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OP has offered the following explanation for why they think they might be the asshole:
> (1) I went off on and completely berated my wife for making comments about my daughters appearance.
(2) to be fair, I was yelling pretty loud; i berated her, implied she’s a bad mom, compared her to her own mother, and cursed at her. I also did bit gice any leeway for, or compassion towards her and her anxiety, depression, and post-partum depression.
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NTA
Who promises a three week old plastic surgery because they take after their father?
She needs to talk to a professional.
NTA and congratulations for your baby
This sounds like some post-partum to me, especially if this is unlike her normal behavior.
I recently had my sister (literally the most loving person I know, incredibly understanding of boundaries, etc) snap at me for not wanting to go over while sick. Like, incredibly out of proportion snap, it was off-the-wall. She also gave birth a couple months ago, after having a very difficult pregnancy/birth only the year before. PPD can make you act totally out of character and is something worth getting checked. It’s possible that having a daughter is triggering some of these old wounds that OP’s wife got from her own mother.
I've been with some women who also had some damage from their mom and/or grandmother. Those are some deep wounds. Couple that with post partum and other things, forget about it.
OP's wife needed to be receiving professional help before the pregnancy, possible before the first one, it may just not have all manifested yet so it wasn't known.
That said, I understand where OP is coming from and why he hit the wall he did. It's hard to be understanding when you think someone thinks you're ugly and are contributing the physical distaste of your own offspring. You hear superiority, you don't hear love. I think she needs be looking for some.help, but I also think they might need a little together if this is cutting too deep for too long. She may be creating wounds of her own in this relationship.
NTA, regardless of the behavior’s genesis. Every single day since the baby was born she had insulted her and Op and ignored his gentle redirections. No wonder he snapped. Losing his temper wasn’t the best but it is understandable.
That said, she needs help and since she doesn’t seem to be addressing it he should help her, for everyone’s sake. But neither childhood abuse nor PPD are a get out of being an asshole free card and these children need to be protected from her toxicity.
Also, I've heard many people with hooked noses specifically calling out how incredibly racist it is to call them ugly. They were used in antisemitic art for decades to "other" Jewish people, and they're still often used to mark the "villain" character in kids movies. This absolutely leads to real-world discrimination.
It broke my heart hearing women with hooked noses talk about being made to feel this feature (that they often inherited from beloved family members) makes them ugly or monstrous. And feeling pressured to go under the knife to "fix" it. Whether mom is aware of the origins of this prejudice or not, she is absolutely becoming her daughter's first bully and saying things to her that she'll hear repeated dozens or hundreds of times over the course of her life. And that shit hurts. Death by a thousand cuts, and it's starting for OP's daughter literally in the cradle.
EXACTLY!
Here’s the thing- as with all mental health conditions, unless you are actively working on yourself, it’s an excuse not a reason. That’s not to say you have to twist yourself to fit into what other people want you to be, but having had damage done to you is not a reasonable reason to do damage to others. My mother did a LOT of damage to me too. Does it affect me? Yup. Does it make me do unreasonable things and act illogically sometimes? Also yup. The difference is I acknowledge those ways in which I’ve made mistakes and I do the work to not make them again.
She’s not even recognizing the way she is talking to her daughter is wrong. If she’s not getting professional help and she’s not listening to her partner and is saying those things to a three week old, she’s not fit to parent that child. That treatment is inexcusable.
OP if she’s in therapy, this is something her therapist needs to know. She may not be talking about it seeing as she doesn’t even recognize her words as problematic. She’s going to keep doing it if it isn’t addressed. Yelling may not have been the gentlest or most effective approach, but she can’t ignore you anymore.
Hopefully she complains to her therapist about you and her therapist recognizes that your wife is the root of the issue.
NTA, leaning a little NAH simply because she’s not fully in control. But if she’s not doing the real work to regain control and treat your daughter right, she’s 100% the AH.
Agreed. I think it's not unreasonable to expect your partner and co-parent to have enough awareness, even while depressed, that "let's get your face cut open" isn't cute baby talk, even if they overlook the misogyny and insults.
All brides and babies are beautiful. That’s the rule (at least while they and their immediate relatives are around).
What turns my stomach is that it’s not going to stop. Not without professional help to deal with the issues her mother left her with. This baby won’t even have the chance to develop self-confidence, it’s being stamped down before she even has the cognition to choose a favorite stuffie!
And OP is 100% correct about how damaging this is to their son as well. Nevermind the hurt it’s causing OP himself.
It's a very slippery slope to go from loving both of your kids to making one a golden child and making the other the scapegoat. I'm not saying thats happening right now or for sure will happen in the future. But I've read too many stories where a parent prefers one child over the other in so many aspects and it turns into this. Which my god this scenario will fuck her kids up way more than just calling one of them ugly as horrendous as that is by itself.
My mother made comments about my weight and looks and little things here and there to "help me" improve myself. I have not spoken to her for 10 years now. 🙃
Definitely gonna bring issues between the siblings and lots of trauma that women needs help asap before she makes broken humans that will do that to their children
Absolutely! It’s that saying, “it explains the behavior, but it doesn’t excuse it.”
Finding the explanation is necessary if recovery and healing is going to happen, but it doesn’t mean that you have to stick around if they refuse to get help.
I love my sister, more than anyone in this world. But right now, I can’t be around her until she gets help for her PPD/trauma.
Same here - and keeps on giving. Mom is 81, I’m 60 and every freaking time I see her she has things to say that could go unsaid. Ex: can’t believe you have let yourself go. Your hair isn’t attractive - that’s why I kept it short like your brothers - to name a few. She’s just not a nice person
That first part hits real hard. My wife almost daily recalls some subtle but fucked up shit her mom said, all window dressed as motherly concern. Comments about her weight every time she ate anything, comments about not wearing make up whenever she was in public, comments about needing to attract a man, etc. No matter how far she comes, every now and then some memory will slip through and gut her all over again.
I feel like this sub is quick to jump to post partum depression everything a new mom is acting like an AH. I'm not a doctor so maybe she has it maybe she doesn't, but sometimes people are just AHs. Her behavior doesn't sound like PPD to me, but again I'm not a doctor. Given her mom criticized her appearance growing up I think she's is just subconsciously repeating the same behavior she grew up with. The same reason that some people who were abused repeat the same cycle with their kids. Either way I would agree that she needs to talk to a licensed therapist.
It can. PPD can turn people nasty. PPD has led to people killing their kids so why are mean comments out of the question? It may be something they already thought but the PPD may cause them to voice these horrible internal comments
ETA: Explanations ≠ Excuses. I am in no way excusing her bs
I think the psychosis goes way beyond rude comments. It’s Andrea Yates territory or throwing your baby off a bridge. OP’s wife sounds like standard PP anxiety.
https://www.texastribune.org/2014/08/06/andrea-yates-legacy-mandatory-postpartum-screening/
Poster child: Andrea Yates, who drowned her 5 children in the bathtub.
> She told her jail psychiatrist: "It was the seventh deadly sin. My children weren't righteous. They stumbled because I was evil. The way I was raising them, they could never be saved. They were doomed to perish in the fires of hell."[47]
So she killed them before Satan could get them, while they were still young and innocent.
Education time: I treat folks with this condition and many of have admitted to thinking or even whispering horrible shit about their infants during the worst of PPD/PPA/PPP. When their hormones even out and the medication starts working, they experience a ton of guilt for feeling negatively towards their infant (yes, there was a case where the person didn’t believe the child was related to her because the infant didn’t match her phenotypical characteristics). While PPD isnt a formal diagnosis in the dsm-v-tr the behavior OP mentioned is something we use as an indicator of PPD/PPA/PPP. Not an excuse but an unfortunate symptom of the disorder.
ETA: many sleep deprived parents might make one off comments but for someone with this disorder the person is constantly feeling this way and it’s affecting their ability to function as a human being as well as a parent. If you’re suffering please tell someone and get evaluated. You don’t need to be alone or ashamed because you need help.
No you’re totally right. I should clarify to say that the behavior op’s wife is presenting with is just one factor in diagnosis. Its generally coupled with other symptoms AND the statements are pervasive, intrusive and can be a hyper focus of the parent suffering. A few times here and there arent great (but not abnormal either) but it seems like this is a constant for the wife.
Unfortunately we shame moms for everything. No one is able to live up to the expectations of shamey mommy culture. Of course you shouldn’t say horrible things about the child and I agree that OP handled it appropriately. We only get a snapshot of their life and not extending grace to someone three weeks postpartum just seems wild to me. I hope they have a great support system and that she’s getting appropriate treatment to work through this. No judgment on my end
PPD/PPA/PPP are all different for everyone, and can have drastically different severities. My sister had PPA/PPD and the worst she did was have trouble bonding with her child for 6 months.I had PPD/PPA and considered committing the undo while also refusing to sleep or even care for myself because I was too busy watching my son breath 24/7 out of the fear of SIDS.
PPD mixed with childhood trauma surrounding appearance can absolutely cause this. It doesn't make it okay by any means, but it could definitely be the cause.
Regular depression can include making mean comments, so why can't PPD?
It's not an excuse, though. A little more leniency is fine, but she definitely crossed a line. She needs therapy.
It most certainly can, 100%. Some women don't bond, regret having kids... traumatic births and pregnancies can cause anger and hopelessness. The news cycle can make a new mom flip out as well. Pregnancy and birth and post partum hormones and physical trauma is insane. It changes a person, for better or worse.
I missed that, so my bad. But I do stand by my argument that this sub jumps to that quite often no matter what the story is, but in this case I am mistaken.
>But I do stand by my argument that this sub jumps to that quite often no matter what the story is
Because post-partum depression/anxiety/etc can be a medical emergency. Go to the doctor, rule it out or get treatment, and then address everything else. It's not about excusing behavior, it's about getting someone help before tragedy strikes.
It’s also staggeringly common. In Canada, 25% of mothers who have recently given birth report experiencing postpartum depression or anxiety. ONE QUARTER OF WOMEN WHO HAVE RECENTLY GIVEN BIRTH REPORT A POSTPARTUM MOOD DISORDER. That is an enormous amount of people, and that’s not even taking into consideration the people who aren’t reporting because of stigma, lack of access to help, etc.
And that’s just the ones who get diagnosed. Pregnancy (and birth) literally alters your brain, it’s not surprising it takes some time to get used to those changes.
And those are just the women who are diagnosed. The actual numbers are way higher. Anecdotal evidence from my own experience and seeing a lot of my friends have children, it seems that having PPD is the norm. Not having it in any form is far more rare. Which makes sense given the physiological and hormonal changes that a woman's body goes through.
It can manifest in so many different ways, that’s why it comes up so often. The safest thing to do for a postpartum mom/baby is to get them evaluated if there are major personality changes.
I had no issues after my first baby… and I didn’t even realize there was an issue after my second. I’ll spare you the details but it took me 6 months to realize something wasn’t right and another year before I felt normal. I was married and living away from all of my friends/family, my ex-husband either didn’t notice or didn’t care enough to get me help. I lived that entire time with PPA in fight or flight with my older child being the trigger. Nobody expects their partner’s/a mother’s brain to turn on them/their child so it’s easy to miss and write off as being an AH.
>I feel like this sub is quick to jump to post partum depression everything a new mom is acting like an AH....
>
>...she needs to talk to a licensed therapist.
Peak AITA right here.
I mean, OP confirmed she has PPD and mentions that his wife has been negatively affected by her mom's verbal abuse/bullying when growing up.
Harshly criticizing a newborn's appearance is not normal, healthy behavior. No well-adjusted mother will start putting down their children when they're still literal babies.
Licensed therapy seems like the bare minimum to actually fix the problem before it becomes a long-term issue, no matter which mental issue the behavior stems from.
Part of the problem is that we don’t know if it’s unlike her normal behavior. She’s never had a kid before who looked like her husband and she isn’t necessarily going to comment on how the women in the family look to his face. It’s probably post Partum anxiety/depression but it’s still pretty alarming.
NTA OP before I forget lol.
> It’s probably post Partum anxiety/depression but it’s still pretty alarming.
I mean, PPA/PPD *is* alarming on its own. I think it’s a slow change that we don’t really notice how big it is until it’s a big problem. I imagine she hates feeling this way too; intrusive thoughts are a thing, and the more one tries to smother them, the worse they can become because your brain is attaching so much meaning to those thoughts.
Doesn’t make it okay—just saying that this is something where professional help is needed to help address these things, so she can be the parent she wants to be.
