u/Skulllily

Link to original: https://www.reddit.com/r/AITAH/s/pFODQ7TfG4

Hi everyone,

I just wanted to come back and say thank you to everyone who took the time to comment on my previous post. I genuinely read every single comment, even if I didn’t respond to all of them.

We haven’t talked to MIL yet, but my husband and I sat down and had a VERY in-depth conversation about everything that has been going on, especially the pool situation.

I showed him a lot of the comments from people who had personal experience with drowning and how quickly and silently it can happen. I also printed out drowning statistics and highlighted the fact that lack of supervision is one of the biggest contributing factors in to children drowning.

He read through everything and, after seeing it all laid out, apologized to me for being so lax about the situation and for not being firmer when it came to our kids’ safety.

I honestly feel like we are finally on the same page.

We have decided that our kids will no longer be going to MIL’s house without one of us there. At this point, we just don’t feel comfortable with them being there unsupervised, and that’s something I’m not compromising on. I told him I’d didn’t care if it upset him or his mother but it’s a hard line for me and he agreed to it.

We are planning to talk to MIL this weekend and explain everything: our concerns about the pool, the other children’s behaviour, the lack of supervision, and the things that have happened that have made us uncomfortable with her judgment when it comes to the kids’ safety.

We’re hoping it will be a productive conversation and that she’ll actually listen to what we’re saying. But honestly, we have no idea how she’s going to react.

I’m sure there will probably be some hurt feelings, and I’m prepared for that. But at the end of the day, these are our children and their safety has to come first.

I really appreciate everyone who commented on the original post, especially those who shared their own experiences. It gave my husband and I a lot to think about and helped me explain it to him in different ways where he understood why I was so upset.

My mother-in-law watches my two children, ages 5 and 3, two days a week while my husband and I are at work. We pay her to watch them because she is on disability and was considering returning to work, and we thought this arrangement would benefit everyone.

When we originally agreed to this, my understanding was that it would be just her and our children. I trusted that arrangement completely.

Over time, however, my mother-in-law’s friend’s daughter has started coming over almost daily with her five children, who range in age from 4 months to 10 years old.

Since then, I feel like concern after concern has come up.

The biggest issue for me is pool safety. The children are allowed in the pool without an adult in the water as long as the younger ones are wearing arm floaties. Some of the younger children cannot swim. I brought up my concerns and said that drowning is often silent and that I was uncomfortable with children being in the pool without close adult supervision. Instead of taking my concern seriously, my mother-in-law and her friend laughed and said, “Nothing’s quiet around here.”

I was so concerned about this that my husband later spoke to his mother about it. However, the supervision practices do not appear to have changed.

My oldest has also told me that the children are allowed in the back alley without adult supervision as long as they stay close to the house. I don’t understand how anyone knows whether they’re staying close if nobody is actively watching them.

There have been other incidents that have added to my concerns as well. For example, my children were left unattended with scissors.

Today my children’s aunt told me she witnessed the other children excluding my 3-year-old, splashing her in the face, laughing at her, and pushing her in the pool. She immediately intervened and told the children that wasn’t acceptable. What upset me most was that none of the adults “supervising” the children were aware it was happening because they were sitting at a table on the other side of the yard.

What also bothered me was that my mother-in-law became angry with my sister in law for telling me about what had happened. That reaction made me feel even more uneasy because I would rather know about problems than have people worry about upsetting me by bringing them up.

This isn’t the first concern I’ve had, and it feels like every time I raise an issue, it gets minimized or brushed off. At this point, I no longer feel comfortable with the environment my children are in. The situation has reached the point where I feel anxious every time my children go there because I no longer feel confident in the supervision they’re receiving.

My husband and I got into an argument because I told him that if his mother cannot guarantee that the other children won’t be there while she is watching ours, then I want to find alternative childcare. He feels I’m being unreasonable and is concerned about hurting his mother’s feelings.

To be clear, I’m not demanding that my mother-in-law change her life or tell other people they can’t come to her house. I simply feel that if this is going to continue to be the childcare environment, then I need to make different arrangements for my children.

I appreciate everything my mother-in-law has done for us, and I know she loves our children. But I feel like the childcare arrangement we originally agreed to is very different from the one that exists now, and I no longer trust that my concerns about supervision and safety are being taken seriously.

Am I the asshole?

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I currently have Ohuhu alcohol markers and I quite enjoy them. My only complaint is that with tiny details they bleed across the lines and I can’t do certain books/pages with them because the details are so fine. Curious if anyone has used the water based Ohuhu markers and what their experience is?

Is there another type/line of Ohuhu markers that won’t bleed as bad? I love the vibrancy of their colours but I’m open to suggestions other than Ohuhu as well.

TIA!