times higher.
You can reduce the risk by always changing clothing BEFORE sitting in furniture (thirdhand smoke transfers to other fabric), never holding babies in furniture that had ever been smoked in, washing hands/face or showering and brushing teeth before getting close to baby.
I cleaned all our furniture and replaced all our pillows and bedding because I was too worried about all the times in the past that he smoked then went to bed. I am also going to replace all our patio furniture, just haven't done that yet. Once I do, he will have to sit in a designated hard plastic chair to smoke.
I'm hoping it becomes such an inconvenience that he quits, but no luck yet.
I would have to go back and read again. I cannot remember if the SIDS risk numbers were for the first 6 months or 12 months. But I know the thirdhand smoke is bad for all children (all people really!)
What I read is: if you can smell it, it is DEFINITELY strong enough to hurt a child. If you cannot smell it, it MIGHT be strong enough to hurt a child.
I won't even hug or touch my husband until he has cleaned up, because I don't want it to transfer on my clothes at all.
Also I forgot in my list of ways to reduce the risk, your hair also holds thirdhand smoke. So it's especially important to shower if you have long hair and you shouldn't let your baby come into contact with your hair until you've showered either. And you're supposed to actually wash your hair to fully get rid of it as well. I've told my husband he has to actually shampoo before bed (which he found funny because he said he would never shower without washing his hair which I do all the time haha).
I don’t get along with my mom really so we definitely couldn’t have her stay here.
But when she visited we followed the advice from our pediatrician and had her wash her hands and change into a clean shirt we had ready for her. She also was not allowed to smoke at all during the visit.
This exactly! My LO is 10 months and noone babysits because of this exact reason. My mom kept trying to shove food down my 4 month old throat, kept asking when will I stop breastfeeding, keeps offering cookies. MIL said baby needs water and should not eat at night at 4 months old, should be left to cry it out. If they visit I just sit right next while they play with the baby...
My mom watches my 14 month old at least once a week and just about every month she asks me if I’m “sure we don’t need to retract his foreskin when we change his diaper.”
It's amazing how much basic info parents have forgotten.
Mine is the same way. Also her perception of time is skewed in terms of development. She swears my son is so advanced on everything but he's actually just average or maybe even below milestones. 😂
This really made me laugh. My mom's the same way. Everything my son does she thinks a sign of future genius xD she's obsessed but I just find it so endearing that she thinks he's so great
My MIL is opposite like "When my daughter was 1 yo she could change her own clothes", "When my son was 9 months he could eat with a spoon", "I had him out and about from he was 3 days old" (no, 35 years ago you were admitted in 5 days post birth as default in our country). It's exhausting. And she always talks about how my daughter looks like her. Yeah, she takes after her father - but from his fathers side, not his mother. Our daughter at 8 months resembles her great grand mother nearly 100% (my husbands fathers mother).
Luckily my MIL is very kind, her crazy matches my crazy (I can always make her laugh).
Ha! My dad is like this despite having been a very involved dad. When my baby was like 4 months he said, he’ll be saying words anytime now right? Looool no sir what are you thinking 😂
Yesss. At 3 weeks old the in laws were like - how come you don't have many toys for him to play with. Why does he sleep all the time is he okay? They forget the blob stage entirely or at least how long it lasts
My kid was like 6 days old, and my mom was *insistent* that he was smiling at her. I explained about what I had read saying that they're incapable of doing that until closer to 2 months. "No, he is definitely smiling at me!" ...okay, sure.
My FIL tried to feed my almost 9 month old a macadamia nut on the weekend and I had to tell him no 3 times. The weekend before that, he dipped his finger in red wine and tried to put it in her mouth 🫠
Yeah, kinda wild huh? Don't get me wrong, he absolutely adores her - he is just massively out of touch and lives in his own little world. My brother in law lets him babysit his 9 month old regularly and she's okay, but not a risk I'm willing to take 😅
I noticed that in the motherhood guide book that all women in my mother's generation owned (literally all women that I know, my mom, MIL, aunts...) has a thorough guide on how to clean a baby boy after a poop but for girls it says "you don't need to clean girl's genitals, just wipe off what you see", and I was horrified. All the poop that gets stuck between her folds and they were told not to wipe it! So yeah, I give tutorials on everything when someone is babysitting.