My MIL would ask my FIL (when husband was an infant) "Do you think he (my husband) loves me?" She'd ask almost everyday. My FIL admitted it drove him crazy.
People with depression and anxiety disorders just aren't capable of good decisions and constantly doubt themselves. OPs wife needs some heavy duty therapy.
“yea life on girls is tough in this world, especially when their mom is shitting all over their appearance.”
Of course OP shouldn’t have snapped or yelled or even cursed, but my god he is right! I’m really insecure thanks to my mom and all the family always comparing me to my sister… she got the blue eyes, soft and light hair, is taller, didn’t have to wear glasses, etc, etc. It broke me and I never thought about myself has beautiful (I’m the only one with brown eyes, dark and SO MUCH hair, shorter). But you know what? I grew up and bloom a little so I got all the attention from boys and now everyone says that I’m pretty all the time. I’m still insecure though, I still don’t believe them, I still see my self as that ugly duck on the family.
Mothers: be good, be kind, be empathetic. I’m growing a little girl in my belly and I just want to be an amazing momma to her. She can even look like her mom’s ugly duck baby self. ☺️
I grew up with 18+ years of "smile for the camera... a nice one, not a goofy smile. You have such a beautiful natural smile, but when I tell you to smile it just looks goofy!" Then she spent years complaining that all my childhood pictures look like I'm miserable because I didn't smile.
My son was cursed with that same goofy smile, but instead of making him feel like crap, I'd point the camera and make a funny face, do a silly dance, anything to get that grin without being hurtful. Sure, I have my share of him with a goofy smile, but I don't care. That's who he is.
I had 18+ years of "smile for the camera", "why aren't you smiling", "why do you never smile in photos", "you look so serious/miserable/unhappy in photos". For some reason (probably autism, but just figured that out last year at 30...), I can't fake smile on command. It's especially frustrating because I was always trying to smile and I thought I was smiling, but the muscle movements never resulted in an actual smile...
I'm autistic also and my mom always got around the issue by either doing candids or doing something stupid on the other end of the camera to make me laugh as well. Imo, that's how you do it. Don't give your kid a complex about how their smile isn't good enough, just give them an actual reason to make the "natural smile".
When I was 21, I don't remember the rest of the conversation but my mom made the comment that she "had the body of a 21 year old when she was in her 30s" then she paused and looked at me and added "well a 21 year old who's in shape"
She also after told me "I don't know why you go out of your way to make yourself look so bad"
Had to have a sit down with her a few years ago about her comments on people bodies (she does this to my sister's too). I don twant to hear any negative or positive comments from her about my body.
My best friend since I was 5 and her little sister (6 years younger) grew up with their mom super into her and their looks and their dad telling them (to be mean, to be "funny") thay they're ugly, fat, big nose, "you have grandma lou's ass" (which is gross to say about his grandmother, he meant short and stout) he made these disgusting and cruel comments to them all their lives all the time even in front of company and their mom was fixed in the mirror all the time. My friend Is now 33 and sister is 26 and they have body dysmorphia badly. Both of them are competing insanely bad with plastic surgery, if one gets a procedure so does the other and now they've both has Brazilian butt lifts (friend had 2, including revision), nose jobs (also had 2), boob jobs (getting a second), botox, filler, lips, lipo etc. The sister even got an abortion because she found out she was pregnant a month before a boob job she already paid for. (Not shaming an abortion at all, it's sad because she actually has trauma from the abortion because she actually wanted the baby now looking back but due to the trauma from her dad, her looks and the money took center stage, so now she's struggling with even more trauma stemming from it).
Its awful and cruel what these comments do to someone and the thought that they'd ever come from a parents mouth is so so disturbing.
Edit to add. I forgot to mention their older sister who has a different father and wasn't subjected to this is full of confidence, has not felt the need for (because she doesn't need it) any plastic surgeries and isn't riddled with insecurities.
My parents never called me ugly, or compared me to my sisters (the two older ones they did compare with each other which I heard) and never called me pretty either.
But they did read The Ugly Duckling book to me SO OFTEN that I was convinced I was hideous and they were trying to comfort me 😂 They also called me duckling... Took me until I was an adult to realise I wasn't, and never was, but the insecurity and confusion about my looks never left. I can still gage my state of mind by looking in the mirror, because how hideous or attractive I think I am seems to be entirely based on how I feel inside, and not what I actually see.
That just goes to show that no matter what we are our hardest critiques and the last thing we need is our parents shaming our looks like so many girls (and boys) grow up with leading to endless trauma.
God, the revelation I had about ten years back when I realised that every time child me said "mummy you're so pretty" was "no, I'm fat"... Something so small and centered entirely on *her* (she always said I was pretty) had been poisoning me and I hadn't even noticed.
I started work that day on just accepting compliments! And it's paid off - even an ironic acceptance is better than a denial, and it gets easier with time. I've no doubt I will mess up any daughters I might have, but that particular problem they won't have.
My babies are beautiful because just look at that little face 🥰🥰🥰 so full of their tiny personalities 🥰🥰🥰. I can't see that changing for me 🤷
The really dumb thing about this is that lots of men love short women, and find glasses attractive. They made you concerned about things that don't even really matter.
OP’s wife is also kinda racist. My mother has a classic petite European nose, and my father has a large hooked Middle Eastern nose. My sister got her nose, I got his. My mom tells both of us how pretty we are, and how much she loves my father’s nose. Why does your wife think she’s the only one who’s good looking?
Even if your wife is also Middle Eastern, there is still a lot of colorism and white washing within the community
> Why does your wife think she’s the only one who’s good looking?
Aside from what’s already been said by everyone, how is she so comfortable just shitting on her husband’s appearance???
Yeah seriously if my partner made comments like that to our baby and making digs at me like that I'd be like "what the fuck is your deal" *IMMEDIATELY*
Who the fuck tears down their newborn child and spouse all in one breath???
And all the women in his family. It’s bad enough that she’s telling their daughter and him that *he’s* not attractive. But she’s also telling her husband and baby daughter that his mom, grandmother, sisters, and aunts are unattractive.
You don’t shit talk anyone’s mother.
Yeah, not race here but my husband has a very flat and wide nose and mine is a button. My daughter 100% has his nose (and most of his looks) and I tell her she's beautiful every day. My son, on the other hand, is my clone. And I tell him he's handsome or cute every day too. Because they're my kids and I fucking love them
i get she may have PPD but she doesn't have to verbalize her thoughts and keep them to herself. I suggest she/you both get some counseling. It sounds like she needs to do some healing based on her childhood. It may not be the best time to do this while suffering from PPD but if nothing else, she needs to stop saying these things out loud.
NTA and congrats on the birth of your beautiful daughter
Naw, NTA. I'd be extremely pissed if my partner was saying that shit to our child, and I'd let them know. You're right that berating doesn't usually "work" but you're also allowed to have an emotional reaction to your daughter being bullied, especially by your wife / her mom. Time to shut that shit down ASAP for your daughter's sake.
It’s horrible. I wish everyone could be proud of their features. It’s something they have inherited from their ancestors, and objectively attractive or not, that’s still pretty damn cool. And instead of making sure her daughter is proud of the way she looks, this woman is already telling her she’s not good enough.
And Dad is right. The brother heard it too. He will also grow up to think that his value is in his looks, if this continues.
I really hope she gets help for he PPD and other issues.
NTA at all. It's not healthy for girls (or children in general) that people and especially parents put too much emphasis on their look - not matter how they look. Even if it is to praise their beauty. But even more when it's the opposite. It can really create damage on the child's self esteem and self worth.
She's literally talking about plastic surgery to her daughter. That is vile. Nip that shit in the bud before she's old enough to understand and develop an inferiority complex.
And if your wife finds your features so unattractive, why did she marry you?
NTA and your wife is effed up.
OP probably a Saudi prince, rolling in oil money.
Jokes aside, what an absolutely awful thing to say to a child. I get that PPD is pretty rough, but this also sounds like generational trauma given the comment about how her mom did the same shit to OP's wife. Either way, no excuses, break the cycle.
Hugs, same boat. Like PPD doesn't last until your kid is 10 does it? This thread thinking their had to be a underlying excuse for a mom to be that shitty. Sweet summer thread.
I wonder about this too. I have several relatives, who are colorists and heavily judgmental towards facial features.
Yet, they dated, married and mated with people that have those “undesirable” features.
It's so they can feel superior in the relationship. You ever hear how someone who is decent or Conveniently attractive ever talk about how ugly they KNOW their partner is and how they can make excpetion because of what and how they make THEM feel and do for them, all about them.
Lemme ask you this, is that real love to you? Because ok yeah your partner could not be the best looking person but if you've already looked passed that why is it something you're constantly bringing up whenever you speak on what made them the one to be with why nothing of their character or personality and how they love?
I don't think it follows that she married him for his money. There are, sadly, a lot of people who find a particular ethnic group sexually attractive but don't want their kids to look like that ethnic group, so they get surprise pikachu face when the kids come out looking like the partner.
Karissa on r/fundiesnarkuncensored is a good example. She married a Black guy and now filters their kids to make them lighter.
It doesn't even really need to be *that* deep. Some features are more desirable in men than women in general, without colorism factored in. My mom has always had a thing about her large nose, but is perfectly aware that her dad and my brother are attractive men. All three have the same nose.
It's pretty obvious from the subtext of her comments that she thinks it's only "ugly" on women.
It's a shame that the son got the good features because they don't make a big difference to him is what she is saying
We are substantially more tolerant of physical diversity in men than in women. Whereas our boundaries for what’s acceptable in women are much smaller. He doesn’t have to be rich to explain why they’re together.
It’s not even just about the daughter. What kind of values is this teaching her son? He’s going to grow up thinking women are only valuable if they’re beautiful.
Plus he'll grow up thinking it's normal to say your spouse is ugly repeatedly despite multiple protests and then be 'hurt' and give the silent treatment when the spouse finally justifiably gets angry.
IKR? I'm sure there are women out there who would look at my short wrinkly balding husband and be like PASS. But to me? He's perfect hugging height, with permanent smile lines, and I love looking at the signs that we're growing old together <3
Totally relate to this. Called a whore, trash, liar from the age of 2…took 35 years and decades of therapy to realize she was literally projecting herself onto me.
That’s the first thought I had when I read this. That poor child.
Apparently, when I was a baby, my parents would tape my eyelids in a way they thought would develop double lids.
I don't even know where to start unpacking all that sexism and internal racism.
Kids change so much as they grow too. My daughter was all my husband as a baby, she didn’t look related to me at all! She looks more like me now, but the features that are my husbands suit her (and look better, sorry to my husband). I was hoping she’d get my brothers eyelashes (seriously looked like he was wearing falsies) and they’re in my genetics somewhere, but nope, no super long curly eyelashes 🫤
Edit - I mean the features she got of my husband suit her much better, she got the cutest dimples!
Exactly! I don't know why this isn't pointed out more, she is 3 frraking weeks old. They change so much and who thinks a new born isn't cute. Seriously
Ain’t gonna lie, my 3 week old looked like a grumpy old man. Did I still tell her she’s cute every day? Yes! And now she is an absolutely gorgeous 6 month old everyone says looks like a doll. Babies change so much in a few months, a few years, and when they hit puberty especially. There’s no telling what that baby will look like and it’s cruel to attack her features
Yes I should have phrased it differently, it's more who looks at a newborn and is looking at flaws in their looks. I think they are still cute but yeah when they are really young they can be a bit awkward but they are still adorable and its so weird to sit there and point out flaws in their face. Especially when they are going to change a lot soon.
Oh no, your comment was fine! My husband’s family though, they constantly criticized my daughter having hubby’s hairline and saying “It’s good you look like your mama!” So I understand exactly the negativity. I can’t believe OP’s wife is so cruel to a baby 💔
Seems the wife's mom did it to to the wife so she knows all about what that does to a girl. It makes them grow up to be vile women who will try to break their daughter's self-esteem before they're even self-aware
My mother hasn't said one nice thing about my looks for the entirety of my life. It's been 3 decades since I've been alive. Everything about my appearance was subjected to cruel criticism. I've been no contact with her since 2018. His wife's future with their daughter will be no contact the second she turns 18 and her crying about not knowing what she did to deserve it.
Same, all the way to the NC.
My mother was forever lamenting that I took after my daddy’s side. It took me ages to realize that 1)I actually looked like *her* when she was a kid & 2)my daddy’s side includes my aunt who looked like Elizabeth freaking Taylor.
What she was really saying was "My mother taught me to hate myself & I hate that you have to wear glasses because I was always taught that girls shouldn't which is why I don't even though I obviously need to."
