stop trying to talk to my tween about whether "girls are chasing him", grandma

[Reader]

OMG this drives me crazy. My MIL talked to my tween yesterday for the first time in months, and the only thing she said to him is, "are the girls chasing you?" He's a tween, he's not into girls. Even if he were into girls, would this be appropriate grandma talk? This is not the first time. Last time we visited, he was drawing, and she said, "are you not going to show me that because it's for your girlfriend?" He didn't not show it to her. Recently she asked DH when we were going to get the kids married off. She's elderly so there's not much to do about it. It brings back memories of being a teen and my extended family questioning why I wasn't bringing a boyfriend to family Thanksgiving and feeling shame because I didn't. Don't kids have the rest of their lives for relationships? Why must grandparents start talking about this before they are even teens? It's gross.

[georgiegirl]

How annoying and inappropriate!

My grandma was like that. When I was in high school, she asked me, “why don’t you have a boyfriend? You have a very nice figure.” I was clever enough to respond,”if a boy likes me for my figure, I don’t want him as my boyfriend.” She passed away right after I got married, but until I was engaged, she always asked about boys. I hated her for it. (Based on her life experiences, I know she very much valued being pretty and having an attractive man in her life.)

[Liziz]

It drives me absolutely batty when people do this. Also when the first and only thing they can say to my girls is that they're "very pretty", but that's a rant for another day. Thankfully I think people are slowly waking up to how inappropriate that kind of thing is, but unfortunately for your son, it's unlikely grandma is going to realize it. Sorry your son has to deal with it!

[jgenie]

Our barber does this every time we go in for haircuts. It.drives.me.nuts!!

[KpbS]

Totally ridiculous. Ugh

[DualvansMommy]

I’m pretty hard liner with this kind of thing, maybe I’m extra sensitive due to my work with abused women and DV in general. But I’m seriously so tired of that and even more so, with the excuse that it’s older generation and therefore we can’t do anything about it. There is a choice we can make and do.

Just tell grandma to stop it; period or you guys would leave. Educate her why it’s inappropriate. It’s the only way they learn and to start respecting the kids choices.


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[Mommy_Mea]

Honestly this bothers me for anyone, for kids of any age. Asking the 4 year old about his "girlfriend" just because he has a friend that is a girl? So many loaded things in that statement.

And that is so not fair for your tween, a whole different set of feelings/expectations at that age with that statement, sorry

[BunnyBee]

You can still tell elderly people to back off your kids on inappropriate subjects! You say you remember feeling ashamed and embarrassed--why don't you want to stop that from happening to your child?

[TwinFoxes]

I'm pretty sure I wouldn't be able to hold my tongue. But I get that it's a difficult situation. The comment about the drawing is especially weird.

[Reader]

You can still tell elderly people to back off your kids on inappropriate subjects! You say you remember feeling ashamed and embarrassed--why don't you want to stop that from happening to your child?

DH tells her it's inappropriate each time and did when they were on Facetime when it happened but that doesn't stop it. This was a case of DS, say hi to your grandma, and he dutifully stuck his face in to say hi when she started in about whether girls were chasing him, a 2 minute interaction. When we were there visiting last I refused to go back to her house with the kids until DH addressed it with her. The big family debate is whether she has dementia and is incapable of staying off this and other inappropriate topics or whether she is just horrible to be around. I've known her 20+ years, and she has always been horrible to be around (I'm sure I've been here before complaining about her) so I have a hard time excusing everything now that "she might have dementia." So I just come here and complain because I know nothing but limiting interaction will change things.