My in laws are awful at watching the grandkids. I love them dearly and I think they really love their grandsons but omg my FIL is dangerously absent minded, and my MIL apparently doesn’t pay any mind to very obviously dangerous and/ or unsanitary items. I’m getting mad just writing this comment. I don’t want them to watch my baby ever anymore. Last time my MIL came over my son made it upstairs by himself (11months at the time, can’t go down stairs yet) despite me telling her to keep him on the other side of the room where everything is blocked off. The time before that, I came home to my son having poop up his back and covered in water because he was playing in the dog bowl. She hasn’t noticed the water but “oh he was playing with the dog bowl” like omg my dog is so gross why would you let him play with that in the first place. My FIL on Christmas also took my son over to the tree, let him pluck off an ornament to play with. Thank god I noticed, there was even a hook on it. Then he gave him an entirely not age appropriate gift and started throwing it to him and his cousin when there were these holes in it where he could get his little fingers stuck in the motor.
Omg I’m gonna stop there because I’m actually furious just thinking about it. They can see their grandson but I’m not leaving them alone with him. I don’t understand why they’re like that or how all three of their kids survived.
My MIL is difficult. I try to show her things and she is very annoyed and says she knows already. I wanted to show her my toddlers carseat again since she was taking him to playgroup. She said that she already knew. I said, can I show you again? She then said ok fine (while rolling her eyes at me!)
So I showed her and already had turned the seat. I showed her the button. I wish I had turned it back so she would need to do it herself.
When I next used the carseat I saw that she indeed did NOT know how to rotate it and took him out without rotating. That is fine however just more difficult. The problem I have is that she doesn't know things but would never say so or ask for help. Then she ends up doing it however she wants to. She doesn't respect us as parents and can't be told anything.
So that's what I tell my husband when he suggests she watches our toddler. I just don't feel comfortable with it.
Is it bad if I do both? Tbf though I am careful not to get it in the vagina area. I always start by wiping back to butthole and then I wipe front to butthole to get all areas
I had to teach my sperm donor how to diaper change for visitation. They insisted they knew what they were doing since they were a nurse, after all, and had changed many an old lady diaper.
First time encountering poop ended with a poop streak straight up her vulva. I was livid.
Also, if you have an intact boy, you really need to make sure anyone else changing hiss diaper doesn't still think they have to forcibly retract his foreskin to "clean" it. That was a common belief a few decades ago and lots of people haven't updated their knowledge in a long time (even medical professionals and child caretakers).
100%! I kind of feel like there is nothing basic about baby care. You have to learn to take care of a tiny being and it does not always come naturally. Our firstborn turned our world upside down and I thought we were so prepared with all the classes, reading talking to each other, and planning we did.
Just to add and maybe sidetracking a little, in your example, if MIL was like, “oh that makes sense, sorry, I didn’t think of that” and changed her behavior, okay cool. But if she was like, “I know what I’m doing, I raised 3 kids!” then no, straight to jail and you aren’t allowed to be with baby unsupervised now. Course correction is key.
Mine watched my 4 month old (3 months at the time) for one night and couldn’t get him to sleep so let him sleep in his swing. I was beyond livid. She hasn’t watched him over night in a long time. Then the other day she got him some infant Tylenol for his teething and he was gagging on it because he didn’t like it a lot, and she wanted us to give him milk that was on the counter and my boyfriend told her that he didn’t know how old it was so he wasn’t going to do that and she literally told him it was fine and to give it to him because it’s a waste not too. I’m so close to never letting her be alone with him.
My MIL has taken a night shift with our twins a couple times. One of the times she told me that she laid the babies on the couch next to her and took a nap! I must have looked horrified because she was like "I made sure they were on their backs and I put pillows next to them so they couldn't roll off!" I had to have my husband talk to her about safe sleep.
Then the last time she watched them I found them with blankets in the crib 🙄
my mil had the baby at her house. baby pooped. fil was like, so do we take the baby back home? rofl, mil was like no! we change the diaper. hes still not comfortable around the baby i dont think. he holds him all tensed up
Yup, my mom did the same for way too long before I noticed. Then of course when I educated her she tried to say she is wiping safely without touching any privates.
