A woman recently joined Reddit to vent about the unfortunate predicament she found herself in last week. Her 7-year-old daughter Rose was sick with a low-grade fever. (Poor thing!) Once this woman who originally posted (or the “OP” as Redditors say) saw the number on the thermometer, she had to figure out childcare because Rose, of course, couldn’t go to school. OP had to go to work and couldn’t find a babysitter, but her sister-in-law thankfully stepped up and offered to watch her niece.
It’s moments like these when we are so thankful for in-laws! But sometimes that feeling is short-lived.
Things seemed to be going well, OP said, until this SIL decided to take the task of curing Rose into her own hands. She used a home remedy that OP was totally not OK with, which is how she ended up on the “Am I The A—hole? (AITA)” subreddit.
“I couldn’t believe that she did this to my child without asking,” OP wrote. “I yelled at her for it, we argued, and I told her she will no longer be able to babysit/be around Rose unsupervised.”
And so now she wants to know, is she the a—hole for having that reaction? Or does the punishment fit the supposed crime?
The Problem
OP explained that Rose is prone to ear infections. Recently, she had a double ear infection — which is likely what ultimately led to the fever. And yeah, there’s nothing fun about having an ear infection. Rose was probably miserable, and her aunt understandably wanted to make her feel better. Nothing wrong with that, right? Except …
The “Solution”
OP’s SIL has a 12-week-old and apparently has breast milk at the ready. So what did she do? She put some of the milk in Rose’s ears.
“She even offered to send some home in a dropper bottle so I can keep giving it to her,” OP said. “She claims it’s a great remedy and that Rose was already starting to feel better.”
The Fallout
“I couldn’t believe that she did this to my child without asking,” OP said. “I yelled at her for it, we argued, and I told her she will no longer be able to babysit/be around Rose unsupervised.”
OP said Rose is upset she won’t be able to see her aunt and that her brother called to say his wife was “just trying to help” and that OP “overreacted.”
“This is a woman putting her bodily fluids in my child’s ear,” OP said. “I think I have a right to be upset.”
Reddit’s Reaction
The Reddit comments are a bit all over the place, with people going back and forth on whether breast milk is a proper treatment. But what a lot of people have pointed out is that it doesn’t matter what treatment it was. It was not the SIL’s place to make that call. Even Redditors who are “pretty damn crunchy” said they would have a “real problem” with this.
“[Jesus f*cking Christ] reddit is wild,” the top comment, with 5.4K upvotes said. “Any other post where a family member babysitter gives a kid baby Tylenol without permission and those people are AHs, but according to Reddit you overreacted because it’s breast milk this time. NTA. Babysitters shouldn’t be given any medicine or home remedies without permission. No matter how normal and fine people apparently think it is.”
“I don’t care how natural a remedy breast milk allegedly is, no one should be taking it upon themselves to treat someone else’s kid with anything, especially with another person’s bodily fluids, until the child’s own pediatrician has recommended it and the parent approved it.”
“When I read the post, I expected solid EnTeeAs all the way down for consent, boundaries, all of Reddit’s favorite things. What’s actually happening here is baffling.”
“You know where you put food? NOT IN YOUR EARS.”
“Every time a drop of water got into my ear, due to a ruptured ear drum up until I was 17, this post gave me massive icky feeling.”
“I understand the OP’s SIL meant well, although she seriously overstepped. Doing nothing was the best course of action! It’s hilarious that people think OP overreacted. They would fly off the handle, too, if someone who isn’t a licensed medical professional decided that they knew more about caring for your child’s needs than you did.”
“People could literally debate back and forth about breastmilk all day and any supposed benefits it may have but the fact of the matter is that the SIL put a foreign substance unsolicited into OP’s 7yo daughter’s ear, I’d be annoyed too … At most, you could maybe say it may have been reasonable for OP to not go so extreme in their response but it’s something OP doesn’t like and it’s OP’s daughter and OP’s very much entitled to set that boundary in whatever way they wish.”
Even SheKnows staffers who used breast milk as more than just food for their babies had a problem with this because — as we [almost] always say — “not your kid, not your call.”
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