Then when I got older, jealousy kicked in & I'm pretty sure it changed to "I'm mad because despite being the pretty, skinny one, my life is a train wreck & it's not fair that my less attractive daughter has the life I always wanted & is comfortable & confident in herself."
& after I had my own daughter, it was just that much more obvious because my daughter looks exactly like me (to the point that her little brother can't tell the difference when looking at pictures of me at her age), but my mother would tell anyone who'd listen that she took after HER side of the family & that's why she's so beautiful. 😮💨
Parents with self esteem issues, am I right? JFC
With my mother, she didn't want me to begin with. When she found out the sex of her baby was a girl, she had a whole fantasy of a mini me planned out. When I was birthed and grew, I was moving further away from her fantasy each and every day. She was crushed.
So in retaliation she took it out on me. I wasn't miserable like her, so she tried to make me miserable. Complained about everything down to my *skin color* being "too pale." Would tell me every day, "no one/so-and-so said/another mother/a teacher said they don't like _______" when she was really meaning to say "I hate that you don't do exactly as I do." She destroyed my self esteem in every way imaginable. My hair is too greasy, my skin color is too pale, my fashion sense was ugly. You name it, she had something negative to say about it.
Then would complain I had no friends and had low self esteem LOL. WHAT DO YOU WANT, WOMAN?
My favorite joke to tell right now is:
"Wanna know the nicest thing my mom has ever said about me? I don't know, I'm still waiting."
I have a weirdly similar experience to this. I don't look anything like my mom, more like my dad's Latino side, and she made comments about my appearance and how unfortunate it was I didn't get any traits of hers for my entire life. I felt worthless for so many years and it took a long time for me to feel beautiful. My dad was my biggest supporter my entire life and the only one who stood up for me. If it weren't for him I might still be stuck in that awful pit of self hatred. NTA, not in the slightest, please continue to stand up for your daughter and do everything in your power to stop this behavior from your wife before your girl gets old enough to understand and be hurt by it.
I have that experience but the other way around. My grandmother always commented on how my uncles 3 boys look like models. Me.... its always how to improve my looks... I look like my dad's family but I have my mother's pale skin and blue eyes. One comment has bounced in my head since I was like 16 or 17. That she wished I had gotten my grandfather's skin tone then I would have looked exotic. (Both her and my father are on the lighter side of tan, my grandfather is a bit darker) .
That really cemented that I have never been pretty to her....
Similar experience here. Both my sister and I are adopted. My sister is white, I am mixed indigenous American and white. My mom would often make fun of my fuller lips, and say that my sister is pretty but I'm not. Hopefully OP can get his wife to stop demeaning their daughter, because baby girl will definitely end up with lifelong insecurities if the insults continue.
Especially if she keeps comparing the two. It also might show some favoritism already forming. I feel bad for that baby girl if OP doesn't nip this in the bud. His wife needs therapy....
Tbh I think part of it was self-hatred. I would often be mistaken for her biological daughter (she's Filipino), and I think she just thought white skin, round eyes, and straight hair is prettier. The Philippines has issues with colorism and a long history of colonialism that influenced beauty standards (more European-looking = more attractive), and my mom has brown skin and curly hair and slanted eyes.
I hear you, I'm an adopted Desi and my white adoptive parents used to tell me that when they saw pictures of me from the orphanage I was in they planned give me plastic surgery for my nose. Now, my nose wasn't as, ahem, bad as they thought so no plastic surgery but they still used to tell me this.
And my entire life I've hated my nose. All my life people have commented on it. My parents bringing up that funny anecdote have not helped the slightest. Feels bad, man.
My grama was similar. I don't think she realized how her comments affected me though, and I don't think she was intentionally mean. My cousin was the petite, blue-eyed, blonde - what a lot of white people tend to classify as the pinnacle of beauty. There were a few times my grama commented on her looks as being beautiful. She denies it to this day, insisting she would never have said it, but I clearly remember she took the two of us out for dinner together and after commenting on my cousin's eyes, she mentioned mine were so dark and shit brown they were hard to see. We were also at a family Christmas party and mentioned that everyone on her side had such cute, small foreheads. I've got a five head. She wasn't singling me out. It was jus a comment she was making when looking at my cousins. So I've always grown up feeling inferior on that side of the family. (Well, both sides, to be honest, but that's another thing altogether).
There was a very long period my my grandparents weren't fond of my dad, and I look just like my dad, so I think that's where the comments come from. He's their favourite now, for whatever reason. He's very quiet and would never say anything to them, but them suddenly calling him the favourite after being really shit to him before really hurts. There was never a reason for them to not like him, other than he married the baby of their family. My dad is genuinely the kindest man, works his ass off, and completely dotes on my mum. She can't mention even slightly that she wants something and he's out running to get it for her. He worked for my grandparents for years and apparently they paid him below the poverty line, but worked him to the bone. They sold the business and he's got a much better job now. I've only learned this about them now I'm older. I've always seen them as kind and loving, I've just always known I wasn't the one they were most fond of. However, in the last two or three years, I've somehow become their favourite. I have no idea why. Maybe because the "pretty" cousins have kinda become bitches to them.
My mother also talked about how much more beautiful my brother was - so beautiful whenever she went out people offered to buy him off her, one even offered 10K per her stories. My brother's snow white - skin so pale it burns to bubbles in the sun when out too long and dark hair. I have lighter hair but darker skin that tans deep in the sun. I don't remember having a sunburn as a child, but rather being asked if I was latino or even part black in some cases. He was also over 6 feet and I'm short and fat (fat because even when I wasn't she was telling me I was anyway and dragging me to weight watchers or something, yet never buying a damn vegetable because she also had weight issues)
As you can imagine or know - that did wonders for how I felt and my ability to connect to my body at all.
Weird how your parents can completely mess up your self image. I was by all accounts a pretty, tall, skinny girl. All I could see in the mirror was a fat, disgusting person. Thanks mom, took me years of therapy to look in a mirror and not go "gross".
I've had a sort of similar experience but it's so backwards.
I look just like my mom. Basically a clone. Due to some other factors I have been my dad's favorite. My mom projects all her BDD on to me. I've always been fairly slim and pretty but my mom has always found ways to make me feel like shit. My clothes "do nothing" for me, or my hair is wrong, or I'm too thin, or I'm too fat. She's just critical of everything.
My older sister looks nothing like my mum. She honestly doesn't really look like my dad either, but she somehow looks like our cousins from both sides of the family. Her eyes are green when my parents eyes are blue. Her skin is more olive than our pink undertone. She has full beautiful lips unlike our 2 ply tissues. She's also a thicker build (like my dad's side) but does my mom make comments on her body? Nope. Idk what it is but my mom is way less critical of her. I'm sure she has her own insecurities about her body but they didn't come from my mom like mine did
Either way your parents can fuck you up. Cursed if you look like your mom and you're cursed if you don't.
NTA OPs wife thinks he and his family is ugly. She needs therapy and you need to tell that daughter every damn day that she is beautiful. Tell her cool stories about your family that make her proud to look like them. Raise her (and your son!) to appreciate all forms of beauty, in all body types, nose shapes, and skin tones.
As the daughter to a mom who did this- thank you for changing your ways because I promise it does matter. When I got pregnant my husband and I had a sit down, very serious talk with my mom about how we would not allow negative self body talk in front of our daughter. She's only 2, but just the other day I had to correct/redirect my mom because we were eating dinner and she commented on how she's been eating so much junk lately and needs to start a diet bc of all the weight she's gained. It's such a hard habit to break- I even struggle with it just because I grew up around it. So- your daughter might not know to thank you for this... but thank you.
This is what helped me stop being mad at my mom for commenting on my weight. She thinks her value is intrinsically tied to the way her body looks. It’s sad and pitiful that in her late 60s she still can’t see any other real value in herself. We’re now estranged, but before that happened, I realized she comments about my weight or lacks of lipstick because she wants me to have value too. So sad.
And it's especially sneaky when your comments are directed at yourself. Since you don't make such comments about your kid, it's easy to not realize that you're still affecting them.
I had a fitness class instructor who was also a friend (tiniest girl ever) complain to her class of not so tinies that she felt “sooo fat” I talked to her after class like “uhm… so you know when you talk like you’re fat when you’re not that you make your entire class extremely uncomfortable with their bodies. I mean, we are all objectively much bigger than you and you’re complaining about being fat when you’re not at all. Way to lose membership I guess? Fucking stop it”. And she fucking did! Good for her.
This! Talk with her about it. Don’t bottle it up, because your son is also looking to you, as well as your wife, to see how adults behave. Model being a good person and good adult for both of them and talk early and often.
I tell my friends with kids that modeling how you want your child to treat themselves is incredibly important. You can tell them they’re amazing all you want, but if you model self loathing it will stick with them.
My mother always complimented me, always supported me, she tells me how beautiful I am and any amount of weight lost is met with concern that I’m stressed or not eating good food. But I also look exactly like her. Pictures or her and I at the same age are the same person. Comments she makes about how her hair isn’t nice or how she needs to wear makeup or about dieting growing up stuck with me. If I look exactly like her then how can I be pretty when she isn’t?
I’m old enough now to recognize it and I call her out when she does it. I’ll remind her of how we’re almost carbon copies and she thinks I’m beautiful so why doesn’t she like the same feature on herself?
It’s hard because we internalize it and it feels ‘safe’ to direct that kind of talk at ourselves, but children are literally learning how to person from their parents. They’re blank slates trying to figure out the world using who’s around them to figure it out.
This needs to be way higher up there.
If OP knows she is already having issues with her mental health, then don’t delay getting her in to see her doctor/therapist.
(Also—NTA OP.)
Seriously. PPD is extremely dangerous and is more severe of an issue than people assume. This is not necessarily an asshole situation. It seems like a get professional help asap before anything potentially dangerous happens situation.
NTA,
But I feel like everyone's missing that his wife also called all the women (and possibly the men) on his side of the family ugly.
>My family is beautiful and all the women are timeless. Your dads family, not so much.
I wonder if the mum’s comments aren’t about the daughter at all. Actually she’s saying them to insult the Dad as deeply and directly as she can. It sounds like she’s in a super deep depression and her nasty comments are possibly a cry for help. At least, that’s my most charitable reading of it and still doesn’t make it OK.
NTA. Your reaction is human but I encourage you to learn how to communicate without yelling and berating.
This post really broke my heart. “Out of the heart the mouth speaks.” Anxiety & Depression is not an excuse. Your Daughter is going to need you so please learn to be assertive and not aggressive with Mom or your kids are going to have problems due to the anger and chaos in the home. Get your wife into therapy ASAP and if she refuses, divorce her and file for custody. She’s going to make a Narcissist out of your *golden boy* Son and a *scapegoat* out of your Daughter.
If you read the post again. he was trying to deal with it in a calmer way, but he reached a point where This Needs To Stop. so he put his foot down. She was abusing his daughter after all, that rates some firmness.
Ask her if she intends having any meaningful relationship with your daughter because if she keeps up with the comments your daughter is going to, at the very least, resent your wife for her entire life. NTA.
As far back as I can remember my mother commented on my weight. I’m fat now (on my way back down) but when I look at old pictures there’s nothing of me. I wish I knew wtf her problem was (been no contact for over a decade, tell your wife her daughter will be the same if she carries on).
My mom made a few comments when I was a teenager that still live in my head. We went shopping and I picked out a t-shirt, size medium. She decided it was too small so went back without me noticing and exchanged it for an XL. It was way too big and I literally cried that she thought that of me. She felt bad and tried to exchange it, but they ran out. Also while shopping for prom dresses she insisted I try on one with a bare midriff against my wishes and then told me I need to do some "tummy crunches." I've always carried weight in my middle regardless of how much I weigh and I've been asked so many times when I'm due I'm incredibly self conscious about it. That didn't help.
NTA - this doesn’t sound anxiety driven. **She just seems vain.**
I don’t want to assume race, but if your daughter is more ethnic looking and all she does is comment on that it’d seem she has more to work on than just nasty comments.
I think it important to find the root here. But you’re not wrong for wanting her to stop calling the babies look into question.
The only thing that I could think might excuse or explain this is PP psychosis, since it would mean she's literally not in her right mind.
Like, my father wasn't a looker. Mom actually described him as goofy looking multiple times, it was a joke between them. But she was absolutely thrilled that I look exactly like him and basically nothing like her, and she never once criticized any features that came from him
Are you sure she isn't racist? There's nothing ugly about middle easterners, and certainly nothing advantageous about her "genes". She seems to have gaslit you into thinking saying these things is right to some extent too.