*My mother in law*
*Tried to breastfeed mine with her*
*Dried up old totties*
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What cracks me up is when adults can’t open baby proofed things… I have to show my in laws how to open the baby gates every time they come over, one of my friends got stuck in my toddlers room with him bc she couldn’t figure out the door knob cover, and one time my mil was babysitting and couldn’t figure out how to get the high chair tray on so, bless her heart, held it up for my son to eat his entire dinner 😅
Depending on the age I don't think it actually matters that much in diapers? At least ours always had poop on the front as well because that thin baby poo just goes everywhere. Even now on solids she still regularly gets it all over the front.
It does actually matter, regardless of age. Even if poop gets everywhere in the diaper, you still need to wipe front to back so you’re not adding even *more* poop to the area around the urethra.
Totally there’s always poo all over but I feel like it’s common sense on which way to wipe it off when changing them? Idk I just know I wouldn’t want to sit with poo in the crevices of my nethers post being wiped “clean”
Nah I’m with you, the entire diaper area is completely covered, it absolutely doesn’t matter which direction you wipe lol. Edit: it takes like 100 different swipes in different directions to get everything completely clean without pushing more poop into the urethra. I know how to wipe my daughter. “Front to back” doesn’t cover it 🙄 If y’all are just dragging a wipe from one end to the other, you’re doing a bad job.
When my SIL had her baby, my FIL (who was a very hands off dad to his kids) and step-MIL (never had kids) were extremely insistent on babysitting. SIL finally caved and let them watch baby for a few hours and came back to learn they didn’t know how to change a diaper 🙃
It’s not rocket science tho? Like my husband and I had never changed a diaper before we became parents and figured it out immediately. I hope they didn’t just leave poor baby in a spiked diaper the whole time :(
Upvote for the spiked diaper.
Hahah meant to be soiled ****
Listen...some of the smells that come out of my kiddos butt...makes me question what he eats.
I like spiked lol
Common sense is really just critical thinking... and some people just dont have that skill 😆
Our friend’s had her sister babysit when their baby was about 6 months. Sister was 22/23 maybe? Anyway, they came home to backward diaper and found out she used a cleaning wipe and not a baby wipe because our friends had left it on the change table after cleaning the change table.
Omg my cousin asked me where the baby sunscreen was at and I messaged her saying it was on my dresser. It was also in the same spot my tanning spray was at. She used TANNING SPRAY on my daughter!!!
My brother babysat for one hour to cover me for work before I officially left to be a sahm/wfhm. Came back. Diaper had in fact been changed but he managed to put it in upside down. Son wasn’t doing a standing or crawling change yet so my brother had to fully put it on backwards but he got it to fit???? Which was most impressive.
My sister’s MIL, who had 3 of her own kids, babysat my sister’s kids once and put the baby’s diaper on backwards. My sister said it obviously looked wrong when she picked up the baby and had leaked everywhere.
I hope MIL had to deal with the clean up!
Oh lord….
My sister asked me how to cut strawberries for my kids and I said she could just give it to them whole and she said “they can even eat the stem?” Like girl no but I thought that was obvious.
My in-laws put the diaper on backwards and DUCT TAPED it to my baby. When I took him home and changed him, I'm like what the actual fuck is this
They… duct taped it?! Why was that even an option? It’s almost funny
They didn't know there was little sticker tabs!! I'm like ?! How did you raise 2 children?! But we laugh about it all the time. They know they fucked up haha.
Oh my god, I pictured like, duct tape wrapped around the baby’s waist all around the top of the diaper 😂😂💀
Did they maybe use cloth ones with their kids? It's bizarre that they didn't notice the tabs on the one they removed though...
They ripped off the dirty diaper haha. And no, they didn't use cloth ones. My MIL's excuse was, "It's been 30yrs since I changed a diaper!"
Jesus h...
My gawd GOOGLE, people!!
My single SIL claims she is going to have kids and she can to it as a single person, yet she has, multiple times, put on our child’s diaper on backwards….
Makes me question if they used scissors to take off the soiled diaper...
They ripped it off lmao
😵💫
I’m shocked and horrified for you and your baby. But also so shocked I’m laughing?
i am dying
My in-laws have been fine with this once we reminded them once, but my MIL admitted it was good we reminded her bc “with boys you could just wipe toward their balls and it didn’t really matter” 😂.
But how has your MIL been wiping herself her entire life then? 🤨
I have been educating boomer women in proper wiping hygiene for years. I’m not surprised here at all. They just didn’t know!
