Mum Looking For Grans Advice

Thank you so much for all of your helpful and kind advice. I am so grateful for the quick and well thought out responses. I feel so validated and supported by women i dont know and love you all for it. To answer some questions -

Yes i exclusively breastfeed and my daughter refuses the bottle - this has been godsend in this drama. FIL has expressed his frustration about this and has also said 'theres nothing wrong with formula' - so very supportive.

In regards to restrictions, I live in Northern Ireland and we are allowed to visit one household as part of our 'bubble' which is my in laws house - they are 5 minutes up the road by car.

I am still on maternity leave, my MIL is a housewife and FIL has been working from home the past year. He works in sales and only needs to make/receive a few calls a day to get the job done. I guess this exacerbates things as he may feel that our close proximity and all his available time at home means he should be seeing her more.

In regards to the sensitive topic of a man needing alone time with his GD - i am so thankful i hear an echo to my own thoughts in this forum. I was too afraid to say this in my initial post as it is so awful to consider. I REALLY hate this part of my conundrum. I had to tell my H as he kept taking my daughter to a back room of the house to rock her on the bed when she was crying and it made me so uncomfortable. My H was understandably upset by the insidious nature of my concern but followed my FIL down on a few occasions to 'check in' on him. In the end he was always just perched on the edge of the bed rocking my D as he is unable to do so on other chairs in the house - also related to his physical abilities affected by his weight. I still do not feel confident though about his need to be alone with her and i know that for me to make any mention of this to my FIL would cause irreparable damage to our relationship.

I think following what i have read from you all i will stick to my guns. I have looked up assertiveness training resources today and aim to put boundaries in practice - i am so bad at this! Hopefully the boundaries discussion can be a productive one.

So glad to hear this Sienmum. Never worry about causing’ irreparable damage’. If that happens....so be it. The absolute priority is your daughter. Everything else pales into insignificance. All the best ?

Six months from now your DD will be crawling/possibly walking, and real little wriggle-bum. How on earth can your FiL, overwaeight and a heavy drinker, even pretend that he could cope with a normal toddler, they wriggle, run or crawl away from fit healthy alert parents and put themselves at risk.

Your FiL sees your daughter 3-4 times a week? He shouldn't be complaining about babysitting and the like he should be on his knees thanking you for being able to see her so often. A very large proportion of grandparents, would consider such access heaven. For all sorts of reasons, distance, illness and, sadly, in some cases, estrangement many grandparents are lucky to see them once a month. My DGC live 200 miles away. We have a close relationship with parents and children and, even without COVID, we have only ever seen them every month to 6 weeks.

I stopped reading when you wrote he almost crashed your child

Fil is out of the picture, to revisit babysitting till:
1. He is one year sober
2. Apologizes for his lack of safety and putting your child in danger
3. He doesnt ask for babysitting, he waits for you to initiate

Now the bad news, your mil.
Are they still married and live in the same house? If so, she could leave your child with fil to make him happy, she could leave your child with him and not tell you

You are way under reacting- i would stop visits with fil till he is sober and depending on mil's behaviour, just supervised for her.

Your fil almost harmed your child more than once, he could kill your baby!

Is the heavy drinking openly acknowledged, or do you all politely ignore it? Does he sit with a glass in his hand and a bottle at his side, or does he secretly go for a refill or even drink secretly?
A sip of whisky at bedtime isn't exactly anything to worry about but if he's drunk before lunch then you're in trouble.
His wanting to be alone with her sounds more sinister however - is that what you really mean? That he's not happy just talking baby talk with her in a room full of people -- does he actually want to be alone in another room with a baby girl?
That is the elephant in the room.
Stay away from this man.

Trust your instincts, you are mum and you know what is right for your baby,
You don't seem to want to leave your baby alone with him so that's what you should avoid doing.

Personally I would be very suspect in his desire to be alone with her. This is the social worker in me talking. I share the concerns about the health issues but would have to question the persistent desire to be alone with her. I would say do not allow this please.