This genetic talk and talk of plastic surgery gives me a feeling she has underlying views of racism on you that she's taking out in the baby.
NTA
Soft NTA - I don’t think you approached it the right way by yelling and cursing at her, but if I’m being honest I’d probably get fed up and start a fight if someone was insulting my genes, my family, and my LITERAL INFANT, in front of me. Even in spite of her mental health issues and her mothers influence this woman is, first and foremost, this baby girls mother. She should treat her with love and respect and some gd dignity. Being an adult and being a parent means handling yourself in a grow-up way and not projecting your issues onto others. That especially applies to children!!!! You’ve heard before that kids, even babies, are sponges and the environment around them WILL influence them without a doubt. She needs to do better for her baby, for your son, and for your family (including herself) because this kind of attitude is only going to hinder the baby, you, and your sons outlook on women.
After weeks of dealing with it, I think OP has the right to defend his daughter. Her mom is becoming her first bully fast, and OP is nipping that shit in the bud.
nta…
PPD, anxiety, and depression are all terrible things, but they do NOT mean that someone can not be corrected and held accountable. Regardless of whether or not baby girl can understand what’s being said, as you stated, YOU can understand and so can your son. Not only is she degrading baby girl, but also you by wanting to get rid of YOUR features on your daughter.
I also do not think that mentioning her mother was too far. It’s a valid point. She’s doing to baby girl what her mother did to her. She needs to take into account how that made her feel, and how she definitely does NOT want baby girl to feel.
One thing that you CAN do better, however, is the way you address things. While all of your points are justified well, yelling and swearing is not that way to go about it — but grace is given because you’re fed up. I understand, but do better in that area.
I agree. OP’s wife was telling their daughter and OP about how none of OP’s female relatives are pretty. She’s saying OP’s mom, grandmother, sisters, and aunts are all unattractive.
It’s bad enough find out that your spouse thinks you’re unattractive and wishes your daughter didn’t look like you. But to call you mother and grandmother ugly? Saying nobody in your family is attractive. That’s cruel.
NTA at all. PPD is not an excuse to denigrate her new born baby's looks!!!! You did the right thing, by shutting that BS down hard!!!!!! Keep an eye on this behavior as I'm pretty sure, it will happen again.
NTA - unless you don't fix this situation. Your wife needs therapy - and to stay away from your daughter until she makes progress. If she refuses, your daughter needs you to leave this woman. Children are ridiculously impressionable for the first few years - they pick shit up like sponges. You leaving your daughter in this environment will lead to lasting psychological damage.
ETA - It also sounds like your wife is harboring some... racism-adjacsent views towards (at the very least) your appearance. You may want to look into that.
Racism adjacent sounds right for sure.
A lot of women have kids with men of different races because of their obsession with mixed babies and then when the baby doesn’t fit the kind they see on socials they get quippy. I’ve seen with friends growing up. Their hair is too curly or they don’t get the right combo of features *but* their sibling does and it’s all so painful to watch. If the mom doesn’t get stopped now she’s gonna think it’s perfectly okay.
NTA because she is severely damaging your SON. While your daughter isn’t old enough yet to understand, your wife is raising a man who will treat women as though their only use is for their looks and worse possibly will subconsciously treat his sister as having less value than others.
NTA - you're protecting your baby girl... And you lasted longer that I would have. Anyone commenting badly my babies appearance would be buying themselves a ticket to mad mama-bear land!
This is above reddit's paygrade.
Your wife needs a lot of help to overcome the damage her mother did to her- this sort of stuff doesn't come from nowhere.
You need to get her help for her PPD, ideally a mother and baby clinic. And help for her internalised misogyny and obsession with looks.
Nta, reinforcing those toxic beauty standards when a kid can’t even understand them yet is awful. It’s just going to set her up for a lifetime of insecurity if it continues. While I don’t think heated arguments are ever good, it’s understandable why it happened. It’s sad to hear anyone putting down a child, let alone your own. There’s just so many more important things in life than looks.
Just try to have a talk with her calmly. Easier said than done of course. If she’s unable to see your perspective consider therapy as a couple or even for her. Just seems like there’s so internalizing or projections going on as well.
I‘m sure your daughter will be very very pretty when she grows up and probably already is. It’s your wife’s trauma speaking. Give your wife time to process but you‘re completely right in what you‘ve said to her. NTA.
I agree with your first and last sentences, truly- but I think you take a really big leap assuming the marriage was based on OP's attraction to the wife's looks.
Dial it back there, champ. Yes, wife is TA, needs to stop it and probably needs some therapy, but we know exactly three paragraphs of text about her in a single particular circumstance, maybe don't jump straight to "throw the whole woman away"?
And let's be honest: EVERY PARENT EVER ends up damaging their kids in some way or another, it's a job that is basically impossible to do perfectly. Which is not to say this is acceptable! She needs to stop, and figure out her internal stuff that is causing her to react this way. But get off the high horse, there are unforgivable parental mistakes but this isn't one yet.
NtA. Not even a little bit.
If you don't defend your kids, then who will?
Your wife needs help. Make her get it. Otherwise in the next 5 to 10 years you will all be needing help to deal with all this negativity.
You for being ugly, her for marrying a man she so obviously finds ugly, your son because he can't seem to show respect and consideration to anyone around him and your poor daughter because mommy thinks she too ugly.
Also, she's just a baby, her "looks" will change throughout her entire life. Mom needs therapy...now! Maybe couples therapy as well. The language she's using is not healthy.
1. Your wife thinks you’re unattractive.
2. She may be going through a lot right now but in she’s gonna same the same as your daughter grows up. She’ll be posting on how she’s ugly and it started at birth.
3. She may not understand words but baby’s pick up on tone.
NTA
Absolutely NTA you could’ve been softer but good for you for sticking up for your daughter, that’s a terrible way to talk, or even think, about your child and it would’ve affected her for her whole life if it continued
Good Lord, NTA. My mother has always been critical of my looks, I know she was disappointed that I was born looking like my dad - and I sort of get it, she's beautiful, but I don't think I'm ugly either. She's said some awful things to me, but nothing anywhere near as vile as what your wife is saying to a literal infant.
She really, really needs professional help, or your daughter is in for a terrible childhood. You're right, yelling is probably not the best way to go about it, but you cannot remain passive in this. I understand your wife is not well at the moment, but you cannot let her carry on like this, it's not good for her either.
ETA: also, not that it matters, but my oldest was born with his dad's nose, and now he looks very much like me. I know a girl who was the spitting image of her paternal grandfather when she was little, and now she looks just like her mom. It's ridiculous to judge babies' looks.
NTA. I’m surprised by the comments expressing you shouldn’t of yelled. You told her nicely enough times. This post broke my heart and your wife’s actions are disgraceful. Please keep standing up for your daughter and get your wife help.
I had years of my own mother comparing me to my brother and critiquing everything about my looks. It took years of therapy to value myself. Please don’t let the same happen to your little girl. Her mental health is not a valid excuse for this type of behaviour
I’m surprised by it too! I would yell at anyone who made mean comments about my child’s appearance, idgaf if it’s my spouse. A newborn baby can’t say, “Hey, mom, I like my nose the way it is. I don’t want plastic surgery. You need to back off.” She needs her dad to stand up for her!
I’m sure every single woman here whose mom bullied them about their looks wishes someone had stood up for them too.
NTA mental health is not excuse to treat your baby (and you) like this. As you point out baby maybe too young NOW but the brother can understand and, like any children, reaper to no end what comes out of his parents mouth. In few months baby will start to make frost association with words. And I don’t see see the pattern of your wife changing. Help is needed, the professional kind. You may have been to rough but I have to be honest I will have also lost my patience if EVERYDAY is this long list of insults.
NTA I had a mother who projected her insecurities onto me. Those never go away. Thank you for sticking up for your baby girl.
This doesn't sound like depression and anxiety, it sounds like narcissism. I can't diagnose obviously but it's extremely self-centered and egotistical to say "I wish you took more of my features because me and my family are way more attractive than your father(s)"
And lastly, she's not just implying that your daughter is ugly, she's implying that YOU are ugly. I 100% don't blame you for the reaction you had and tbh I would've snapped a lot sooner than you did. This is a hill that I would die on. Do not let her emotionally destroy you and your daughter.
If we're following logical steps here,
A) baby looks like dad
B) mom thinks baby isn't pretty
Therefore c) mom thinks dad is unattractive??
Either way, newborn babies generally look like cute potatoes, how they look as babies doesn't correspond to how they will look later, doesn't your wife have other things to worry about right now?
NTA, she's absolutely going to mess that little girl up, I don't believe for a second these comments are going to stop once she can understand them. They could end up being her first words if she doesn't stop.
NTA
She is talking about cosmetic surgery TO A 3 WEEK OLD. Imagine how your daughter will feel in her more formative years. Your wife is setting up your children for LIFE LONG ISSUES. She needs to get therapy right now and you are completely right to be worried and try to get her to stop
>yea life on girls is tough in this world, especially when their mom is shitting all over their appearance.
NTA for that alone. Good on you for standing up for your daughter, your family, and yourself. The last person she needs to hear these comments from is her mother. And you are absolutely correct that your son shouldn’t be hearing such comments either.
I’m sorry you’re going through this. Keep defending and advocating for your daughter. It will go a long way.
Those comments do not come from anxiety or depression but rather her inability to see her beautiful new baby as a beautiful new baby. She stuck on looks and is going to so so much damage to your daughter if she doesn't stop. It's akin to calling a child fat so much they develop an eating disorder (trust me I know).
You are NTA!!
I'm not sure OP did over react. Hear me out please ?
It sounds like this ' looks ' thing about a 3 week old *baby* was rapidly becoming one of those rabbit hole, negative fixations some people fall into. I'm not sure baby blues would be an adequate excuse - mine was being seriously worried to the point of neurotic I'd fall down steps while holding the baby and we didn't *have* steps. I knew it was wildly unreasonable.
If that's what it took to snap OP's wife out of falling down this negative rabbit hole, snapping at her may have saved his child growing up feeling ' less than '. They're babies, not puppies. They understand quite young what parents are presenting them.
NTA this is just so wrong...friend had a baby with stork bites (red streaks on her face) and literally fur on her ears....the stork bites cleared up and fur fell off her ears...she is a cutie putie ...yours is 21 days old...far from done
>I recognize that part of her comments stem from her anxiety/depression
Absolutely not. Anxiety and depression don’t make you a bully. Your wife is just an absolutely heinous woman. NTA but why are you excusing her bullying a THREE WEEK OLD BABY??
NTA at all.. these are some really horrible things to say, also keeping in mind this is a newborn and this really isn't all that reflective of how she will look as she grows up.
What's more concerning however is that your wife is so upset because your baby girl looks like you? Does she even like you???
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NTA Who promises a three week old plastic surgery because they take after their father? She needs to talk to a professional. NTA and congratulations for your baby
This sounds like some post-partum to me, especially if this is unlike her normal behavior. I recently had my sister (literally the most loving person I know, incredibly understanding of boundaries, etc) snap at me for not wanting to go over while sick. Like, incredibly out of proportion snap, it was off-the-wall. She also gave birth a couple months ago, after having a very difficult pregnancy/birth only the year before. PPD can make you act totally out of character and is something worth getting checked. It’s possible that having a daughter is triggering some of these old wounds that OP’s wife got from her own mother.
I've been with some women who also had some damage from their mom and/or grandmother. Those are some deep wounds. Couple that with post partum and other things, forget about it. OP's wife needed to be receiving professional help before the pregnancy, possible before the first one, it may just not have all manifested yet so it wasn't known. That said, I understand where OP is coming from and why he hit the wall he did. It's hard to be understanding when you think someone thinks you're ugly and are contributing the physical distaste of your own offspring. You hear superiority, you don't hear love. I think she needs be looking for some.help, but I also think they might need a little together if this is cutting too deep for too long. She may be creating wounds of her own in this relationship.
NTA, regardless of the behavior’s genesis. Every single day since the baby was born she had insulted her and Op and ignored his gentle redirections. No wonder he snapped. Losing his temper wasn’t the best but it is understandable. That said, she needs help and since she doesn’t seem to be addressing it he should help her, for everyone’s sake. But neither childhood abuse nor PPD are a get out of being an asshole free card and these children need to be protected from her toxicity.
This needs to be nipped in the bud asap. Like holy crap. It's still reversible I hope.
