17 month old being denied solid food

@Bluebelle yes the baby's cough is better and he has his voice back. I wouldn't say she's "the much disliked daughter in law" as I did like her until she started to be so unreasonable.

Alexa thanks for replying to my post but I really don't care anymore. #willtolive

Can't see what "stress" you've had Lavazza1st. Any you may have had I think you've brought on yourself. Did you meet her before having her come to live with you? She probably simply doesn't like you.

Let her stay in her room if she wants to. If it were me, that would suit me fine. Get on with your own life.

MissAdventure - reality check - there is nothing we can do.

How long has your daughter in law lived in this country ?

Take the pram cover to Oxfam.

baby blanket

gonegirl if you really cant see the stress the OP has had then

Obviously the main concern on this thread is the baby's welfare but I am afraid your standard of living is not up to your DIL's expectations and what you or your son can do about this I don't know. Homesickness and shock at such a different way of life must be difficult for her, I wonder if she thought you had servants and a lot more money.

I work in a post office and the Chinese are always sending boxes of formula milk back home

Agnurse, I agree and the sooner registered st a practice the better.

@lulaugust you may be right. We can't live beyond our means and we aren't a well off family but we do support our own and we are supporting them while son looks for work and beyond til he has money to rent a place. After we bought everything they could possibly want or need for our Grandchild, we expected they would be happy.

I do feel like saying "what did your last slave die of!" but I won't. Her Grandma spoilt her and did all the washing, cleaning, cooking and babycare- so naturally she will miss that. But I expected her to realise things here are culturally different. Before she came, I arranged to take a long lunch each day to care for the toddler between 12 and 2 so she could have a break. This was a huge compromise for me.

I'm sure she must be homesick and missing the Chinese way of life. I think they should have come for a holiday really, rather than trying to come to live in a country she doesn't seem to have researched and customs she doesn't seem willing to embrace. But I'm not going to say that!

I have done everything possible to be kind and nice. It's probably not enough, but I am only human and we also care for elderly relatives and still have kids in education at home too.

My husband does not want to make them "too welcome" so he will not be changing the things they don't like because he does not want them living with us long term. They aren't paying rent or anything, so we feel they should be grateful for our support and see it as a stop gap. Both of us have been really ill since they came, due to the stress they've caused. DH doesn't have time to work on the house, has a manual job and gets very tired due to copd and age. So they will have to put up and shut up.

Please note, I have not said ANY of the above TO them! I'm not a horrid person! We don't really feel they have thought things through though...

I think you are putting so much emphasise on the poor daughter in law, why not the son he’s the one who didn’t think it through and brought her here, to live with his already busy/ill/ hard working / not very rich family ...poor girl
You keep going on about cultural difference but nothing really jumps out you say she was spoilt rotten my her grandmother I can think of many many English girls who are spoilt rotten by family that not cultural at all

You have two choices get on with life helping where you can with a pleasant heart or ask them to leave and let your son sort his own family dynamics out, but to do everything so reluctantly is really going to be detrimental for you all

Yes its my son who has no doubt lied about a "land of milk and honey" to get her here. He can be very manipulative and has done his utmost to beat me into (his) submission. He has failed though, so is now resorting to taking pot shots against me and making sure we can't spend time with the baby.

As I said, before they came I agreed to take care of the baby between 12 and 2 every day and I have been helping where I can, as cheerfully as I can. Obviously I've said things here which I've kept to myself. My son has been trying to create drama and I do believe he doesn't want his wife and I to talk because he has been worse to me since I've been including her in things.

I'm in Australia at present. Baby formula is restricted to 2 purchases per customer per visit in the supermarkets as the Chinese are trying to buy it by the trolley load and causing a shortage. They take/send it back to China where apparently each tin can be sold for up to 200 Au dollars which is around £112

Is that because of the contaminated baby milk scandal? I thought that they had overcome that.

2 weeks is such a short time and I can totally understand the mum wanting to focus on feeding things that are familiar to her. There are bound to be huge cultural differences in what is considered good/bad food.

I remember when I had my children in Sweden there were a lot of feeding traditions that seemed very odd to me. Babies are given a lot of liquid foods such as serving a type of runny porridge/gruel (välling) in a bottle twice a day to babies from 6 months until around 8-9 years. From a UK perspective giving porridge in a bottle seemed very strange as you are told not to add grains or rusks to bottles but the Swedes swear by it. They also give toddlers a butter or cheese made from caramelized goat milk (mesmör/ mesost) which are totally disgusting imho - but they feel the same about marmite!

Jalima
"China's tainted milk scandal, combined with the scrapping of the one-child policy, poor long-term breastfeeding rates and clever marketing, continue to drive strong demand for formula."

@Cold that sounds odd and a bit yukky, but yes of course other cultures find marmite gross
If the Mum would actually plan his meals, I would be totally happy but she takes no interest. In the absence of effort/interest/input I have been doing my best to provide a range of nutritionally balanced meals.
There ARE many Chinese supermarkets nearby where she could go and buy him familiar foods, but she does not. I have gone there a few times, but he does not seem keen on the things I bought and everything is in Chinese.
I have now succeeded in getting them to register with a Health Visitor! (Hooray!)

@Marmight yes there is a lot of profit to be made on milk powder in China, though I hear that the government are trying to crack down on this now. Apparently people were taking it over the border from HK into mainland China but now only one tin a day can be taken per person.