Am I wrong for getting mad about this, regarding my daughter?

The only thing that it seems you’re “wrong” about is expecting such an irrationally defensive and self-righteous person to have a reasonable discussion of “things that could be done better.”

Good luck with that.

No, you are not wrong for wanting to discuss it. It is a damned legitimate issue. I feel like I am the one who usually blows up on my partner, so let me explain from my perspective: when I do blow up prematurely, it is because I feel as if I have been indicted in some mishap, that I am to blame for the bad thing happening, so I immediately rush to my own defense. No, it’s not rational, but it is a knee-jerk reaction. I need to work on that, and so does your partner. Ask her calmly, what does she feel she needs to be so defensive about?

By the way, you might both be at fault here regarding the tumbtacks. Try something else, something more secure and safer.

She saw the thumbtacks on the bed. That should have been enough. I would have let it go there.
When someone is wrong, you don’t need to shove their face in it.

Personally, after reading all the details I was thinking you both need help from a relationship counselor in regards to your communication skills as a couple.

No, you are not wrong. It appears she overreacted and doesn’t see things in a sensible, rational, and mature manner. A person with common sense and maturity would see to it that the safety of his/her child is of utmost priority, and a discussion of this should be paramount and not have to “wait” until it’s convenient! I wonder why she is so often “negatively reactive” when you want to discuss things about the baby. As caregivers/parents, the two of you should be able to work together, but she always appears to put up a roadblock by getting upset at you. From being “happy” one minute, then blowing up the next, your partner might do good with some counselling (with all due respect), otherwise, I can see a lifetime of this sort of unstable behavior from her. There seems to be something else in her life bothering her, and this needs to be resolved.

@filmfann I don’t understand what you’re trying to say.

No, you’re not wrong for being upset about it. That was a potentially dangerous situation and should not have happened. That being said, it is one thing to stick a poster on the wall with thumbtacks, because if you pull on the poster, it will just tear. Putting a blanket on the wall with thumbtacks is not safe, because a simple tug on the blanket will pop the thumbtacks out, no matter how firmly they’re pushed in.

Why is it so important to hear that she is wrong? Instead of looking to assign blame or looking for someone to accept the fault, even if you haven’t directly assigned blame; talk it overly and go on with life.

You pointed it out to her, that should have been OK. If she is a repeat offender on the safety issues, maybe this is something you need to consider when she is watching your child.

I doubt that she gave a lot of thought to your daughter pulling the blanket down. She was looking for a solution to help her sleep. I realize that tacks are dangerous; and yes, I agree that they really have no place in a child’s room, but I’m a mom. I think of the 20 different scenarios before I do something. It may not seem that way, but I run things through in my mind and understand if it’s something I think is OK or not, for children.

I’m not saying she was being careless, I think she probably was just trying to help with one issue. In her mind, she did do something positive, but now she’s only hearing the negative. Consider how it may come across.

Also, I know she said it was OK to call her, but I don’t think her workplace is the right arena for this issue. You’re putting her on the spot at work and really, I don’t think that is the right place for this discussion. It doesn’t matter where her mood was, at that moment, she also may not have felt like she could really approach this, at that moment.

I think this situation could have been handled on both sides. Also, if you saw it, knew it was hung with thumb tacks, why didn’t you fix it – before it could have become an issue?

I don’t blame you for being upset – it was a potentially dangerous situation – but I can kind of see her side of it too. She was probably embarrassed that what she had done had upset you, and was more worried about that aspect of it than about the potential safety issue.

Is it a fairly new relationship? Are you both parents of the child? She may also be offended and under the impression that you think she’s a bad mother.

Give her a little time to cool down, and talk about it when you both are relaxed and have time. In the meantime, get a blackout blind for baby’s room and install it properly.

I don’t think you are wrong getting mad, but I don’t think showing your anger is a good idea in this situation.

Instead of blaming your partner for what went wrong, praise her for the good idea and ask her to help you find a better way to implement it.

I doubt she intended to endanger the child, there really is no need to place the blame for every thing that happens on someone. Sometimes stuff just happens and you have to blow it off. It is more important to create a safe environment for your child than it is to play the blame game in this situation.

@filmfann – She didn’t see them on the bed. She had already left when the baby pulled on the blanket for the first time.