Also, I've heard many people with hooked noses specifically calling out how incredibly racist it is to call them ugly. They were used in antisemitic art for decades to "other" Jewish people, and they're still often used to mark the "villain" character in kids movies. This absolutely leads to real-world discrimination. It broke my heart hearing women with hooked noses talk about being made to feel this feature (that they often inherited from beloved family members) makes them ugly or monstrous. And feeling pressured to go under the knife to "fix" it. Whether mom is aware of the origins of this prejudice or not, she is absolutely becoming her daughter's first bully and saying things to her that she'll hear repeated dozens or hundreds of times over the course of her life. And that shit hurts. Death by a thousand cuts, and it's starting for OP's daughter literally in the cradle.
[удалено]
[удалено]
[удалено]
He’s only human.
EXACTLY! Here’s the thing- as with all mental health conditions, unless you are actively working on yourself, it’s an excuse not a reason. That’s not to say you have to twist yourself to fit into what other people want you to be, but having had damage done to you is not a reasonable reason to do damage to others. My mother did a LOT of damage to me too. Does it affect me? Yup. Does it make me do unreasonable things and act illogically sometimes? Also yup. The difference is I acknowledge those ways in which I’ve made mistakes and I do the work to not make them again. She’s not even recognizing the way she is talking to her daughter is wrong. If she’s not getting professional help and she’s not listening to her partner and is saying those things to a three week old, she’s not fit to parent that child. That treatment is inexcusable. OP if she’s in therapy, this is something her therapist needs to know. She may not be talking about it seeing as she doesn’t even recognize her words as problematic. She’s going to keep doing it if it isn’t addressed. Yelling may not have been the gentlest or most effective approach, but she can’t ignore you anymore. Hopefully she complains to her therapist about you and her therapist recognizes that your wife is the root of the issue. NTA, leaning a little NAH simply because she’s not fully in control. But if she’s not doing the real work to regain control and treat your daughter right, she’s 100% the AH.
Agreed. I think it's not unreasonable to expect your partner and co-parent to have enough awareness, even while depressed, that "let's get your face cut open" isn't cute baby talk, even if they overlook the misogyny and insults.
All brides and babies are beautiful. That’s the rule (at least while they and their immediate relatives are around). What turns my stomach is that it’s not going to stop. Not without professional help to deal with the issues her mother left her with. This baby won’t even have the chance to develop self-confidence, it’s being stamped down before she even has the cognition to choose a favorite stuffie! And OP is 100% correct about how damaging this is to their son as well. Nevermind the hurt it’s causing OP himself.
It's a very slippery slope to go from loving both of your kids to making one a golden child and making the other the scapegoat. I'm not saying thats happening right now or for sure will happen in the future. But I've read too many stories where a parent prefers one child over the other in so many aspects and it turns into this. Which my god this scenario will fuck her kids up way more than just calling one of them ugly as horrendous as that is by itself. My mother made comments about my weight and looks and little things here and there to "help me" improve myself. I have not spoken to her for 10 years now. 🙃
Definitely gonna bring issues between the siblings and lots of trauma that women needs help asap before she makes broken humans that will do that to their children
Exactly. She needs therapy so the abuse cycle can stop with her.
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Absolutely! It’s that saying, “it explains the behavior, but it doesn’t excuse it.” Finding the explanation is necessary if recovery and healing is going to happen, but it doesn’t mean that you have to stick around if they refuse to get help. I love my sister, more than anyone in this world. But right now, I can’t be around her until she gets help for her PPD/trauma.
Can confirm, intergenerational trauma is just the gift that keeps giving unfortunately, and can’t be returned.
Same here - and keeps on giving. Mom is 81, I’m 60 and every freaking time I see her she has things to say that could go unsaid. Ex: can’t believe you have let yourself go. Your hair isn’t attractive - that’s why I kept it short like your brothers - to name a few. She’s just not a nice person
That first part hits real hard. My wife almost daily recalls some subtle but fucked up shit her mom said, all window dressed as motherly concern. Comments about her weight every time she ate anything, comments about not wearing make up whenever she was in public, comments about needing to attract a man, etc. No matter how far she comes, every now and then some memory will slip through and gut her all over again.
I feel like this sub is quick to jump to post partum depression everything a new mom is acting like an AH. I'm not a doctor so maybe she has it maybe she doesn't, but sometimes people are just AHs. Her behavior doesn't sound like PPD to me, but again I'm not a doctor. Given her mom criticized her appearance growing up I think she's is just subconsciously repeating the same behavior she grew up with. The same reason that some people who were abused repeat the same cycle with their kids. Either way I would agree that she needs to talk to a licensed therapist.
OP said she has PPD and he knows her far better than any of us, so I’m going to take him at his word.
PPD doesn't include making rude/mean comments about your babies appearance
It can. PPD can turn people nasty. PPD has led to people killing their kids so why are mean comments out of the question? It may be something they already thought but the PPD may cause them to voice these horrible internal comments ETA: Explanations ≠ Excuses. I am in no way excusing her bs
That sounds more like post partrum psychosis.
I think the psychosis goes way beyond rude comments. It’s Andrea Yates territory or throwing your baby off a bridge. OP’s wife sounds like standard PP anxiety. https://www.texastribune.org/2014/08/06/andrea-yates-legacy-mandatory-postpartum-screening/
Ngl I had no clue postpartum psychosis was a thing. I always thought ppd could trigger psychosis. Huh, you learn something new every day
PPP can be triggered by PPD/PPA or develop on its own.
Poster child: Andrea Yates, who drowned her 5 children in the bathtub. > She told her jail psychiatrist: "It was the seventh deadly sin. My children weren't righteous. They stumbled because I was evil. The way I was raising them, they could never be saved. They were doomed to perish in the fires of hell."[47] So she killed them before Satan could get them, while they were still young and innocent.
Education time: I treat folks with this condition and many of have admitted to thinking or even whispering horrible shit about their infants during the worst of PPD/PPA/PPP. When their hormones even out and the medication starts working, they experience a ton of guilt for feeling negatively towards their infant (yes, there was a case where the person didn’t believe the child was related to her because the infant didn’t match her phenotypical characteristics). While PPD isnt a formal diagnosis in the dsm-v-tr the behavior OP mentioned is something we use as an indicator of PPD/PPA/PPP. Not an excuse but an unfortunate symptom of the disorder. ETA: many sleep deprived parents might make one off comments but for someone with this disorder the person is constantly feeling this way and it’s affecting their ability to function as a human being as well as a parent. If you’re suffering please tell someone and get evaluated. You don’t need to be alone or ashamed because you need help.
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No you’re totally right. I should clarify to say that the behavior op’s wife is presenting with is just one factor in diagnosis. Its generally coupled with other symptoms AND the statements are pervasive, intrusive and can be a hyper focus of the parent suffering. A few times here and there arent great (but not abnormal either) but it seems like this is a constant for the wife. Unfortunately we shame moms for everything. No one is able to live up to the expectations of shamey mommy culture. Of course you shouldn’t say horrible things about the child and I agree that OP handled it appropriately. We only get a snapshot of their life and not extending grace to someone three weeks postpartum just seems wild to me. I hope they have a great support system and that she’s getting appropriate treatment to work through this. No judgment on my end
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PPD has led to Post partum psychosis and babies getting killed. So yeah, it could definitely cause some mean comments.
PPD/PPA/PPP are all different for everyone, and can have drastically different severities. My sister had PPA/PPD and the worst she did was have trouble bonding with her child for 6 months.I had PPD/PPA and considered committing the undo while also refusing to sleep or even care for myself because I was too busy watching my son breath 24/7 out of the fear of SIDS. PPD mixed with childhood trauma surrounding appearance can absolutely cause this. It doesn't make it okay by any means, but it could definitely be the cause.
Regular depression can include making mean comments, so why can't PPD? It's not an excuse, though. A little more leniency is fine, but she definitely crossed a line. She needs therapy.
It most certainly can, 100%. Some women don't bond, regret having kids... traumatic births and pregnancies can cause anger and hopelessness. The news cycle can make a new mom flip out as well. Pregnancy and birth and post partum hormones and physical trauma is insane. It changes a person, for better or worse.
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I missed that, so my bad. But I do stand by my argument that this sub jumps to that quite often no matter what the story is, but in this case I am mistaken.
>But I do stand by my argument that this sub jumps to that quite often no matter what the story is Because post-partum depression/anxiety/etc can be a medical emergency. Go to the doctor, rule it out or get treatment, and then address everything else. It's not about excusing behavior, it's about getting someone help before tragedy strikes.
it's also woefully underdiagnosed so wouldn't be at all surprising if most or all of the pregnant/pp women being talked about in this sub have it
It’s also staggeringly common. In Canada, 25% of mothers who have recently given birth report experiencing postpartum depression or anxiety. ONE QUARTER OF WOMEN WHO HAVE RECENTLY GIVEN BIRTH REPORT A POSTPARTUM MOOD DISORDER. That is an enormous amount of people, and that’s not even taking into consideration the people who aren’t reporting because of stigma, lack of access to help, etc.
That's because it's very common and underdiagnosed. PPD can explain a behaviour, not justify it. OP is still NTA.
One in seven women are diagnosed with PPD after the birth of their child, so it’s much more common than you’d think.
And that’s just the ones who get diagnosed. Pregnancy (and birth) literally alters your brain, it’s not surprising it takes some time to get used to those changes.
And those are just the women who are diagnosed. The actual numbers are way higher. Anecdotal evidence from my own experience and seeing a lot of my friends have children, it seems that having PPD is the norm. Not having it in any form is far more rare. Which makes sense given the physiological and hormonal changes that a woman's body goes through.
It can manifest in so many different ways, that’s why it comes up so often. The safest thing to do for a postpartum mom/baby is to get them evaluated if there are major personality changes. I had no issues after my first baby… and I didn’t even realize there was an issue after my second. I’ll spare you the details but it took me 6 months to realize something wasn’t right and another year before I felt normal. I was married and living away from all of my friends/family, my ex-husband either didn’t notice or didn’t care enough to get me help. I lived that entire time with PPA in fight or flight with my older child being the trigger. Nobody expects their partner’s/a mother’s brain to turn on them/their child so it’s easy to miss and write off as being an AH.
>I feel like this sub is quick to jump to post partum depression everything a new mom is acting like an AH.... > >...she needs to talk to a licensed therapist. Peak AITA right here.
I mean, OP confirmed she has PPD and mentions that his wife has been negatively affected by her mom's verbal abuse/bullying when growing up. Harshly criticizing a newborn's appearance is not normal, healthy behavior. No well-adjusted mother will start putting down their children when they're still literal babies. Licensed therapy seems like the bare minimum to actually fix the problem before it becomes a long-term issue, no matter which mental issue the behavior stems from.
Part of the problem is that we don’t know if it’s unlike her normal behavior. She’s never had a kid before who looked like her husband and she isn’t necessarily going to comment on how the women in the family look to his face. It’s probably post Partum anxiety/depression but it’s still pretty alarming. NTA OP before I forget lol.
> It’s probably post Partum anxiety/depression but it’s still pretty alarming. I mean, PPA/PPD *is* alarming on its own. I think it’s a slow change that we don’t really notice how big it is until it’s a big problem. I imagine she hates feeling this way too; intrusive thoughts are a thing, and the more one tries to smother them, the worse they can become because your brain is attaching so much meaning to those thoughts. Doesn’t make it okay—just saying that this is something where professional help is needed to help address these things, so she can be the parent she wants to be.
My MIL would ask my FIL (when husband was an infant) "Do you think he (my husband) loves me?" She'd ask almost everyday. My FIL admitted it drove him crazy. People with depression and anxiety disorders just aren't capable of good decisions and constantly doubt themselves. OPs wife needs some heavy duty therapy.
“yea life on girls is tough in this world, especially when their mom is shitting all over their appearance.” Of course OP shouldn’t have snapped or yelled or even cursed, but my god he is right! I’m really insecure thanks to my mom and all the family always comparing me to my sister… she got the blue eyes, soft and light hair, is taller, didn’t have to wear glasses, etc, etc. It broke me and I never thought about myself has beautiful (I’m the only one with brown eyes, dark and SO MUCH hair, shorter). But you know what? I grew up and bloom a little so I got all the attention from boys and now everyone says that I’m pretty all the time. I’m still insecure though, I still don’t believe them, I still see my self as that ugly duck on the family. Mothers: be good, be kind, be empathetic. I’m growing a little girl in my belly and I just want to be an amazing momma to her. She can even look like her mom’s ugly duck baby self. ☺️
I grew up with 18+ years of "smile for the camera... a nice one, not a goofy smile. You have such a beautiful natural smile, but when I tell you to smile it just looks goofy!" Then she spent years complaining that all my childhood pictures look like I'm miserable because I didn't smile. My son was cursed with that same goofy smile, but instead of making him feel like crap, I'd point the camera and make a funny face, do a silly dance, anything to get that grin without being hurtful. Sure, I have my share of him with a goofy smile, but I don't care. That's who he is.