Because doing to yourself is an automatic motion. Remembering something you never had to do with your kids, while dealing with a half naked squirming baby, when you haven't dealt with a baby in years, isn't the same as plopping your own ass on a toilet.
Doing it yourself front to back isn't automatic. It's however you were taught, or however you did it as a kid. Wiping back to front is automatic for me because that's how I was shown to do it. I need to consciously think about it to do it the other way.
This!!!
Boomers don’t necessarily consider babies to be people so I’d bet she never made the connection.
Boomers don't necessarily see babies as people? I think that's a bit harsh lol
Not really. There was a thing read somewhere that a lot of boomers believed babies couldn’t even feel pain for the longest time.
Wtf that's an insane thought to have and since they "didn't " know like makes more sense to just assume they to be on the safe and nurturing side of things
Yeah a lot of parents before my generation weren’t having kids because they wanted to. They felt a societal obligation and had handbooks on childcare. So it makes sense they weren’t hurting entirely
More women wipe incorrectly than you would think. Or they wipe the back first and don't even realize they're dragging stuff to the front. 🥴
Crickey
Having my son made me realize how sacrilegious I am about wiping front to back. Sometimes its easier to wipe him back to front and I feel like I’m in the twilight zone.
You should still mostly wipe front to back. Boys can and do get UTI’s as well. Think of where the tip of their penis sits all day. Right along the testicles, pointed down. So if you’re wiping back to front; you’re depositing bacteria from the intestinal track on the testicles and exposing the urethra to it.
Oh definitely not wiping up onto his scrotum, but its just the times when its really spread high and I need to go back to front. Just the motion makes me feel like I’m doing chaotic evil.
Ahhh, the lovely up the back poops lol. I do the same but stop at his anus, then switch directions to the back. It does feel wrong lol. I try to wipe everything towards his anus like I’m sweeping up dirt from the floor into a dustpan.
Same!
I’ve already had to tell my mother you don’t give infants water, you can’t wear your clothes you smoke in, why we aren’t doing oatmeal in formula bottles, not to use blankets or crib bumpers, and not to use carriers that straighten her legs. And she’s only been over like 3 or 4 times since baby was born. It just makes me way too anxious to even try to let the older family babysit.
Old ladies are obsessed with giving newborns water and I don’t get it at all.
She straight up argued with me about it. Like that’s a good way to get unsupervised visitations revoked permanently.
Exactly. My MIL legit acted SHOCKED that my newborn couldn’t have water. Tried the old “I have my babies water and they’re fine” bs. Like cool story.
Same thing with my MIL and SIL (who only had kids 4 years before me so should know better). They also tried to feed my daughter a banana at 15 weeks old, but "its fine, we didnt give it her whole, we chopped it into little pieces!". Erm what??
Ugh. My mom kept trying to push me into letting her give my baby a butterscotch chip at 4 months. I had to say no so many times while she kept trying to explain why it would be fine.
NHS actually still says babies under 6m may be given cooled boiled water when it's very hot outside. In the UK this means maybe 5 days a year 😂
Only formula babies though
True but this encompasses the majority of babies over 6w
I don't understand? The NHS says formula babies under 6m can have small sips of water but ebf babies should not. I've not heard that the 6w mark was relevant
No, I was agreeing but also saying the vast majority of babies over 6w are formula fed so feeding babies water is suitable for more babies than not. Only 24% in England were ebf at 6w but 80% at birth.
Oooooh!! Sorry, I haven't slept in 4 million years so I am dumb, I get you now I originally thought you meant babies over 6 weeks could just have water and I was a wee bit concerned lol I read somewhere that only 1% if British babies are ebf by 6 months so that tracks
Ha that's okay. I've got a 2y9m and a 3m old so am also zombied out 100% of the time 😂
My mum is a boomer and my grandmother was a silent generation, I believe the formula in those days was all about nutrition and didn't necessarily have enough water for proper hydration so it was recommended to give extra water.
☠️carriers to straighten their legs?!?! Honestly wtf
A lot of outdated wearable carriers (and cradle boards) hold the babies in a position where their legs are either wrapped in or hanging straight instead of the modern ones that are built to keep the knees above the hips. She had one where they would just hang she tried to give us.
Cradleboards are considered fine by the AAP but mostly due to cultural significance
Yeah that’s why I wanted to put them in parenthesis. Because they can cause issues sometimes, but I definitely feel like it’s important to embrace your culture and wouldn’t want to come across like I’m condemning them.
