grandpa problem...oh boy

this is a little bit of a problem I've got here....
ok, well, my dad keeps calling saying that he wants to babysit Leane, and I've been telling him that I just want to wait until she's a little older. There's a couple reasons:
For one, she really freaks out when he's around. She makes strange with a lot of people, but him especially....i mean, she looks at him and there comes the tears. But of course I don't want to tell him that I don't want him to watch her because she's afraid of him or something!
Second (and one of the most important), he's epileptic. He has to take tons of drugs and still has the occasional grandmal seziure. What would Leane do if he were to have one when she's with him!!!???? she's 6 months old. He gets offended when you use this for a reason for not wanting him to do something, but then he'll use that as an excuse 10 minutes later when you ask something of him.....getting into an argument with him about this...or anything.....is not fun.....
He's also got some serious anger issues. We used to get into fist fights where he would end up grasping my arms behind my back so I couldn't move and saying, "I'm stronger than you are," when I was younger.....
He's gone to anger management, and now he just sends people on MAJOR guilt trips instead of freaking out. But who knows what he would do with a crying baby?
Now, he is her grandpa, and I don't want them to not have a relationship without me or het dad there, but I really am iffy about letting her stay with him. I was putting it off by saying wait till she's older, but since she's 6 months, he figures she's old enough.
I told him the other night that I just wasn't comfortable with it.
Bah, I don't know what to do.
In my opinion, she's still not old enough to be left alone with anyone other than me or her dad....my mom attempted to watch her a couple months ago, and she cried the whole time. (Granted, my mom didn't do anything that we told her), but still.
This isn't excuse isn't going to work forever.....then what? I don't want to start a fight with him.

 

I went through this with my inlaws. We let them "babysit" Sunshine a few times, and she would come home sick, because they '"didn't beleive" in food allergies.

I was really honest and said that Bear and I weren't leaving the babies with anyone until they were older. I was breastfeeding Moon when we did this, but formula feedling mamas can Attachment Parent, too. Maybe you can nicely (without mentioning the epilepsy) tell him about Attachment Parenting, and how you aren't going to be leaving Leane until she is much older. If you are working outside the home, tell him you feel bad leaving her any more than neccesary, if you are a SAHM (I am getting a SAHM vibe from you) then tell him you just don't leave her yet.

My MIL would actually call my mother and ask if she had baby sat the kids. Aside from the food allergy thing (both my parents respected it) and the Attachment Parenting thing, she didn't watch the kids, so, it wasn't much of an issue.

From what you are describing, thiough, he is vioent and abusive. I wouldn't leave my baby with someone who would punch a teenage girl, NEVER, no matter who is was. If worse comes to worse, you can maybe bring this up, but usually abusers deny they did anything wrong. I'd wait on this, and hope other strategies work.

But YOU are the mom. YOU have the final say of who will take care of your baby and who won't. He can have a relationship with her, without getting her alone. WHY would he want to have her by himself?She's 5 months old. I'd just say, "We don't leave Leane yet." and leave it at that.

 

Thanks.
I am primarily a SAHM, but I work the odd couple days a week. Her dad is ALWAYS with her when I'm not.
Although we can say right now that we don't want to leave her alone just yet, when she's a year old, I have to go back to college. Her dad is in college right now, as well. We are going to have to put her in daycare. It breaks my heart to do it, but we're trying to better our lives.
As for explaining AP to the grandparents....well, I'm in deep water there.
I haven't strayed from my beliefs in raising her, but my parents and in laws sure are giving me a piece of their mind. It's kind of like the allergies thing that you described with your daughter. We more often than not co-sleep with Leane(we don't only when we're sick and have taken medicine, or are being "intamate"), and my dh's mom has repeatedly told us that we're "messing her up," and we're doing a "bad job..." It really bugs me when they do this. Especially since she left my dh in a play pen all his childhood and is PROUD of it.
All the grandparents believe that letting them "cry it out," is GOOD for them, and there's a whole array of other things.
Neither I nor my dh are changing what we're doing and what we believe is right, but it's hard to try to get them to understand anything that we're saying; which is why that they're still pushing us to leave her alone with them.
My dh's mom and dad both understand that it's too soon, and my mom is too scared after that one time that we had to leave her for a couple hours.....it's just my dad.
You're right, he does deny that he did anything wrong. In fact, he actually says, "I raised 2 perfectly healthy girls." Even though he spent the time he was married to my mom fighting with us and then when they got divorced when I was 10, he basically stopped showing any intrest in us.
I don't trust him with her one bit. He seems nice around babies, and even when we were little, my cousins loved him. But it still makes me uncomfortable. He seems to only show the anger towards older kids, teenagers and adults, but that doesn't change the fact that he does have anger issues, which therefore makes him dangerous.