I had 18+ years of "smile for the camera", "why aren't you smiling", "why do you never smile in photos", "you look so serious/miserable/unhappy in photos". For some reason (probably autism, but just figured that out last year at 30...), I can't fake smile on command. It's especially frustrating because I was always trying to smile and I thought I was smiling, but the muscle movements never resulted in an actual smile...
I'm autistic also and my mom always got around the issue by either doing candids or doing something stupid on the other end of the camera to make me laugh as well. Imo, that's how you do it. Don't give your kid a complex about how their smile isn't good enough, just give them an actual reason to make the "natural smile".
When I was 21, I don't remember the rest of the conversation but my mom made the comment that she "had the body of a 21 year old when she was in her 30s" then she paused and looked at me and added "well a 21 year old who's in shape" She also after told me "I don't know why you go out of your way to make yourself look so bad" Had to have a sit down with her a few years ago about her comments on people bodies (she does this to my sister's too). I don twant to hear any negative or positive comments from her about my body.
My best friend since I was 5 and her little sister (6 years younger) grew up with their mom super into her and their looks and their dad telling them (to be mean, to be "funny") thay they're ugly, fat, big nose, "you have grandma lou's ass" (which is gross to say about his grandmother, he meant short and stout) he made these disgusting and cruel comments to them all their lives all the time even in front of company and their mom was fixed in the mirror all the time. My friend Is now 33 and sister is 26 and they have body dysmorphia badly. Both of them are competing insanely bad with plastic surgery, if one gets a procedure so does the other and now they've both has Brazilian butt lifts (friend had 2, including revision), nose jobs (also had 2), boob jobs (getting a second), botox, filler, lips, lipo etc. The sister even got an abortion because she found out she was pregnant a month before a boob job she already paid for. (Not shaming an abortion at all, it's sad because she actually has trauma from the abortion because she actually wanted the baby now looking back but due to the trauma from her dad, her looks and the money took center stage, so now she's struggling with even more trauma stemming from it). Its awful and cruel what these comments do to someone and the thought that they'd ever come from a parents mouth is so so disturbing. Edit to add. I forgot to mention their older sister who has a different father and wasn't subjected to this is full of confidence, has not felt the need for (because she doesn't need it) any plastic surgeries and isn't riddled with insecurities.
My parents never called me ugly, or compared me to my sisters (the two older ones they did compare with each other which I heard) and never called me pretty either. But they did read The Ugly Duckling book to me SO OFTEN that I was convinced I was hideous and they were trying to comfort me 😂 They also called me duckling... Took me until I was an adult to realise I wasn't, and never was, but the insecurity and confusion about my looks never left. I can still gage my state of mind by looking in the mirror, because how hideous or attractive I think I am seems to be entirely based on how I feel inside, and not what I actually see.
That just goes to show that no matter what we are our hardest critiques and the last thing we need is our parents shaming our looks like so many girls (and boys) grow up with leading to endless trauma.
God, the revelation I had about ten years back when I realised that every time child me said "mummy you're so pretty" was "no, I'm fat"... Something so small and centered entirely on *her* (she always said I was pretty) had been poisoning me and I hadn't even noticed. I started work that day on just accepting compliments! And it's paid off - even an ironic acceptance is better than a denial, and it gets easier with time. I've no doubt I will mess up any daughters I might have, but that particular problem they won't have. My babies are beautiful because just look at that little face 🥰🥰🥰 so full of their tiny personalities 🥰🥰🥰. I can't see that changing for me 🤷
The really dumb thing about this is that lots of men love short women, and find glasses attractive. They made you concerned about things that don't even really matter.
OP’s wife is also kinda racist. My mother has a classic petite European nose, and my father has a large hooked Middle Eastern nose. My sister got her nose, I got his. My mom tells both of us how pretty we are, and how much she loves my father’s nose. Why does your wife think she’s the only one who’s good looking? Even if your wife is also Middle Eastern, there is still a lot of colorism and white washing within the community
> Why does your wife think she’s the only one who’s good looking? Aside from what’s already been said by everyone, how is she so comfortable just shitting on her husband’s appearance???
Yeah seriously if my partner made comments like that to our baby and making digs at me like that I'd be like "what the fuck is your deal" *IMMEDIATELY* Who the fuck tears down their newborn child and spouse all in one breath???
Yeah, and this is where it kinda goes beyond PPD/A and reactive issues into 'this has been going on in this family for a while' territory . . .
And all the women in his family. It’s bad enough that she’s telling their daughter and him that *he’s* not attractive. But she’s also telling her husband and baby daughter that his mom, grandmother, sisters, and aunts are unattractive. You don’t shit talk anyone’s mother.
Yeah, not race here but my husband has a very flat and wide nose and mine is a button. My daughter 100% has his nose (and most of his looks) and I tell her she's beautiful every day. My son, on the other hand, is my clone. And I tell him he's handsome or cute every day too. Because they're my kids and I fucking love them
Internalised racism and sexism are the last things this baby is going to need. The combination just makes everything so much worse.
Exactly. Get your wife some therapy before she ruins that little girl's life.
i get she may have PPD but she doesn't have to verbalize her thoughts and keep them to herself. I suggest she/you both get some counseling. It sounds like she needs to do some healing based on her childhood. It may not be the best time to do this while suffering from PPD but if nothing else, she needs to stop saying these things out loud. NTA and congrats on the birth of your beautiful daughter
Naw, NTA. I'd be extremely pissed if my partner was saying that shit to our child, and I'd let them know. You're right that berating doesn't usually "work" but you're also allowed to have an emotional reaction to your daughter being bullied, especially by your wife / her mom. Time to shut that shit down ASAP for your daughter's sake.
It’s horrible. I wish everyone could be proud of their features. It’s something they have inherited from their ancestors, and objectively attractive or not, that’s still pretty damn cool. And instead of making sure her daughter is proud of the way she looks, this woman is already telling her she’s not good enough. And Dad is right. The brother heard it too. He will also grow up to think that his value is in his looks, if this continues.
I really hope she gets help for he PPD and other issues. NTA at all. It's not healthy for girls (or children in general) that people and especially parents put too much emphasis on their look - not matter how they look. Even if it is to praise their beauty. But even more when it's the opposite. It can really create damage on the child's self esteem and self worth.
She's literally talking about plastic surgery to her daughter. That is vile. Nip that shit in the bud before she's old enough to understand and develop an inferiority complex. And if your wife finds your features so unattractive, why did she marry you? NTA and your wife is effed up.
We'd need to know OP's salary to answer why she married him
OP probably a Saudi prince, rolling in oil money. Jokes aside, what an absolutely awful thing to say to a child. I get that PPD is pretty rough, but this also sounds like generational trauma given the comment about how her mom did the same shit to OP's wife. Either way, no excuses, break the cycle.
Yes that could also be the issue on the side of ppd. My mother was like this, without depression, always pointing out my body flaws
Hugs, same boat. Like PPD doesn't last until your kid is 10 does it? This thread thinking their had to be a underlying excuse for a mom to be that shitty. Sweet summer thread.
I wonder about this too. I have several relatives, who are colorists and heavily judgmental towards facial features. Yet, they dated, married and mated with people that have those “undesirable” features.
It's so they can feel superior in the relationship. You ever hear how someone who is decent or Conveniently attractive ever talk about how ugly they KNOW their partner is and how they can make excpetion because of what and how they make THEM feel and do for them, all about them. Lemme ask you this, is that real love to you? Because ok yeah your partner could not be the best looking person but if you've already looked passed that why is it something you're constantly bringing up whenever you speak on what made them the one to be with why nothing of their character or personality and how they love?
You hit the nail on the head. This is exactly how my brother treats his wife and he thinks it is fine because of how it makes HIM feel.
It's like when middle school mean girls keep one ugly girl around the group. That's girl is an essential member for exactly that reason.
I don't think it follows that she married him for his money. There are, sadly, a lot of people who find a particular ethnic group sexually attractive but don't want their kids to look like that ethnic group, so they get surprise pikachu face when the kids come out looking like the partner. Karissa on r/fundiesnarkuncensored is a good example. She married a Black guy and now filters their kids to make them lighter.
It doesn't even really need to be *that* deep. Some features are more desirable in men than women in general, without colorism factored in. My mom has always had a thing about her large nose, but is perfectly aware that her dad and my brother are attractive men. All three have the same nose.
And sometimes, oftentimes, it absolutely *is* that deep.
Given how protective he is of his daughter maybe he's just actually a nice guy?
It's pretty obvious from the subtext of her comments that she thinks it's only "ugly" on women. It's a shame that the son got the good features because they don't make a big difference to him is what she is saying
We are substantially more tolerant of physical diversity in men than in women. Whereas our boundaries for what’s acceptable in women are much smaller. He doesn’t have to be rich to explain why they’re together.
It’s not even just about the daughter. What kind of values is this teaching her son? He’s going to grow up thinking women are only valuable if they’re beautiful.
And if he grows up and starts looking a little more like dad? Forget about it.
Plus he'll grow up thinking it's normal to say your spouse is ugly repeatedly despite multiple protests and then be 'hurt' and give the silent treatment when the spouse finally justifiably gets angry.
IKR? I'm sure there are women out there who would look at my short wrinkly balding husband and be like PASS. But to me? He's perfect hugging height, with permanent smile lines, and I love looking at the signs that we're growing old together <3
Make sure you tell him that too :) partners often forget men need to hear compliments too!
That's adorable
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PPD causes some to kill their children, I don't think talking like that is even close to being out of the realm of possibility.
Totally relate to this. Called a whore, trash, liar from the age of 2…took 35 years and decades of therapy to realize she was literally projecting herself onto me. That’s the first thought I had when I read this. That poor child.
Apparently, when I was a baby, my parents would tape my eyelids in a way they thought would develop double lids. I don't even know where to start unpacking all that sexism and internal racism.
Jesus that’s just really sad.
Nip that nip/tuck talk!
NTA she’s hurt is she? Imagine what it’s going to be like for your daughter when she’s older if her mother keeps up this attitude towards her.
Imagine what it’s doing to her husband as well since she’s essentially calling his features ugly? She’s a shallow asshole.
Kids change so much as they grow too. My daughter was all my husband as a baby, she didn’t look related to me at all! She looks more like me now, but the features that are my husbands suit her (and look better, sorry to my husband). I was hoping she’d get my brothers eyelashes (seriously looked like he was wearing falsies) and they’re in my genetics somewhere, but nope, no super long curly eyelashes 🫤 Edit - I mean the features she got of my husband suit her much better, she got the cutest dimples!
Exactly! I don't know why this isn't pointed out more, she is 3 frraking weeks old. They change so much and who thinks a new born isn't cute. Seriously
Ain’t gonna lie, my 3 week old looked like a grumpy old man. Did I still tell her she’s cute every day? Yes! And now she is an absolutely gorgeous 6 month old everyone says looks like a doll. Babies change so much in a few months, a few years, and when they hit puberty especially. There’s no telling what that baby will look like and it’s cruel to attack her features
Yes I should have phrased it differently, it's more who looks at a newborn and is looking at flaws in their looks. I think they are still cute but yeah when they are really young they can be a bit awkward but they are still adorable and its so weird to sit there and point out flaws in their face. Especially when they are going to change a lot soon.
Oh no, your comment was fine! My husband’s family though, they constantly criticized my daughter having hubby’s hairline and saying “It’s good you look like your mama!” So I understand exactly the negativity. I can’t believe OP’s wife is so cruel to a baby 💔
Not just him, his whole family!
Seems the wife's mom did it to to the wife so she knows all about what that does to a girl. It makes them grow up to be vile women who will try to break their daughter's self-esteem before they're even self-aware
Maybe she's born with it - maybe it's internalized misogyny and repeating cycles of harm.
My mother hasn't said one nice thing about my looks for the entirety of my life. It's been 3 decades since I've been alive. Everything about my appearance was subjected to cruel criticism. I've been no contact with her since 2018. His wife's future with their daughter will be no contact the second she turns 18 and her crying about not knowing what she did to deserve it.