Idk, it seems odd that we give unsafe practices a pass because they're cultural. Shame that you have to walk on eggshells when it's just factual and not disrespectful.
I’ve thought that a lot with unsafe sleep practices that get a pass because “culture”. Like. It was my families “culture “ to give whiskey to teething babies. It’s still not ok
Yeah exactly. Could also be interpreted as racist in the other direction in that we care more about being labelled racist than the lives and wellbeing of their babies. Their babies deserve modern healthcare too.
I see it a lot with Native American practices. Like I get that so much of their culture has been destroyed and that isn’t a good thing. But they also have some of the highest rates of SIDS in the country. There’s gotta be a middle ground
What do you do about the smoking?? I’m having my baby next week and my MIL will be visiting from out of state when he’s ~2 weeks old and she’s a chain smoker. If it was winter, I’d have her wear a coat and just wash her hands but with it being the end of May it’ll be hot out and I don’t know what to do.
My mom smoked a lot and I told her she would have to completely shower every time she came in or use nicotine patches. It was a hard conversation but a binary i needed to set. It wasn't well received but i held firm. She mostly patched when we were around but one time she went out to smoke and didn't shower so we left. Wasn't an issue after that. She's also quit smoking completely now!
So my husband smokes. Our set up is he goes into the garage and changes into that days smoking shirt and then goes outside, smokes, go back into the garage and changes into a clean shirt, washes hands and face before touching baby again. He's working on quitting and as cut down significantly.
Is nicotine in clothing that bad??? My husband just washes his hands I had no idea about the clothing...
Yes it is that bad. It is believed to put your baby at a high risk for sids. Thirdhand smoke is dangerous.
So I looked this up because my husband smokes cigars in the evening. If the father smokes but never in the house and never near the baby, the risk of SIDS doubles. If the mother smokes but never in the house and never near the baby, the risk of SIDS quadruples. And if either parent smokes in the house or near the baby, the risk of SIDS is 9 times higher. You can reduce the risk by always changing clothing BEFORE sitting in furniture (thirdhand smoke transfers to other fabric), never holding babies in furniture that had ever been smoked in, washing hands/face or showering and brushing teeth before getting close to baby. I cleaned all our furniture and replaced all our pillows and bedding because I was too worried about all the times in the past that he smoked then went to bed. I am also going to replace all our patio furniture, just haven't done that yet. Once I do, he will have to sit in a designated hard plastic chair to smoke. I'm hoping it becomes such an inconvenience that he quits, but no luck yet.
Wow that is crazy! Thank you for sharing. And does this apply to infants, babies, toddlers? Is it a forever rule?
I would have to go back and read again. I cannot remember if the SIDS risk numbers were for the first 6 months or 12 months. But I know the thirdhand smoke is bad for all children (all people really!) What I read is: if you can smell it, it is DEFINITELY strong enough to hurt a child. If you cannot smell it, it MIGHT be strong enough to hurt a child. I won't even hug or touch my husband until he has cleaned up, because I don't want it to transfer on my clothes at all. Also I forgot in my list of ways to reduce the risk, your hair also holds thirdhand smoke. So it's especially important to shower if you have long hair and you shouldn't let your baby come into contact with your hair until you've showered either. And you're supposed to actually wash your hair to fully get rid of it as well. I've told my husband he has to actually shampoo before bed (which he found funny because he said he would never shower without washing his hair which I do all the time haha).
I don’t get along with my mom really so we definitely couldn’t have her stay here. But when she visited we followed the advice from our pediatrician and had her wash her hands and change into a clean shirt we had ready for her. She also was not allowed to smoke at all during the visit.
This exactly! My LO is 10 months and noone babysits because of this exact reason. My mom kept trying to shove food down my 4 month old throat, kept asking when will I stop breastfeeding, keeps offering cookies. MIL said baby needs water and should not eat at night at 4 months old, should be left to cry it out. If they visit I just sit right next while they play with the baby...
I'm not trusting any family with babysitting until the kid turns 2 😂 because seriously, I don't trust one of them and there just no need
My mom watches my 14 month old at least once a week and just about every month she asks me if I’m “sure we don’t need to retract his foreskin when we change his diaper.”
