just sharing a conversation over dinner

solidstars

solidstars

Registered User
(may not be exactly in this order, just how i remember it as I type it out now)

so we're having dinner, and husband's mom complains about baby's teeth and how they're yellow (top ones) and melting away (dentists think he has bottle teeth, please google). Husband mom, husband sister, and husband starts having a conversation about how baby's teeth must be due to lack of calcium since he only drinks one glass of fresh milk a day.

husband mom says he should drink formula. husband sister says formula has lots of really good nutrients. husband mom says that's why in Hong Kong children drink formula until 6 years old. This is where i can't stand it anymore and i pitch in, saying hong kong is practically one of the few places in the world where children drink formula until 6 years old, mostly due to marketing and advertisements culture.

Husband tells me not to change the topic. (??!?!?!)

I further mention that it's probably bottle teeth and due to the fact that he went to sleep with nipple in his mouth for so long (I breastfed till ~1.8 yrs), husband mom brings up that that's why he should drink with a bottle, because it's better. I mention that the condition is called 'bottle teeth' and happens to bottle drinkers too.

Husband tells me to shut up.

Husband sister changes the topic.

I mentally scream inside my head.

Note: baby is almost 2 years old
 
deep breath and turn on the mental music to drown them out...they are truly going to drive you crazy... if you need a shoulder, you know i have two... i can easily spare one for you to cry on if you need it!
 
when out with my in-laws i can sometimes mentally go through my entire ipod playlist, and i have about 6 hours of music on there!LOL!
 
There was a documentary that showed on ATV few months ago, about how some babies turned overweight due to the formula. They also said something about how formulas have lot of stuff in them, but there is mo prove that those stuff will be absorbed, as those are added and are not natural.

I don't know if I can find it on YouTube. You may then try to show that to your hubby.
Posted via Mobile Device
 
problem is her husband has permanently turned his brain off. he doesn't listen to reason. he only has time to disregard his wife's views, to humiliate her, to yell at her and to just be a nasty piece of work... all the while being backed up by his mother, who it seems has passed every nasty gene she had to her son...

again, star, i got your back, babe!
 
thanks gataloca, knowing my husband, he'll say something along the lines of 'but that's for western babies and doesn't apply to our baby', so i better stick to carang's advice and go through mental music instead of endure another stupid conversation that goes nowhere...

but i have heard the same as well, that formula actually has a lot of nutrients in it that your child can't absorb anyways
 
Yes... Probably your hubby will come up with something. But the documentary is in Chinese, and was about children obesity in Hong Kong, and was broadcasted on Nov 25, 2010 on ATV Home. I could find some information on the web, but couldn't find the video, as we don't have access to YouTube or Facebook at work.
Posted via Mobile Device
 
And the reason I remember this documentary is because my mum used to push me to give formula to my baby.
Posted via Mobile Device
 
Very funny convo, laugh out loud, especially when hubby told you to shut up. Nice.
What's funny is all their reasoning and logic. Why don't you take your son to the dentist and see what they have to say.
When my MIL says ridiculous things, I can't say much in her language, and she doesn't understand mine. Maybe that's a good thing, I don't know...
Formula till 6... Haha, classic stuff:)
 
This kind of conversation occurs frequently in my home too as my ILs stay with me. However, my hubby havent ask me to shut up yet. Being Chinese and also relative having another baby that is less than 3 months younger than mine, if those relative have those yum cha session with my ILs,then the dinner converstation will be kind of similar to solidstars.

It'll be somewhere like "how many ml of milk is our baby drinking, theirs is drinking 140ml", "so and so baby is taking puree at 4 months, our baby is more than 4 months already", "our baby is so thin compare to so and so baby, we should change to formula"

solidstars i feel for you really...
 
Everyone in the family seems to have an opinion on this one. Oh, I think those formula commercials are RIDICULOUS. I was just laughing at one yesterday on the MTR. Even the names of the formulas like "PhD" are stupid. I mean, formula is formula--it's not going to send your child to Harvard (or even to the Chinese University of Hong Kong, for that matter). Formula has a lot of sweetener in it--no wonder why babies LOVE it and if kids are drinking it until they are 6-years-old of course they're going to get chubby--it's a lot of extra unnecessary calories. Totally reminds me of this (obviously from the Mainland) commercial where all these 5-year-olds dressed in tuxedos are being waited on at this luxurious dining hall by men with white gloves carrying silver platters and on the platters are actual BOTTLES of formula milk which the 5-year-olds then drink FROM THE BOTTLE! Excuse me while I roll on the ground laughing! If your child is 5-years-old and drinking from a bottle and you think that's normal then you deserve to fall for every marketing ploy out there.