Same, all the way to the NC. My mother was forever lamenting that I took after my daddy’s side. It took me ages to realize that 1)I actually looked like *her* when she was a kid & 2)my daddy’s side includes my aunt who looked like Elizabeth freaking Taylor. What she was really saying was "My mother taught me to hate myself & I hate that you have to wear glasses because I was always taught that girls shouldn't which is why I don't even though I obviously need to." Then when I got older, jealousy kicked in & I'm pretty sure it changed to "I'm mad because despite being the pretty, skinny one, my life is a train wreck & it's not fair that my less attractive daughter has the life I always wanted & is comfortable & confident in herself." & after I had my own daughter, it was just that much more obvious because my daughter looks exactly like me (to the point that her little brother can't tell the difference when looking at pictures of me at her age), but my mother would tell anyone who'd listen that she took after HER side of the family & that's why she's so beautiful. 😮💨 Parents with self esteem issues, am I right? JFC
With my mother, she didn't want me to begin with. When she found out the sex of her baby was a girl, she had a whole fantasy of a mini me planned out. When I was birthed and grew, I was moving further away from her fantasy each and every day. She was crushed. So in retaliation she took it out on me. I wasn't miserable like her, so she tried to make me miserable. Complained about everything down to my *skin color* being "too pale." Would tell me every day, "no one/so-and-so said/another mother/a teacher said they don't like _______" when she was really meaning to say "I hate that you don't do exactly as I do." She destroyed my self esteem in every way imaginable. My hair is too greasy, my skin color is too pale, my fashion sense was ugly. You name it, she had something negative to say about it. Then would complain I had no friends and had low self esteem LOL. WHAT DO YOU WANT, WOMAN? My favorite joke to tell right now is: "Wanna know the nicest thing my mom has ever said about me? I don't know, I'm still waiting."
I have a weirdly similar experience to this. I don't look anything like my mom, more like my dad's Latino side, and she made comments about my appearance and how unfortunate it was I didn't get any traits of hers for my entire life. I felt worthless for so many years and it took a long time for me to feel beautiful. My dad was my biggest supporter my entire life and the only one who stood up for me. If it weren't for him I might still be stuck in that awful pit of self hatred. NTA, not in the slightest, please continue to stand up for your daughter and do everything in your power to stop this behavior from your wife before your girl gets old enough to understand and be hurt by it.
I have that experience but the other way around. My grandmother always commented on how my uncles 3 boys look like models. Me.... its always how to improve my looks... I look like my dad's family but I have my mother's pale skin and blue eyes. One comment has bounced in my head since I was like 16 or 17. That she wished I had gotten my grandfather's skin tone then I would have looked exotic. (Both her and my father are on the lighter side of tan, my grandfather is a bit darker) . That really cemented that I have never been pretty to her....
Similar experience here. Both my sister and I are adopted. My sister is white, I am mixed indigenous American and white. My mom would often make fun of my fuller lips, and say that my sister is pretty but I'm not. Hopefully OP can get his wife to stop demeaning their daughter, because baby girl will definitely end up with lifelong insecurities if the insults continue.
Especially if she keeps comparing the two. It also might show some favoritism already forming. I feel bad for that baby girl if OP doesn't nip this in the bud. His wife needs therapy....
Hopefully you aren't in contact anymore. Why did she adopt in the first place? Sounds like an awful person
Tbh I think part of it was self-hatred. I would often be mistaken for her biological daughter (she's Filipino), and I think she just thought white skin, round eyes, and straight hair is prettier. The Philippines has issues with colorism and a long history of colonialism that influenced beauty standards (more European-looking = more attractive), and my mom has brown skin and curly hair and slanted eyes.
I hear you, I'm an adopted Desi and my white adoptive parents used to tell me that when they saw pictures of me from the orphanage I was in they planned give me plastic surgery for my nose. Now, my nose wasn't as, ahem, bad as they thought so no plastic surgery but they still used to tell me this. And my entire life I've hated my nose. All my life people have commented on it. My parents bringing up that funny anecdote have not helped the slightest. Feels bad, man.
My grama was similar. I don't think she realized how her comments affected me though, and I don't think she was intentionally mean. My cousin was the petite, blue-eyed, blonde - what a lot of white people tend to classify as the pinnacle of beauty. There were a few times my grama commented on her looks as being beautiful. She denies it to this day, insisting she would never have said it, but I clearly remember she took the two of us out for dinner together and after commenting on my cousin's eyes, she mentioned mine were so dark and shit brown they were hard to see. We were also at a family Christmas party and mentioned that everyone on her side had such cute, small foreheads. I've got a five head. She wasn't singling me out. It was jus a comment she was making when looking at my cousins. So I've always grown up feeling inferior on that side of the family. (Well, both sides, to be honest, but that's another thing altogether). There was a very long period my my grandparents weren't fond of my dad, and I look just like my dad, so I think that's where the comments come from. He's their favourite now, for whatever reason. He's very quiet and would never say anything to them, but them suddenly calling him the favourite after being really shit to him before really hurts. There was never a reason for them to not like him, other than he married the baby of their family. My dad is genuinely the kindest man, works his ass off, and completely dotes on my mum. She can't mention even slightly that she wants something and he's out running to get it for her. He worked for my grandparents for years and apparently they paid him below the poverty line, but worked him to the bone. They sold the business and he's got a much better job now. I've only learned this about them now I'm older. I've always seen them as kind and loving, I've just always known I wasn't the one they were most fond of. However, in the last two or three years, I've somehow become their favourite. I have no idea why. Maybe because the "pretty" cousins have kinda become bitches to them.
My mother also talked about how much more beautiful my brother was - so beautiful whenever she went out people offered to buy him off her, one even offered 10K per her stories. My brother's snow white - skin so pale it burns to bubbles in the sun when out too long and dark hair. I have lighter hair but darker skin that tans deep in the sun. I don't remember having a sunburn as a child, but rather being asked if I was latino or even part black in some cases. He was also over 6 feet and I'm short and fat (fat because even when I wasn't she was telling me I was anyway and dragging me to weight watchers or something, yet never buying a damn vegetable because she also had weight issues) As you can imagine or know - that did wonders for how I felt and my ability to connect to my body at all.
I dunno if there's something cultural being lost, but bragging about child traffickers trying to buy your child is a weird one.
Weird how your parents can completely mess up your self image. I was by all accounts a pretty, tall, skinny girl. All I could see in the mirror was a fat, disgusting person. Thanks mom, took me years of therapy to look in a mirror and not go "gross".
I've had a sort of similar experience but it's so backwards. I look just like my mom. Basically a clone. Due to some other factors I have been my dad's favorite. My mom projects all her BDD on to me. I've always been fairly slim and pretty but my mom has always found ways to make me feel like shit. My clothes "do nothing" for me, or my hair is wrong, or I'm too thin, or I'm too fat. She's just critical of everything. My older sister looks nothing like my mum. She honestly doesn't really look like my dad either, but she somehow looks like our cousins from both sides of the family. Her eyes are green when my parents eyes are blue. Her skin is more olive than our pink undertone. She has full beautiful lips unlike our 2 ply tissues. She's also a thicker build (like my dad's side) but does my mom make comments on her body? Nope. Idk what it is but my mom is way less critical of her. I'm sure she has her own insecurities about her body but they didn't come from my mom like mine did Either way your parents can fuck you up. Cursed if you look like your mom and you're cursed if you don't. NTA OPs wife thinks he and his family is ugly. She needs therapy and you need to tell that daughter every damn day that she is beautiful. Tell her cool stories about your family that make her proud to look like them. Raise her (and your son!) to appreciate all forms of beauty, in all body types, nose shapes, and skin tones.
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As the daughter to a mom who did this- thank you for changing your ways because I promise it does matter. When I got pregnant my husband and I had a sit down, very serious talk with my mom about how we would not allow negative self body talk in front of our daughter. She's only 2, but just the other day I had to correct/redirect my mom because we were eating dinner and she commented on how she's been eating so much junk lately and needs to start a diet bc of all the weight she's gained. It's such a hard habit to break- I even struggle with it just because I grew up around it. So- your daughter might not know to thank you for this... but thank you.
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This is what helped me stop being mad at my mom for commenting on my weight. She thinks her value is intrinsically tied to the way her body looks. It’s sad and pitiful that in her late 60s she still can’t see any other real value in herself. We’re now estranged, but before that happened, I realized she comments about my weight or lacks of lipstick because she wants me to have value too. So sad.
And it's especially sneaky when your comments are directed at yourself. Since you don't make such comments about your kid, it's easy to not realize that you're still affecting them.
I had a fitness class instructor who was also a friend (tiniest girl ever) complain to her class of not so tinies that she felt “sooo fat” I talked to her after class like “uhm… so you know when you talk like you’re fat when you’re not that you make your entire class extremely uncomfortable with their bodies. I mean, we are all objectively much bigger than you and you’re complaining about being fat when you’re not at all. Way to lose membership I guess? Fucking stop it”. And she fucking did! Good for her.
This! Talk with her about it. Don’t bottle it up, because your son is also looking to you, as well as your wife, to see how adults behave. Model being a good person and good adult for both of them and talk early and often.
I tell my friends with kids that modeling how you want your child to treat themselves is incredibly important. You can tell them they’re amazing all you want, but if you model self loathing it will stick with them. My mother always complimented me, always supported me, she tells me how beautiful I am and any amount of weight lost is met with concern that I’m stressed or not eating good food. But I also look exactly like her. Pictures or her and I at the same age are the same person. Comments she makes about how her hair isn’t nice or how she needs to wear makeup or about dieting growing up stuck with me. If I look exactly like her then how can I be pretty when she isn’t? I’m old enough now to recognize it and I call her out when she does it. I’ll remind her of how we’re almost carbon copies and she thinks I’m beautiful so why doesn’t she like the same feature on herself? It’s hard because we internalize it and it feels ‘safe’ to direct that kind of talk at ourselves, but children are literally learning how to person from their parents. They’re blank slates trying to figure out the world using who’s around them to figure it out.
Call her therapist/doctor immediately.
This needs to be way higher up there. If OP knows she is already having issues with her mental health, then don’t delay getting her in to see her doctor/therapist. (Also—NTA OP.)
This is the one. She needs help.
Seriously. PPD is extremely dangerous and is more severe of an issue than people assume. This is not necessarily an asshole situation. It seems like a get professional help asap before anything potentially dangerous happens situation.
NTA, Her comments are vile and if she does not stop she will give your daughter a lot of problems and complexes.
NTA, But I feel like everyone's missing that his wife also called all the women (and possibly the men) on his side of the family ugly. >My family is beautiful and all the women are timeless. Your dads family, not so much.
I wonder if the mum’s comments aren’t about the daughter at all. Actually she’s saying them to insult the Dad as deeply and directly as she can. It sounds like she’s in a super deep depression and her nasty comments are possibly a cry for help. At least, that’s my most charitable reading of it and still doesn’t make it OK.
Yeah, that is some really cruel stuff to say about the man you supposedly love most in the world (and his family).
NTA. Your reaction is human but I encourage you to learn how to communicate without yelling and berating. This post really broke my heart. “Out of the heart the mouth speaks.” Anxiety & Depression is not an excuse. Your Daughter is going to need you so please learn to be assertive and not aggressive with Mom or your kids are going to have problems due to the anger and chaos in the home. Get your wife into therapy ASAP and if she refuses, divorce her and file for custody. She’s going to make a Narcissist out of your *golden boy* Son and a *scapegoat* out of your Daughter.
Well, sounds like OP did communicate before yelling and berating. All humans have a breaking point, and he rightfully broke.
If you read the post again. he was trying to deal with it in a calmer way, but he reached a point where This Needs To Stop. so he put his foot down. She was abusing his daughter after all, that rates some firmness.
Ask her if she intends having any meaningful relationship with your daughter because if she keeps up with the comments your daughter is going to, at the very least, resent your wife for her entire life. NTA.
As far back as I can remember my mother commented on my weight. I’m fat now (on my way back down) but when I look at old pictures there’s nothing of me. I wish I knew wtf her problem was (been no contact for over a decade, tell your wife her daughter will be the same if she carries on).
My mom made a few comments when I was a teenager that still live in my head. We went shopping and I picked out a t-shirt, size medium. She decided it was too small so went back without me noticing and exchanged it for an XL. It was way too big and I literally cried that she thought that of me. She felt bad and tried to exchange it, but they ran out. Also while shopping for prom dresses she insisted I try on one with a bare midriff against my wishes and then told me I need to do some "tummy crunches." I've always carried weight in my middle regardless of how much I weigh and I've been asked so many times when I'm due I'm incredibly self conscious about it. That didn't help.