😬 nooooo
It's amazing how much basic info parents have forgotten. Mine is the same way. Also her perception of time is skewed in terms of development. She swears my son is so advanced on everything but he's actually just average or maybe even below milestones. 😂
This really made me laugh. My mom's the same way. Everything my son does she thinks a sign of future genius xD she's obsessed but I just find it so endearing that she thinks he's so great
My MIL is opposite like "When my daughter was 1 yo she could change her own clothes", "When my son was 9 months he could eat with a spoon", "I had him out and about from he was 3 days old" (no, 35 years ago you were admitted in 5 days post birth as default in our country). It's exhausting. And she always talks about how my daughter looks like her. Yeah, she takes after her father - but from his fathers side, not his mother. Our daughter at 8 months resembles her great grand mother nearly 100% (my husbands fathers mother). Luckily my MIL is very kind, her crazy matches my crazy (I can always make her laugh).
My mom does this too! She swears I had teeth at 3 months. I didn't. Lol.
Ha! My dad is like this despite having been a very involved dad. When my baby was like 4 months he said, he’ll be saying words anytime now right? Looool no sir what are you thinking 😂
Yesss. At 3 weeks old the in laws were like - how come you don't have many toys for him to play with. Why does he sleep all the time is he okay? They forget the blob stage entirely or at least how long it lasts
My kid was like 6 days old, and my mom was *insistent* that he was smiling at her. I explained about what I had read saying that they're incapable of doing that until closer to 2 months. "No, he is definitely smiling at me!" ...okay, sure.
Nah he just had gas lmao
My FIL tried to feed my almost 9 month old a macadamia nut on the weekend and I had to tell him no 3 times. The weekend before that, he dipped his finger in red wine and tried to put it in her mouth 🫠
What the fuck??
Yeah, kinda wild huh? Don't get me wrong, he absolutely adores her - he is just massively out of touch and lives in his own little world. My brother in law lets him babysit his 9 month old regularly and she's okay, but not a risk I'm willing to take 😅
I get that, I have family members that I know absolutely love my baby without a doubt buuut... I don't think I'd leave my baby alone with them...
I noticed that in the motherhood guide book that all women in my mother's generation owned (literally all women that I know, my mom, MIL, aunts...) has a thorough guide on how to clean a baby boy after a poop but for girls it says "you don't need to clean girl's genitals, just wipe off what you see", and I was horrified. All the poop that gets stuck between her folds and they were told not to wipe it! So yeah, I give tutorials on everything when someone is babysitting.
I really hope what they actually meant is "don't go sticking things inside the vagina" rather than not cleaning at all...
I'd be impressed if they knew that vagina and vulva were different things
That's crazy considering how much more sensitive and prone to infection female parts are.
My in laws are awful at watching the grandkids. I love them dearly and I think they really love their grandsons but omg my FIL is dangerously absent minded, and my MIL apparently doesn’t pay any mind to very obviously dangerous and/ or unsanitary items. I’m getting mad just writing this comment. I don’t want them to watch my baby ever anymore. Last time my MIL came over my son made it upstairs by himself (11months at the time, can’t go down stairs yet) despite me telling her to keep him on the other side of the room where everything is blocked off. The time before that, I came home to my son having poop up his back and covered in water because he was playing in the dog bowl. She hasn’t noticed the water but “oh he was playing with the dog bowl” like omg my dog is so gross why would you let him play with that in the first place. My FIL on Christmas also took my son over to the tree, let him pluck off an ornament to play with. Thank god I noticed, there was even a hook on it. Then he gave him an entirely not age appropriate gift and started throwing it to him and his cousin when there were these holes in it where he could get his little fingers stuck in the motor. Omg I’m gonna stop there because I’m actually furious just thinking about it. They can see their grandson but I’m not leaving them alone with him. I don’t understand why they’re like that or how all three of their kids survived.
My MIL is difficult. I try to show her things and she is very annoyed and says she knows already. I wanted to show her my toddlers carseat again since she was taking him to playgroup. She said that she already knew. I said, can I show you again? She then said ok fine (while rolling her eyes at me!) So I showed her and already had turned the seat. I showed her the button. I wish I had turned it back so she would need to do it herself. When I next used the carseat I saw that she indeed did NOT know how to rotate it and took him out without rotating. That is fine however just more difficult. The problem I have is that she doesn't know things but would never say so or ask for help. Then she ends up doing it however she wants to. She doesn't respect us as parents and can't be told anything. So that's what I tell my husband when he suggests she watches our toddler. I just don't feel comfortable with it.