@SpatzieLover – We did talk about going to couples counseling, and if she is willing to go, I’d like to see the counselor tomorrow to talk about it – I get free counseling through my university and she’s already said she wouldn’t mind going to counseling together. But that doesn’t mean that she is still going to want to go now.

@cak – I told her that I didn’t want to hear that she was wrong. She specifically asked “Do you think I’m the only one at fault for it?” and I told her “No, I should have double-checked it.” I just wanted to make it clear that from now on, she needs to be more careful with things like that. (Edit: I phrased it as “we should be more careful about things like that, hoping that she wouldn’t just hear “you” and blow up.) The problem is that she refused to talk about it at all. And I also did give her positive feedback as soon as I saw it – like I said, I told her that I thought it was a great idea. I didn’t realize she had done it with thumbtacks – we have a hammer and nails in the same room that she got the thumb tacks from, and she knows it is there because she’s the one who put it there. This is also the reason why I didn’t fix it before it became an issue – I assumed she had used nails.

@Seelix We have been together since before the baby was born, and she has pretty much adopted her as her own.

@WestRiverrat I understand what you’re saying, and I agree. I literally tried to bring it up in a perfectly calm and sincere manner at least 3 times before I got irritated that she simply refused to talk about it.

Another thing is, I don’t know if I should bring it up when she gets home. I mean, I don’t want to just have an awkward silence all night and morning, but I also don’t want her to storm out of the house the minute I say “thumb tacks”. I want to ask if she is willing to see the counselor, but if we can’t get an appointment tomorrow, I don’t even know how to act in the meantime.

@stemnyjones If you both are committed to making this work then you both need better communication skills. I’m with @cak here. You both could have conducted yourselves more maturely.

@Seelix was also correct. No parent wants their parenting skills criticized.

In the meantime, apologize for calling her about this at work. Try to move on from there.

It seems to me you are making a big deal out of nothing. You told her to be more careful, let it go. You jumped her while working, and I would be unhappy about that. She was trying to be helpful and you criticized her. Next time, she won’t be so helpful. You need to appologize and get over it.

@SpatzieLover What makes you feel that I was conducting myself immaturely? I called her calmly asking to talk about it, told her that I wasn’t begging for an apology, I just wanted to let her know what had happened and that we should be more careful next time. I listened to her rant about how I was the only one in the wrong for it, etc, and I told her that we were both in the wrong for it. I never cursed at her like she cursed at me, and when she hung up on me I didn’t try to call her back. I thought I reacted as calmly and efficiently as I could.

@stemnyjones – I understand that you may have thought that you were acting calmly and efficiently, at that time. At work though, isn’t the right time. And no, it’s really not about thumb tacks now, it’s about how both of you communicate with each other. Bringing up the thumb tacks, is kinda beating a dead horse, at this juncture.

Think of it this way. If you would have just said, “We need to find a more sturdy way to hang this” instead of calling her out on the issue, which is probably how she was feeling. That way, there wasn’t blame. It was more of an observation. Both of you accept it wasn’t the best solution; however, it was on the right path.

I will say her blaming the baby isn’t the right way to go, either. I think she felt cornered and lashed out. Not a great form of communication.

I just texted her and apologized for calling her at work about it. Now that I am seeing other people’s points of views on the topic, I realize that it could have waited until she got home. It is confusing to even me in that field, because if I wait to talk to her about it she says “Why didn’t you tell me it was a problem when it happened? You have to talk to me about it then, not just act like everything’s okay.” But then another day she’ll say “Why can’t you wait to talk to me about it until later?”

Not only is it a blurry line in the first place, but I admit that I do have obsessive thoughts when something bothers me (part of my ADHD). I am on medication for it, but I just changed medication and it needs adjustment – the meds wear off after 4 hours after I take it, so by the time I get home from the university it isn’t even working anymore. For everything else that happens, I have been controlling myself to a point that I never have been able to before, and only mentioning it once then dropping it. But this seemed like a bigger issue than any other issues that we have dealt with recently, because it concerned Alyssa’s safety.

@stemnyjones You are a terrific partner. You did the right thing. It is very understandable how you reacted to your daughters safety. I’m sure you will be able to talk it over calmly with your partner now and things will work out for the best.

My son has the same issue as you, the obsessive thoughts when something bothers him. I understand what you are saying.