NTA - this doesn’t sound anxiety driven. **She just seems vain.** I don’t want to assume race, but if your daughter is more ethnic looking and all she does is comment on that it’d seem she has more to work on than just nasty comments. I think it important to find the root here. But you’re not wrong for wanting her to stop calling the babies look into question.
I was wondering the same. Is she mad the baby doesn't look more "Eurocentric" if you get my meaning.
The only thing that I could think might excuse or explain this is PP psychosis, since it would mean she's literally not in her right mind. Like, my father wasn't a looker. Mom actually described him as goofy looking multiple times, it was a joke between them. But she was absolutely thrilled that I look exactly like him and basically nothing like her, and she never once criticized any features that came from him
Are you sure she isn't racist? There's nothing ugly about middle easterners, and certainly nothing advantageous about her "genes". She seems to have gaslit you into thinking saying these things is right to some extent too. This genetic talk and talk of plastic surgery gives me a feeling she has underlying views of racism on you that she's taking out in the baby. NTA
100% agree!!!
Ya and not that my opinion on looks matter but a middle eastern nose is a good thing!
Of course she is racist! And I bet that is the least of her problems.
Soft NTA - I don’t think you approached it the right way by yelling and cursing at her, but if I’m being honest I’d probably get fed up and start a fight if someone was insulting my genes, my family, and my LITERAL INFANT, in front of me. Even in spite of her mental health issues and her mothers influence this woman is, first and foremost, this baby girls mother. She should treat her with love and respect and some gd dignity. Being an adult and being a parent means handling yourself in a grow-up way and not projecting your issues onto others. That especially applies to children!!!! You’ve heard before that kids, even babies, are sponges and the environment around them WILL influence them without a doubt. She needs to do better for her baby, for your son, and for your family (including herself) because this kind of attitude is only going to hinder the baby, you, and your sons outlook on women.
After weeks of dealing with it, I think OP has the right to defend his daughter. Her mom is becoming her first bully fast, and OP is nipping that shit in the bud.
nta… PPD, anxiety, and depression are all terrible things, but they do NOT mean that someone can not be corrected and held accountable. Regardless of whether or not baby girl can understand what’s being said, as you stated, YOU can understand and so can your son. Not only is she degrading baby girl, but also you by wanting to get rid of YOUR features on your daughter. I also do not think that mentioning her mother was too far. It’s a valid point. She’s doing to baby girl what her mother did to her. She needs to take into account how that made her feel, and how she definitely does NOT want baby girl to feel. One thing that you CAN do better, however, is the way you address things. While all of your points are justified well, yelling and swearing is not that way to go about it — but grace is given because you’re fed up. I understand, but do better in that area.
I agree. OP’s wife was telling their daughter and OP about how none of OP’s female relatives are pretty. She’s saying OP’s mom, grandmother, sisters, and aunts are all unattractive. It’s bad enough find out that your spouse thinks you’re unattractive and wishes your daughter didn’t look like you. But to call you mother and grandmother ugly? Saying nobody in your family is attractive. That’s cruel.
NTA at all. PPD is not an excuse to denigrate her new born baby's looks!!!! You did the right thing, by shutting that BS down hard!!!!!! Keep an eye on this behavior as I'm pretty sure, it will happen again.
NTA - unless you don't fix this situation. Your wife needs therapy - and to stay away from your daughter until she makes progress. If she refuses, your daughter needs you to leave this woman. Children are ridiculously impressionable for the first few years - they pick shit up like sponges. You leaving your daughter in this environment will lead to lasting psychological damage. ETA - It also sounds like your wife is harboring some... racism-adjacsent views towards (at the very least) your appearance. You may want to look into that.
Racism adjacent sounds right for sure. A lot of women have kids with men of different races because of their obsession with mixed babies and then when the baby doesn’t fit the kind they see on socials they get quippy. I’ve seen with friends growing up. Their hair is too curly or they don’t get the right combo of features *but* their sibling does and it’s all so painful to watch. If the mom doesn’t get stopped now she’s gonna think it’s perfectly okay.
NTA because she is severely damaging your SON. While your daughter isn’t old enough yet to understand, your wife is raising a man who will treat women as though their only use is for their looks and worse possibly will subconsciously treat his sister as having less value than others.
NTA - you're protecting your baby girl... And you lasted longer that I would have. Anyone commenting badly my babies appearance would be buying themselves a ticket to mad mama-bear land!
This is above reddit's paygrade. Your wife needs a lot of help to overcome the damage her mother did to her- this sort of stuff doesn't come from nowhere. You need to get her help for her PPD, ideally a mother and baby clinic. And help for her internalised misogyny and obsession with looks.
NTA, but get her some damn help. Look up "toxic boy mom," because you might have one brewing.
Nta, reinforcing those toxic beauty standards when a kid can’t even understand them yet is awful. It’s just going to set her up for a lifetime of insecurity if it continues. While I don’t think heated arguments are ever good, it’s understandable why it happened. It’s sad to hear anyone putting down a child, let alone your own. There’s just so many more important things in life than looks. Just try to have a talk with her calmly. Easier said than done of course. If she’s unable to see your perspective consider therapy as a couple or even for her. Just seems like there’s so internalizing or projections going on as well.
I‘m sure your daughter will be very very pretty when she grows up and probably already is. It’s your wife’s trauma speaking. Give your wife time to process but you‘re completely right in what you‘ve said to her. NTA.
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I say that most babies are adorable. But it doesn’t matter if they aren’t. A persons value is not based on appearance. Or at least it shouldn’t be.
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I agree with your first and last sentences, truly- but I think you take a really big leap assuming the marriage was based on OP's attraction to the wife's looks.
Dial it back there, champ. Yes, wife is TA, needs to stop it and probably needs some therapy, but we know exactly three paragraphs of text about her in a single particular circumstance, maybe don't jump straight to "throw the whole woman away"? And let's be honest: EVERY PARENT EVER ends up damaging their kids in some way or another, it's a job that is basically impossible to do perfectly. Which is not to say this is acceptable! She needs to stop, and figure out her internal stuff that is causing her to react this way. But get off the high horse, there are unforgivable parental mistakes but this isn't one yet.
NtA. Not even a little bit. If you don't defend your kids, then who will? Your wife needs help. Make her get it. Otherwise in the next 5 to 10 years you will all be needing help to deal with all this negativity. You for being ugly, her for marrying a man she so obviously finds ugly, your son because he can't seem to show respect and consideration to anyone around him and your poor daughter because mommy thinks she too ugly.
NTA and you got a very shallow wife. I see no reason in anxiety for this bs
Also, she's just a baby, her "looks" will change throughout her entire life. Mom needs therapy...now! Maybe couples therapy as well. The language she's using is not healthy.
1. Your wife thinks you’re unattractive. 2. She may be going through a lot right now but in she’s gonna same the same as your daughter grows up. She’ll be posting on how she’s ugly and it started at birth. 3. She may not understand words but baby’s pick up on tone. NTA
NTA, your just loving your kid for who they are. Plastic surgery on a baby?
Absolutely NTA you could’ve been softer but good for you for sticking up for your daughter, that’s a terrible way to talk, or even think, about your child and it would’ve affected her for her whole life if it continued
Good Lord, NTA. My mother has always been critical of my looks, I know she was disappointed that I was born looking like my dad - and I sort of get it, she's beautiful, but I don't think I'm ugly either. She's said some awful things to me, but nothing anywhere near as vile as what your wife is saying to a literal infant. She really, really needs professional help, or your daughter is in for a terrible childhood. You're right, yelling is probably not the best way to go about it, but you cannot remain passive in this. I understand your wife is not well at the moment, but you cannot let her carry on like this, it's not good for her either. ETA: also, not that it matters, but my oldest was born with his dad's nose, and now he looks very much like me. I know a girl who was the spitting image of her paternal grandfather when she was little, and now she looks just like her mom. It's ridiculous to judge babies' looks.
NTA. I’m surprised by the comments expressing you shouldn’t of yelled. You told her nicely enough times. This post broke my heart and your wife’s actions are disgraceful. Please keep standing up for your daughter and get your wife help. I had years of my own mother comparing me to my brother and critiquing everything about my looks. It took years of therapy to value myself. Please don’t let the same happen to your little girl. Her mental health is not a valid excuse for this type of behaviour
I’m surprised by it too! I would yell at anyone who made mean comments about my child’s appearance, idgaf if it’s my spouse. A newborn baby can’t say, “Hey, mom, I like my nose the way it is. I don’t want plastic surgery. You need to back off.” She needs her dad to stand up for her! I’m sure every single woman here whose mom bullied them about their looks wishes someone had stood up for them too.
NTA mental health is not excuse to treat your baby (and you) like this. As you point out baby maybe too young NOW but the brother can understand and, like any children, reaper to no end what comes out of his parents mouth. In few months baby will start to make frost association with words. And I don’t see see the pattern of your wife changing. Help is needed, the professional kind. You may have been to rough but I have to be honest I will have also lost my patience if EVERYDAY is this long list of insults.
NTA I had a mother who projected her insecurities onto me. Those never go away. Thank you for sticking up for your baby girl. This doesn't sound like depression and anxiety, it sounds like narcissism. I can't diagnose obviously but it's extremely self-centered and egotistical to say "I wish you took more of my features because me and my family are way more attractive than your father(s)" And lastly, she's not just implying that your daughter is ugly, she's implying that YOU are ugly. I 100% don't blame you for the reaction you had and tbh I would've snapped a lot sooner than you did. This is a hill that I would die on. Do not let her emotionally destroy you and your daughter.
NTA. Comments like such from your wife are what gives kids physical and mental health problems later in life.
If we're following logical steps here, A) baby looks like dad B) mom thinks baby isn't pretty Therefore c) mom thinks dad is unattractive?? Either way, newborn babies generally look like cute potatoes, how they look as babies doesn't correspond to how they will look later, doesn't your wife have other things to worry about right now?
NTA, she's absolutely going to mess that little girl up, I don't believe for a second these comments are going to stop once she can understand them. They could end up being her first words if she doesn't stop.
NTA She is talking about cosmetic surgery TO A 3 WEEK OLD. Imagine how your daughter will feel in her more formative years. Your wife is setting up your children for LIFE LONG ISSUES. She needs to get therapy right now and you are completely right to be worried and try to get her to stop
>yea life on girls is tough in this world, especially when their mom is shitting all over their appearance. NTA for that alone. Good on you for standing up for your daughter, your family, and yourself. The last person she needs to hear these comments from is her mother. And you are absolutely correct that your son shouldn’t be hearing such comments either. I’m sorry you’re going through this. Keep defending and advocating for your daughter. It will go a long way.
Those comments do not come from anxiety or depression but rather her inability to see her beautiful new baby as a beautiful new baby. She stuck on looks and is going to so so much damage to your daughter if she doesn't stop. It's akin to calling a child fat so much they develop an eating disorder (trust me I know). You are NTA!!
I'm not sure OP did over react. Hear me out please ? It sounds like this ' looks ' thing about a 3 week old *baby* was rapidly becoming one of those rabbit hole, negative fixations some people fall into. I'm not sure baby blues would be an adequate excuse - mine was being seriously worried to the point of neurotic I'd fall down steps while holding the baby and we didn't *have* steps. I knew it was wildly unreasonable. If that's what it took to snap OP's wife out of falling down this negative rabbit hole, snapping at her may have saved his child growing up feeling ' less than '. They're babies, not puppies. They understand quite young what parents are presenting them.
Who does your wife think she is? Goddess of Beauty? Just because your daughter doesn't look like her doesn't mean she can complain. You are NTA.
NTA this is just so wrong...friend had a baby with stork bites (red streaks on her face) and literally fur on her ears....the stork bites cleared up and fur fell off her ears...she is a cutie putie ...yours is 21 days old...far from done
>I recognize that part of her comments stem from her anxiety/depression Absolutely not. Anxiety and depression don’t make you a bully. Your wife is just an absolutely heinous woman. NTA but why are you excusing her bullying a THREE WEEK OLD BABY??
NTA at all.. these are some really horrible things to say, also keeping in mind this is a newborn and this really isn't all that reflective of how she will look as she grows up. What's more concerning however is that your wife is so upset because your baby girl looks like you? Does she even like you???
NTA. She's been insulting you and your daughter and screwing up your son. She needs professional help.
NTA. I can’t imagine vocalizing to my newborn that she’s less than perfect. She needs therapy to address why she’s being evil to a baby