New Mom Says Her In-Laws Criticized Formula and Contact Naps at the Park — Then She Finally Snapped

A new mom says her first real outing with her 6-week-old baby was already stressful before her in-laws started picking apart how she was feeding and soothing her daughter.

She explained in a Reddit post that she is 27 and had her first baby in March with her husband, who is also 27. The baby had not been easy in those early weeks. She had colic and cried often, both inside and outside the house, so every outing already came with a little extra pressure.

Last week, the family was invited to their first outing with the baby. They went to a park with her husband’s family. It should have been a simple chance to get outside and spend time together, but the baby became overstimulated and started having a crying episode.

Instead of letting the crying disturb the whole group, the mom walked away from everyone to try to calm her daughter.

While she was doing that, her husband was warming a bottle. His grandmother asked whether they were feeding the baby breast milk or formula. When he said formula, the grandmother made a face but did not say anything.

The mom noticed the judgment anyway.

That reaction hit a sore spot because formula had already been one of the issues the family kept commenting on. The mom said she had made it clear from the beginning that if she did not want to breastfeed, she would not. She had tried after the baby was born, but her supply could not keep up.

So formula was not some careless decision. It was how her baby was being fed.

Then the grandmother came over to the mom and asked how the baby sleeps. The mom answered honestly. She said the baby sleeps well at night and sleeps in her crib at night, but during the day, she contact naps because she will only sleep about 20 minutes in the crib compared with around two hours in her arms.

That answer apparently became another opening for criticism.

According to the mom, the grandmother told her, “Well, you trained her to do that.”

That was the comment that pushed her over the edge.

The baby was 6 weeks old. The mom was already dealing with colic, crying, feeding judgment, and the mental weight of being a brand-new parent in front of relatives who seemed to think every choice needed commentary. So she snapped.

She told the grandmother to let her parent how she wanted because the grandmother had already had her chance.

The grandmother walked away and, according to the mom, tattled to her mother-in-law by saying the mom was “stuck in her ways.” The phrase bothered the mom because it was not new. She said her in-laws had repeatedly called her “stuck in her ways” whenever she and her husband chose to parent differently than they expected.

That included feeding their baby formula.

After the blowup, her mother-in-law came over and kept telling her she was doing a great job. Instead of feeling supportive, the mom said it came across as condescending. At that point, she had already been judged, criticized, and talked about enough that even reassurance felt loaded.

The mom said the family constantly talks about her behind her back, and she hears about it from her husband’s siblings. She is losing patience with the passive-aggressive comments in person and the gossip afterward.

She also said the in-laws already had an idea of her as controlling because of the wedding. One example she gave was that she told her grandmother-in-law she could not wear white and had specific colors for the wedding party. Since then, it seems like normal boundaries have been treated as proof that she is difficult.

In the comments, the mom added that her husband is on her side completely. She said he draws strict lines with his family, but they do not take him seriously. Because of that, he has encouraged her to stand up for them too, hoping the family might listen to her where they ignore him.

She also said his family has disrespected his boundaries throughout their whole relationship because they think they know best about everything.

That is really what the park argument was about. It was not only formula or naps. It was a new mom, six weeks postpartum, trying to calm a crying baby while older relatives treated every decision like an invitation for judgment.

She asked if she was wrong for blowing up. But from her side, she had already absorbed plenty. The grandmother just happened to be the person standing there when her patience finally ran out.

Commenters mostly told her she was not wrong for snapping. Many focused on the baby’s age, pointing out that a 6-week-old cannot be “trained” into wanting comfort. A baby that young is still adjusting to the world, and contact naps are normal for many infants.

Several commenters said the formula judgment was unnecessary and outdated. They pointed out that the baby was being fed, and that was what mattered. Some also said older relatives often forget how hard the newborn stage is and act like their advice should outrank the parents’ decisions.

A lot of commenters believed the husband needed to handle his own family more directly. Even though the mom said he supports her, several people said it should not fall on a postpartum mother to fight off his relatives’ criticism while caring for a colicky baby.

Others suggested taking a break from the in-laws if they could not be civil. Commenters said access to the baby should come with basic respect for the parents.

A few people wondered whether the mother-in-law’s repeated praise after the argument might have been an awkward attempt to calm things down rather than pure condescension. But most still agreed that the grandmother’s comments were out of line.

The main advice was simple: the parents make the parenting decisions. If relatives cannot stop judging formula, naps, and normal newborn needs, they should not be surprised when the new mom stops smiling through it.