Look, you are a mother and you want Alyssa to always be safe. There is nothing in the world wrong with that; however, the problem seems to be in communication – on both sides. I think it’s wise that you apologized for calling her at work and she needs to understand that blowing up about every issue isn’t a productive way of communication. I don’t know, though, that you are going to be able to convince her of this – and reminding her again and again about something, may be something that sets her off.

If she’s okay with counseling, if the appointment is not available right away, take one down the road.

@stemnyjones – Don’t beat yourself up about how you reacted. Many mothers would do the same. Don’t beat up your partner about it, either. You two will work through this.

@stemnyjones Everything @cak has said is right on…

I said you conducted yourself immaturely, because you were reactionary. If you haven’t read this book yet you and your partner should.

@SpatzieLover Thanks for recommending that book. I will definitely look into it asap.

Also, she called me, and we both apologized for how we reacted. And we are going to see a counselor asap.

@stemnyjones: Good for both of you! Wishing you both luck and best wishes!

@stemnyjones Are you the same person who a while back had a question about possibly leaving your partner because she was not too swift about many things? She doesn’t want to dscuss things, because she doesn’t want to be reminded she is an idiot probably. I would never tack a blanket in a small childs room.

@JLeslie Yes, I am. When I start to feel like I really may be wrong in a situation, I like to get other people’s perspectives, but I know that if I contact any of my friends or family, they will immediately side with me… so I come to Fluther for other people’s opinions.

Here is a true incident that you might pass onto your partner. This was a 911 police call I answered years ago.

I arrived at the front door of this house and heard a woman yelling inside, that her grandaughter was choking to death. This was a two year old toddler, just learning to walk. The baby had started turning blue. I grabbed the baby by its ankles and lifted her straight up in the air. I then began gently slapping her on her back. Within a minute, an object fell out of her mouth and onto the floor. She was normal again.

In talking to the mother, I began to see pieces of a monopoly game on the floor. I looked for the object that fell out of the babys mouth and it was a monopoly toy cannon. Part of the monopoly game.

I told the grandmother that these pieces should not be on the floor. This is what happens when a two year old places everything into their mouths, not knowing how dangerous it really is.

The grandmother began picking up the game pieces and the paramedics arrived to check out the baby. She appeared to be okay.

You are correct in your question. The blanket should have been secured with something, other than thumb tacks.

Let your partner read this, if you wish. Your friend would never forgive herself, if your child had suffered serious consequences from swallowing the thumb tacks. Her intentions may have been good, but she just used the incorrect securing devices for the blanket. Luckily, nothing happened and you two should get back together again.

I don’t think you were wrong. I think your partners reaction was uncalled for and that it almost sounds to me like she knew it was a lazy way to put up a sheet and was embarrassed that she used the easy way out which could have caused harm. She probably knew it as soon as the tacks got in the wall! I mean really I tried that when I was 16, it doesn’t work and if it does it doesn’t last. I have stepped on a nail in my 20s and it bloody well hurts! Not to mention the hours to get the tetnus shots. I would of said something too. Any partner respects the other partners views if it’s going to work out, respect is a viable component in a relationship. So I think her reaction was disrespectful. And if the respect levels can’t be raised…move on out and find someone who will. IMO :)
BTW I also agree with @john65pennington ^

At this point, I would be more angry about how she spoke to you than about the tacks. The tacks issue appears to be resolved, but something tells me she won’t hesitate to act the same way about something else in the future.

Based on your description of events, I think your reaction was normal and you made an effort to not attack her. We can always look back and see how we could have handled a situation better, but I cannot fault you for any part of this. Who can take such an emotional situation and have a perfectly rational conversation about it, especially when there is a fear of being on the receiving end of that kind of reaction?

Seems to me she made a mistake and yes, it was careless and she should have thought about the safety issues, but I doubt she did it deliberately. She was trying to do something positive. You have told her about what happened, she is aware she should have put the pins in more firmly, does she need to grovel for forgiveness? Certainly it would appear she has overreacted to your pushing the point, but then I think you are overreacting too. I also don’t have the history to your relationship i.e. is she constantly careless or are you often judgemental?

@Mz_Lizzy it seems this person never thinks about safety issues. I could not live with someone like that, especially not if I had a small child.

