Grandma Banned From Watching Grandson After ‘Crossing Boundary’

The story, posted to an anonymous forum, featured a 23-year-old struggling to manage boundaries with her mother after moving back into her childhood home — bringing along her 24-year-old husband and six-month-old son.

Of course, disputes over child rearing ensued — leading to drama that ultimately spilled out onto Reddit.

The tale seemed to divide many in the forum, with plenty of parental advice being doled out along with some empathy from those who could relate to the challenges the original poster (a.k.a. “OP”) faced.

Read on to see how the whole thing played out.

OP kicked off the post by sharing some background information: “I (F23) and my husband (M24) welcomed our baby (M) in September of last year. We moved from his hometown to mine (in January) in hopes of saving up to buy a house. We moved in with my mom (50); something she very enthusiastically agreed to.”

“Throughout our few months, she’s been a little weird,” she explained. “She’s constantly checking to see if he has teeth, pushing for us to stop feeding him milk, tries to give him really complicated food (like candy yams). Her defense is: I did with you and you survived.”

“Most recently, she was holding him and playfully asked him if he wanted water, in which I responded: ‘Do not give him water mom.’ She proceeds to give it him and goes: ‘See, he’s fine. He isn’t dead.’

Then came OP’s swift reaction.

“I immediately took my child from her and informed her that she will no longer be watching the baby alone since she is constantly overstepping my boundaries and doing everything I ask her to not do.”

“She isn’t talking to me now and told me I made her feel like a bad parent and grandparent.”

She then asked, “AITA [am I the a–hole]? Is there something I should be doing to make her talk to me?”

Two updates followed.

“I pay half the mortgage, utilities, buy my own food to cook with. I don’t rely on her for childcare. Just want to clear that up since I’m seeing a few comments about it,” OP wrote in the first “edit” to the post.

“For some more context: my father was diagnosed with kidney and lung cancer and can’t work,” she later added, in another update. “He lives in rehab that my mom pays for. Moving in with her was to help my husband and I save; it also helps her since he can’t work.”

The post proved to be wildly popular — clearly hitting a nerve among young parents on Reddit.

The highest rated comment quoted the grandma saying “he survived” and noted “This is an incredibly low standard for her to be proud of maintaining.”

Which elicited this observation from a fellow Redditor: “Yep! This is called survivor bias and it’s dangerous.”

While another was thrown down a dark memory lane, writing: “Your comment reminded me of my grandma’s funeral. The best any of her children could muster was ‘well…. She never beat us’ […] Hell of a eulogy, and literally the only one she got.”

One Redditor seemed to exemplify the overwhelming response on the forum, which was not to necessarily weigh into the family drama but instead offer their own unsolicited medical advice. Specifically, whether or not infants can drink water or milk: “6/7 months, it’s safe to give a baby water. You mentioned milk, not formula. If it’s cows milk, before a year is a huge No-no.”

The comment continued to reiterate those same points at length.

OP replied to that Redditor, noting: “Thank you for this. It’s not the water part that bothered me, it’s just the part where she did it even after I asked her not to.”

Elsewhere, she shared that her son was “breastfed and has never been introduced to water. I feed him yams and sweet potatoes all the time, but they are plain. My mom gave him yams cooked down in sugar.”

OP also divulged some of her interactions with the child’s doctor: “Pediatrician told us we didn’t need to give him water any time soon. He’s breastfeeding for the most part; a formula bottle every now and then.”

In another reply, she clarified she does take some of her mom’s advice to heart, writing: “I ask for her advice all the time and she does have some good gems. I always let her know of my rules with my child. I’m not saying I’m an expert in all childcare, but she’s also not an expert in what’s best for the child I carried and pushed out.”

“I pray she gets the fullest joy of having her first grandchild,” she added. “But right now, I just need her to respect my boundaries. Show me you can have a good time with him and still be mindful of what I want as a parent.”

Other comments on the post shared horror stories of friends’ children who died because food rules were not obeyed — showing the importance of heeding up-to-date medical advice.

While some comments simply asked why infants shouldn’t drink water, to which OP replied: “Water intoxication can happen if a baby has too much water. It’s recommended to wait until after 6 months when a baby can start to handle it.”

Of course, when it came to actual advice to the question posed on the forum, the lion’s share of comments suggested she move her and her family out in order to save her relationship with her own mother.

What do you think?