 

Tell him he's more than welcome to visit with her whenever he'd like, but you just aren't letting her be away from you right now. You don't have to give him a time line or any excuses/reasons. Simply say you aren't in need of a babysitter. Period.

 

I wasn't meaning to offend you, it's just that she's 6 months old, and he tends to have grandmal seziures. The last one that he had, he was out for hours.
It's another thing when she's older and it can be explained to her why it's happening and what to do.
As for the laundry thing...he lives about an hour away...that's a long way to go so i can get a couple house chores done alone. Besides, i like wearing her around the house with me, it makes the work more fun.

 

I was basicly going to say the same thing. I have epilepsy, too.
I don't know how frequent his seizures are, or if he gets an aura (a warning), but when she gets a little older, that will make a difference in whether the epilepsy is a safety issue. I really don't think so. My kids are just fine.

But right now she's six months old. That's really young to have him watching her anyway, IMO. And your folks are hassling you about how you're raising her. I got a lot of grief from my in-laws about co-sleeping and breastfeeding and not letting people babysit when they were that young and picking them up when they cried. That's disrespectful. If you don't put your foot down now and assert yourself and make some clear boundaries, it will make things even more difficult later.

Invite them to do stuff with you and the baby, but don't let them boss oyu around.

You also said that he says the epilepsy isn't a good reason for him to not watch the baby, but that he uses it as an excuse to not do other things. As a person who has had epilepsy my whole life, I just wanted to add that nobody understands his epilepsy like he does. Only he knows how he's feeling on a particular day as far as his seizure threshold goes, only he really knows what his triggers are or if he's feeling 'funny'. You should just take his word for it.

Trust me.

 

tis your bubba, your choice!
grandparents can be wonderful beings but you are there mum so you get to ultimately decide how things go and what works and doesn't work for your little one. For me it took me ages to leave my litle one with anyone else apart from me, though there was a lot of time spent with those who will possibly be involved in her life. You are the mum and your job is to take care of your little one and the ultimate decision is yours so choose what you are happy and comfortable with, if others buck and don't like it well they can take it up with you, but at six months that is all they can do, what are they going to do, argue with her and convince her that your decisions are wrong!! Seriously you are her mum and your job, right, privelage, is to take care of this little person so don't be too worried about the social or familial interplays that are going on but stick to your gut feelings and take it from there. There is no reason that they can't learn together to have a relationship unlike others in his life and past but I think it is your place when she is so small to take care and set boundaries for her and for him.
good luck!

 

that's not really what i meant. he wants to watch her and says that he's fine, but for example, when my sister wanted him to do something with her (go to the park or something) he didn't want to....This isn't a one time occurance. It's when something is asked of him that he uses it as an excuse, know what I mean?
I just have a genuine concern here that something is going to happen and a baby can't do anything if/when it does.
Yeah, I think that she's too young, too. That;s what I've been telling the grandparents. I'm worried about when she's older.

 

This is what we've been doing. For some reason he's just pushing me to leave her alone with him.... you'd think it wouldn't matter, as long as he gets to see her.