I agree with what @JLeslie just said. As a parent, your child’s safety is of the utmost importance. You and your daughter are on the same team, you and your daughter have to be on the same team. Your partner does not have to be on the team, she is optional. If she cannot understand why tacks holding up a blanket on a wall over or near a baby’s crib is not a good idea, then that would be more my concern. Part of keeping a child safe is having the forethought to understand what not to do. In the example that @john65pennington gave, those caretakers did not have the forethought to think of the child’s tendencies to put things in her mouth. Throughout the child’s development, safety issues will constantly be evolving and changing as the child’s developmental age changes. And as in the example @john65pennington gave, it would only take one incident for the child’s life and your lives to be changed forever. Then you would never forgive yourself. This for a woman who does not want to discuss something that is concerning?

@Mz_Lizzy I’ll say for the third time, I didn’t want her to grovel for forgiveness. I just wanted to hear from her mouth that she will be more careful next time. And yes, she does have a history of being irresponsible, which is something we are working on. As @JLeslie and @jca said, I am a mother. Alyssa’s safety is my top priority. I wanted to talk to Erica about it because it wasn’t a mistake that could be made again.

Also, it’s been mentioned by you guys more than once that she wasn’t deliberately trying to hurt Alyssa. I know that she had good intentions, which is why I told her that it was a good idea, but it should have been done differently.

@stemnyjones Have you made an appointment for counseling yet? Did she agree to go?

I agree with @SpatzieLover that counselling is in order. And actually you said “This is the first time she’s done something like this though, and this is the first time in a long time that I asked to talk in more detail about something that happened”. People make mistakes. They don’t think but certainly when it comes to child safety, you need to talk to her about that and about being more careful. However, if it i something so important and you really want to make a point and have a serious discussion, perhaps you should have waited until she got home from work and have talked face-to-face about your concerns and especially if she tends to go off as she did.

I understand it is about your child’s safety, but what exactly did you want her to say on the phone? What is it you wanted her to do at that time apart from say I will be more careful in future? If it is something important and likely to upset your partner, perhaps don’t ring her when she is at work. Wait until she gets home.

@SpatzieLover Yes. The appointment has been made for Wednesday. :)

@Mz_Lizzy When I said “This is the first time she’s done something like this”, I meant that this the first time in a long time that she’s done something so blatantly careless. She does things I don’t like with the baby all the time – picking her up by her arms, letting her get too close to stranger’s dogs, etc.. but this was putting something within the baby’s reach that can only be swallowed or stuck into her body. Most other things have a legitimate excuse. This didn’t.

As you know by now, we have communication problems. One of them is that Erica tends to tune me out and just say “ok” or “won’t happen again” or “sorry”, and later admit that she wasn’t even listening. So we both agreed that it was better that she make eye contact with me and give me a ‘real’ response. Of course you can’t do this on the phone, so all I really wanted was a real response to tell me that she was listening – instead of just “yeah” or “sorry”, an actual sentence that tells me that she’s not tuning me out. I didn’t even get the chance to get to that at first, because the minute I said “we should talk about how you hung the blanket up” (which I didn’t realize at the time seemed like blaming), she told me to shut up and not interupt her or she’d hang up on me, and she went on a 10 minute rant about how if anything would have happened, it would have been my own fault for letting her touch the blanket, etc. It wasn’t until the end of the conversation that I even got the chance to speak enough to tell her that I didn’t even want an apology, I just wanted her to tell me that she’d be more careful in the future. It’s just that she never said that until after I posted this and texted her to say I was sorry, and she admitted that she was wrong for blowing up and apologized too.

The work situation also isn’t like a normal situation. She complains when I don’t call her at work enough. She’s usually the most superior person there, and so it’s easy for her to say “Hey, employee, do this for me” then go in the office and call me. I know that this isn’t the case for most people – at my last job at an AT&T call center, I couldn’t take calls, period. If someone died I wouldn’t know about it until I went on break. But her job isn’t like that. And after we apologized to eachother, she even told me that she does want me to call her if something happens, let her know what happened, and she’ll tell me if she can talk at that time or not.

From what you have said, I am very surprised this person has any superiority over anyone. The more you say, the more I am worried that you are leaving your daughter with a completely clueless individual. I think at this point you need to stop thinking of yourself and what you want and start thinking of the kind of life you are getting your daughter into. You might start thinking about living apart from your partner because she is clearly not concerned with your daughter and could care less about your thoughts or discussing anything with you. There is really something wrong with a person that never listens to their partner. Is she just mooching off of you?