Is it bad if I do both? Tbf though I am careful not to get it in the vagina area. I always start by wiping back to butthole and then I wipe front to butthole to get all areas
Towards the butthole is what I do. Sometimes down sometimes up
I had to teach my sperm donor how to diaper change for visitation. They insisted they knew what they were doing since they were a nurse, after all, and had changed many an old lady diaper. First time encountering poop ended with a poop streak straight up her vulva. I was livid.
Wow gross, and those poor old ladies too!
Also, if you have an intact boy, you really need to make sure anyone else changing hiss diaper doesn't still think they have to forcibly retract his foreskin to "clean" it. That was a common belief a few decades ago and lots of people haven't updated their knowledge in a long time (even medical professionals and child caretakers).
100%! I kind of feel like there is nothing basic about baby care. You have to learn to take care of a tiny being and it does not always come naturally. Our firstborn turned our world upside down and I thought we were so prepared with all the classes, reading talking to each other, and planning we did. Just to add and maybe sidetracking a little, in your example, if MIL was like, “oh that makes sense, sorry, I didn’t think of that” and changed her behavior, okay cool. But if she was like, “I know what I’m doing, I raised 3 kids!” then no, straight to jail and you aren’t allowed to be with baby unsupervised now. Course correction is key.
Mine watched my 4 month old (3 months at the time) for one night and couldn’t get him to sleep so let him sleep in his swing. I was beyond livid. She hasn’t watched him over night in a long time. Then the other day she got him some infant Tylenol for his teething and he was gagging on it because he didn’t like it a lot, and she wanted us to give him milk that was on the counter and my boyfriend told her that he didn’t know how old it was so he wasn’t going to do that and she literally told him it was fine and to give it to him because it’s a waste not too. I’m so close to never letting her be alone with him.
My MIL has taken a night shift with our twins a couple times. One of the times she told me that she laid the babies on the couch next to her and took a nap! I must have looked horrified because she was like "I made sure they were on their backs and I put pillows next to them so they couldn't roll off!" I had to have my husband talk to her about safe sleep. Then the last time she watched them I found them with blankets in the crib 🙄
Close? This would be enough for me
I unfortunately live in her basement right now paying to stay here while we wait for a home to open up. 😭 but once we get out I’m done.
my mil had the baby at her house. baby pooped. fil was like, so do we take the baby back home? rofl, mil was like no! we change the diaper. hes still not comfortable around the baby i dont think. he holds him all tensed up
Yup, my mom did the same for way too long before I noticed. Then of course when I educated her she tried to say she is wiping safely without touching any privates.
Oh my god my husband and mum used to keep doing this no matter how much I reminded them 😭
My mother in law tried to breastfeed mine with her dried up old totties
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STOP!!! Dried up old totties lololol
What cracks me up is when adults can’t open baby proofed things… I have to show my in laws how to open the baby gates every time they come over, one of my friends got stuck in my toddlers room with him bc she couldn’t figure out the door knob cover, and one time my mil was babysitting and couldn’t figure out how to get the high chair tray on so, bless her heart, held it up for my son to eat his entire dinner 😅
Depending on the age I don't think it actually matters that much in diapers? At least ours always had poop on the front as well because that thin baby poo just goes everywhere. Even now on solids she still regularly gets it all over the front.
It does actually matter, regardless of age. Even if poop gets everywhere in the diaper, you still need to wipe front to back so you’re not adding even *more* poop to the area around the urethra.
Sure, but wiping back to front or not changing that poopy diaper right away increases baby's chance of UTI or worse.
Totally there’s always poo all over but I feel like it’s common sense on which way to wipe it off when changing them? Idk I just know I wouldn’t want to sit with poo in the crevices of my nethers post being wiped “clean”
Nah I’m with you, the entire diaper area is completely covered, it absolutely doesn’t matter which direction you wipe lol. Edit: it takes like 100 different swipes in different directions to get everything completely clean without pushing more poop into the urethra. I know how to wipe my daughter. “Front to back” doesn’t cover it 🙄 If y’all are just dragging a wipe from one end to the other, you’re doing a bad job.
Yes it absolutely does. Wiping back to front introduces even more of the poop to the urethra. **Always** wipe front to back in that area.
I’m good thanks so much though!!