Sorry to hear your husband is still being a "you-know-what." I find it absolutely hilarious how some of my in-laws bicker about stupid things when they get together for a meal. Everyone thinks they know the answer and usually their assumptions about life and reality are waaaay off (like believing that drinking from a bottle is actually better for children!). I just let them argue themselves into the ground and believe what they want to believe--they just seem ignorant to me.

Here are some of the more funny TV ads for formula:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4cWp7VTEPTs&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UiIHx8FjYtM&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WVLl9HYWcWk&feature=related
 
thanks everyone! I feel much better reading all your comments

and yes thanka2, I do remember the bottle served on a platter to boys in tuxedos ad!

I did take our son to the dentist, baby and I went to at least 8 actually (we only really saw and paid for one, the rest we just asked the nurses). The majority shared the opinion that it's because of drinking to sleep (milk in mouth, etc) and most said nothing can be done about it since it's baby teeth.

Two did say that something COULD be done, but he needed full body general anesthesia and both my husband and i are apprehensive about that...
 
Yes, its is hard to adapt to the culture here other than to resort to mental music I've found. Trying to explain things with a well reasoned argument and even scientific evidence to back it up gets you no where. The heads will nod or else you just gte talked over but you know your info is passing right from one ear to the other. Case in point, the locals eat this (not for me) ginger, pigs trotter number and one of my girlfriend who reads chinese and is a scientist discovered that the basis of this is that ginger thins your blood which was useful in the ye old days when because of blood loss, infections ect women would spend weeks to months in bed post childbirth and get blood clots....so at the time, food loaded with ginger was of some benefit but not so much now. By all means eat it if you like the taste but when my MIL insists that I HAVE to eat it for my health post birth......anyway, nothing changed after my explanation.
So solidstars, probably the video, bellowing the expert opinions you have sought out from the mountain tops, reasoning the benefits if breast milk, is not going to make a shred of difference. Just do what I notice loads of people here, which is to say yes, yes, be totally agreeable, nod, make the speaker feel like they have hit it on the money and then just do what you believe in....a totally insane way to be/almost dishonest but probably will generate a lot less effort and angst on your half.
 
i'm sure solidstars has done all of this... if you read her past posts, her husband is verbally and emotionally abusive towards her... it's not a simple matter of nodding and saying, 'yes dear, whatever you say dear.'
 
And yes, probably wouldn't help much if they have a fixed mind. I also feel for you... Mental music doesn't really work for me.
Posted via Mobile Device
 
Gosh! I must take my hat off to all of you for having the patience and mental agility to deal with such nonsense! I need to learn the Ipod Playlist trick (for my meetings at work with a very difficult person).

My son's formula fed (not by choice - no breastmilk, naturally and unfortunate case of bad milk glands) and the minute I could ween him off formula, at 1, I went off it! I even started solids earlier because I felt that it's much better than all that chemicals! As soon as he could have yoghurt, I was at it too!

There is no basis for extended use of formula. It's just crazy talk!*

*No offense intended to formula supporters.
 
Gataloca said:
Here is a link to the program. It is in cantonese:
http://video.online.hk/watch/22945
Click to expand...

oh fantastic! I'm going to play this (repeatedly) really loudly and pretend i'm watching it whilst trying to ensure they can see/hear it...

Thanks all, i'm not anti-formula, it just hurts when some people (especially relatives) mindsets are so closed that they refuse to acknowledge all the things you do for your baby is positive (or aims to be) and they just keep pushing their own way of doing or thinking onto you because they don't agree with you.
 
I think I wanna vent here as well. Tonight there's another similar session about my MIL mentioning that my breastmilk nutrients are lost becoz I kept it inside the fridge. I was like??? I'm working after pumping the fridge is the best way to keep. Then it was "questioning" about when I'm going to wean her off breastmilk. She said I know some babies started semi solid by 6 months. I really dont know how to stop her from making such comments. I'm pumping in the middle of night when my supply is the highest at 3 or 4 am and when the whole family is sleeping.

@ solidstars

Sorry to piggy back your thread. Just that tonight I'm really frustrated and upset.
Posted via Mobile Device
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top