@chyna She is concerned with Alyssa, she just was honestly not ready for a child, but she is interested in learning and improving her child care skills. She does have mood swings and easily gets defensive, but in her defense, just like me, her doctor is adjusting her medications and the ‘adjustment’ isn’t really working that well – she has an appointment coming up to change them, as do I. She has done some really careless and stupid things, but she has also done some very selfless and amazing things for both me and Alyssa.

As far as mooching off of me – she has a job, I don’t. Granted, I am a student and get about $3000 in student loans every semester, plus $155/month for Alyssa. But if she was with me for money, she would have left as soon as my maternity leave was up and I quit my job.

As I said, until we go to counseling, Family Tree, and she attends some sort of parenting classes, she is rarely ever alone with the baby, and almost never takes her outside of the house alone. It was my fault, in a way, with the thumb tack thing – when it comes down to it, I am her maternal mother and I am the one responsible for her, so I should have double-checked the blanket to make sure it was nailed in. I didn’t, because I didn’t even think of the possibility of thumb tacks.

As I said, I come on Fluther often when we have an arguement and I’m unsure of whether I was in the wrong or not, so most of what you read is negative. There are almost as many positives as well, so what I talk about here probably seems really disproportionate to real life. Yes, she does make mistakes sometimes, and sometimes they were really careless, preventable mistakes. I make mistakes too. Not nearly as much, but that’s because I prepared myself for a child for 9 months and have that biological connection that only a mother who carried the baby in her stomach for 9 months can have. Erica came into my life around 2 or 3 months before Alyssa was born, and at that time I was still debating putting Alyssa up for adoption… yes, I very strongly sided with keeping her, but I was still struggling with whether or not I could afford to properly raise a baby as a single mother and whether or not she would be better off with another family. So even then, Erica couldn’t completely commit to the idea of becoming a mother out of the blue, because she is a very sensative person and could have been seriously hurt if I decided to give the baby up. This didn’t come from her mouth, but knowing her after all this time, I’m assuming that this is how she felt. I know I would definitely have reservations about getting excited about the prospect of raising a baby with someone that I had just started dating and might not even keep the child.

But I’m getting off topic. I really do appreciate everyone’s feedback and especially the concerns. I want to be the best mother I can be, and I want to be called on my shit if I don’t see it myself. Alyssa is going through the phase where she likes the parent who is out of the house more often better – most of the time when she cries she wants her “Riri”. Even just now, she woke up in pain because she’s finally growing more teeth (has the least out of her daycare class – 17 months and only 4, lol), and although she let me comfort her, she still kept asking for “Riri”. When we go to daycare together to pick her up, she runs right past me and into Erica’s arms. Only after she gives Erica her “thanks for saving me!” kisses will she give some to mommy. I’m not offended by this – it’s actually sort of a relief, as before she was favoring me and I was the only one who could feed her, change her, put her to sleep, etc… it’s nice to have somewhat of a break.

I know that the fact that both me and Alyssa love Erica is not enough of a reason to keep her around, don’t get me wrong.

We already have appointments to get ourselves help, with both our relationship and her parenting. In the meantime, she will continue to have limited “full-responsibility alone time” with Alyssa – she can put her to sleep alone, play with her alone, etc, but no leaving the house with her to take her to the park alone or taking her over to her friends’ houses alone. I know that once her depression and my ADHD are in order, we will be able to communicate much more effectively, and she will be able to pay more attention to what she’s doing. Once she proves to me that she can do it alone – and really proves it, as in I continue supervising her, but I have absolutely nothing to complain about because she does 95% of it right, and that 5% wrong is harmless – she can take the baby out alone again and bring her over to visit her family or friends without me.

I would guess she does not worry about dangers in general. Not only for the baby, but for herself. I think it is difficult to get someone to think about what could go wrong if they are not wired that way. I guess some of it is teachable. I worry about what could go wrong much more than my husband, and he mich more than say his sister. She thinks worrykng about such things is ridiculous. She actually believes more bad things will happen if you think negatively. I don’t feel I am negative, just aware. I don’t sit around worrying what can go wrong. It is just natural and takes no time for me. Lock everything, don’t leave the cup by the edge of the table, nothing flammable left on top of the stove, out of the pool if a lightening storm approaches, don’t put the crib by the venetian blinds, etc. It is second nature for me. People who don’t do these things, don’t even think about them, or know about them, I guess were raised by parents who didn’t worry about such things?

