I've overcome my pissed-offness about the smoking issue from the other night. Thanks to those who posted to me. I'm glad I'm not the only one who feels that smoke is downright awful.
Now I have another thing that I fail to understand. While sitting at the dinner table at Easter, my ILs continued to give my son pop. Caffeine-free Diet Coke to be exact. Now I do understand the grandparent spoiling thing, and I hope to have the priviledge of spoiling my little grandbabies someday, too. I do not however, understand the need to constantly give the child pop, or caffeinated ice-tea at 7:30 at night, but that's another story. I also get a bit peeved when Jeff or I ask them to not give him any more and we are mocked, and Steve continues to get fed more pop. I mean, we are the parents. Sidenote: we don't have a problem with a few sips of pop as a 'treat', but that's it. At any rate, as we are being mocked the conversation turns to when Jeff was a baby. Yes, the old and 'he turned out fine' speech. AKA Bev: listen up. You are too overprotective. Apparently, Jeff's aunt and uncle who never had kids, for good reason we believe, talked about when they babysat Jeff when he was 3 months old and put Pepsi in his bottle. I turned to Jeff's sister and told her, "And they wonder why they don't babysit Steve." Well, of course, the aunt heard, and was offended. Do I feel guilty? NO! If you are dumb enough to think that it was EVER ok to feed an infant Pepsi, then you deserve to hear what I said. Anyway, Jeff's parents laughed, and talked about putting a straw into a cup when Jeff was young and feeding him pop too. They continued to laugh, as my face looked on mortified I'm sure, and said,"I think he turned out just fine." So I say,"Yah, he's just struggled with his weight." Either I was not heard, which is possible, or I was ignored because as usual I was being overprotective in their minds. I thought about all the problems Jeff has had with his teeth too. I mean do these people watch the news and hear about all the problems with childhood obesity and cavities? I mean the doctors are going ballistic about JUICE, let alone POP. It blows my mind.
Steve loves milk and water, yes water. He will drink juice SOMETIMES. I have bought pineapple juice because he loves pineapples; he hates it. I bought tomato juice; he hates it. I bought apple juice, not a fan of that either. Hates orange juice, too. So I have backed off on juice. My MIL feels the child should have juice. Both of my ILs feel we are mean for giving him water, even though it is recommended by our doctor and he LOVES it. I have made my peace with juice though. When we go out with Jeff parents, they can order him juice if it makes them feel better. Choose your battles. I think juice in moderation is fine actually. It's just Steve doesn't like it so why force him to drink it?
The other thing that has been keeping me awake lately is what do they give him to drink when we're not around? I have resigned myself that when they babysit him, which is only occassionally these days, that whatever he drinks is fine. It's only one night. But now I am actually worried about the 4-5 days they will be watching him when I am in the hospital. I tell myself that I probably won't care as I'll be in la-la land at that point, but I do care. I also am worrying about my routine being shot to hell while they are with him. I have worked hard to get a general rountine going and it's worked very well. Now is not the time to change that routine. Especially with a new baby, kids cling to routine. By routine, I am not talking about a nap that strictly takes place at 12:00 sharp; I 'm talking more about the order of things. A friend of mine commented on how she sent her own mother home, because in her words, "Everything was a mess. Everything was out of order and I couldn't take it anymore." She had a c-section and was still in pain, but favored toughing it out physically than dealing with the disorder that her home now had. I can understand that actually. My brother has also offered to take Steve too, so this is an option. I do think that Jeff's parents coming to the house is a good thing, though. So we'll see. I also know they love him, but we do have different parenting styles. I know it is common to feel what worked for your child, regardless of how old said child is, will work for all. But the truth of the matter is we are his parents, and like they did 30 years+ ago, we will do what we feel is best for our child. Things change, some for the better, some for the worse, but we are the ones responsible for him and we will do what we feel is right. Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but as the old saying goes, "If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all.'
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