Seeking the formula for parenting

Blogger Content: September 2006 - April 2010

Flexible Links

My Blogging Inspiration
Campaign for Unshaved Snatch (CUSS) & Other Rants

Flexible Affiliations


Parent Bloggers Network
- Crazy/Hip Blog-Mamas+
(Random Site)
A Member of Bust's Girl Wide Web
Parenting Blogs - Blog Top Sites
blog search directory
Search For Blogs, Submit Blogs, The Ultimate Blog Directory

Monday, May 14, 2007

MIL in Training

How can I mention Mother's Day without attempting a humorous reflection on mothers-in-law (MILs). Some women and men are blessed to have wonderful relationships with their MILs. Others struggle. There are too many reasons to list why someone might have a bumpy relationship, or no relationship for that matter, with their MIL. I think my own MIL would be the first to say that at the beginning we had our ups and downs, but we've both really tried to work things out and now enjoy being around each other even though we still have our differences (at least I think so). I have to say in my frustrations with the yard sale, she was my number one supporter! Individual cases of MIL relationships aside, one thing that seems to be a source of contention (and rumor may have it that I just may have commented on this to my own friends) is criticisms from MILs. You know what I'm talking about. The "I can't believe what my MIL just said!" That person, usually a woman, then proceeds to tell how her MIL gave her some unsolicited or aggressive advice and totally offended her in the process.

I've often wondered where that came from? This need to give unsolicited or aggressive advice. O.K. maybe often is a strong word and a better choice would be I've wondered a couple of times. It's not like they woke up one day and decided that from now on they were going to make an effort to get their DILs worked up whenever they talked to them. Although you never know...

Recently I've noticed the tendency of many of my my friends and me to give unsolicited advice. That's what this whole blog is about! Seriously, before kids my friends would give me advice and I would give them advice. That's just what friends do, but it was usually on larger things in life and not minute little things like how to cut finger nails better. Now that I have kids, I sometimes feel that when hearing advice either given to me by friends with kids or better yet when I've heard myself give advice, if the friend or I just changed our voices to sound in our 60's we would sound exactly like a MIL! I've started calling this MIL in Training. Sometimes I have to bite my lip to keep from laughing when I witness this.

Take Saturday for example. Two of my close friends and I spent the day in Boston having a girls day out. Crystal is expecting for the first time. She asked Linda and me some questions about parenting, childbirth etc. At the beginning of the day, Linda and I were both very careful to encourage Crystal to develop her own opinions, to point out every childbirth and every child is different. You can't make generalizations etc. By the end of the day, we were all in Borders reading Baby Bargains. The three of us began to engage in a conversation over baby products. All of the sudden I realized a lot of time had gone by during discussions of high chairs, the need for a swing, breast pumps etc. and Crystal was no longer participating in our conversation. Truth be told she looked a little frightened of us, and Linda and I were expressing almost identical viewpoints about baby gear! That's when it hit me: it was a prime example of MIL in Training! We apologized profusely yet continued our discussion. It was just so hard to stop.

For me, it was because it was a topic that I felt like I was an expert at. I enjoyed being able to share my opinion. Why see Crystal spend the time and effort to register for a baby product that clearly Linda and I knew was inferior (so imagine this last statement said in a 60 year old voice!) We had been there, used it and felt, although we probably wouldn't admit it, that Crystal could just learn from our mistakes. At least we refrained from giving her baby wipes from our purses to wipe her hands after we had a snack. I could see how MILs can get a bad rap.

Here's an example from this week when I was on the other side of the fence. I'm very pleased that I've gone down a whole jean size. After both busting my butt (so to speak) working out and watching what I eat since December, I am finally starting to lose weight. I'm pretty psyched about it. I decided I wanted to meet with a personal trainer because I'm beginning to find my workouts a little boring. I thought it would be great to get some new ideas. I told a bunch of people about this. I explained exactly what I just wrote. I have to say all of them except Linda, who congratulated me on losing weight and looking good, immediately focused on how much I would be able to benefit from working out and meeting with a personal trainer. It actually made me feel a little, do I dare admit it, bad about myself. It left me thinking "Did you not just hear that I've been busting my butt and eating well since December? I've gone down a whole jean size!" It's as if all of my progress was dismissed. A little support and acknowledgment of both my accomplishment and my plan to get new ideas would be nice. MIL in Training :)

A. Elliott's Lesson Learned: Change the tone of any advice delivered to that of a 60 year-old's voice and voila, a MIL comment is created.

Labels: ,

posted by Alex Elliot @ 7:47 PM   2 comments
2 Comments:
Post a Comment
Home
 

My Profile

Name:Alex Elliot
Home:MA, United States
About Me:Professional Mom of two cats, a dog, an ant farm, and oh yeah...two boys: a 6 year old and a 3 year old. Also found in my house is my husband who is known on this blog as The Big Giraffe.
See my complete profile

Flexible Media Appearances

The Morning Show with Mike and Juliet, Fox TV, August 3, 2007

Flexible Feeds

More Flexible Parenting

Grasshopper New Media Parents
Just Cause
Birth Days

Flexible Categories

Previous Posts

Archives

For those of us who didn't get an instruction manual with our babies and for whom parenting hasn't always gone as planned. On a more serious note this blog is about supporting a woman's ability to make her own choices about parenting including the choice, for whatever reason, to bottle feed her babies formula.

Powered by Blogger
© Formula Fed and Flexible Parenting


Creative Commons License
Formula Fed and Flexible Parenting by Alex Elliot is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.

Template Design based on one produced by isnaini dot com