@JLeslie You hit the nail on the head. I was actually about to come back and add something related to that.

Since the baby has been born, I’ve somewhat corrupted her from her innocence. I’ve always been the kind of person who hopes for the best but expects the worst. She, on the other hand, has actually said before that if I expect something to go bad, I will somehow make it negative. Her views have changed throughout the year and a half of having a baby and bad things happening when you don’t expect it, but when we first got together and I was still pregnant, it was a completely different story.

I can’t blame her for getting frustrated sometimes – when we first got together, it was that new love, spending 24 hours a day together, making love frequently, sleeping in late together and watching movies in the dark while we cuddle. I was still making $13/hour, so if we wanted to go eat out or see a movie, we did it without giving it a second thought. I told her repeatedly since the time she decided that she wanted to stay and raise the baby with me that it wasn’t going to be all fun and games and unicorns and rainbows. I told her it was going to get hard, we were going to struggle, and we would definitely argue and fight. She simply refused to believe it. She had only moved out of her disapproving and uncaring mother’s house two years prior, and during those latter two years she lived with an extremely controlling girlfriend that wouldn’t let her leave her house. She was thinking of this as her first time really “on her own”, able to do what she wanted and be herself, except that she would have this new love of hers and a little bundle of joy along for the ride. She refused to listen to my reasoning, so when the baby was born and we became strapped for cash, exhausted, and only able to do child-friendly things in maximum 4-hour increments.

I’m not saying that this makes her hate me or the baby, but I can see how she might still get frustrated with the fact that when she signed up for parenthood, this isn’t what she expected.

@stemnyjones Oh, she had an extremely controlling girlfriend in the past? So, coupled with basically not being aware of possible dangers she will never let anyone control her like that again or make her feel on egg shells like she is little and wrong all of the time? she has set herself up to be in a similar relationship again, parent child, where she is the child, and you are the parent, but she hates being there. At least that is my psychoanalysis (guess) without really knowing either of you.

The way you described her reaction on the phone makes me think she has anger issues. That’s not good for a baby to be around – someone who is explosive. To a baby, that can be very scary.

I don’t see how seeing a counselor is going to magically make your partner any smarter. She’s a danger to the child.

If you really want to know what is going on while you are gone, buy a “Nanny Cam”. It is a hidden camera that you set up to see what the “nanny” or whoever is watching your child is actually doing to your child.

@JLeslie Exactly. She tells me that sometimes I treat her more like a child than my girlfriend. Since we started going to couples counseling she’s been doing better.. the few times that she has gotten angry at me and said something like that, she later admits that she was acting in a way that made me respond like that.

@Dutchess_III I’m starting to think that the problems aren’t caused by a lack of intelligence, but just not stopping to think before she does things sometimes. She seems to readily understand and agree that something shouldn’t be done, and she even brings things up to me sometimes that we should do differently, but when she gets excited about something or starts worrying about something else it’s like she stops thinking. In addition to seeing the couples counselor with me, her own doctor is trying her on depression and ADHD medicine.

@chyna I’ve been thinking of buying a nanny cam for a while now. It’s not only a good idea for when she is alone with Alyssa or when someone else is babysitting, but I’d love to get some of the shit my landlord says on camera (when I email her about a problem she will respond to the email in a very nice, professional manner and say that she is going to fix the problem because she knows that I have a hard copy of the email, but then she comes to the house and acts like it’s not her problem and gives me shit about it)

@stemnyjones Well, good luck. From what you said it seems she is getting better at responding to criticism, but not better at figuring out what to do in situations, still no concept of what could be dangerous, and in the end that is the real issue for you. Her issue is deciding to deal with a relationship where it will continue to be pointed out when she does something stupid, or her moving onto a relationship where she dates a total idiot who will make her look smart and competent. Unless she really grows in terms of thinking ahead she is probably doomed to one extreme or the other, parent or child. I hope She actually does just mature in terms of thinking ahead, it would be better for everyone all around.