It's important to know what you can't do just as much as what you can. For instance, if you know you aren't going to be skillful at cutting hair (as salons are still closed in many places), the best choice is to just not do it.
One mom recently shared on Reddit that this is the exact path she chose for her 2-year-old boy. But when she posted a cute picture of him with a ponytail on Facebook, her MIL didn't find it at all endearing.
The mom said since she wasn't about to "butcher" her son's hair, she did the next best thing to get it out of his face: put it in a small pony.
"It's constantly in his eyes and annoying him, I put it in a little water spout ponytail," she wrote. "He looks absolutely adorable and doesn't mind having it up, so I posted a picture on my Facebook for family to see."
Not everyone cough grandma cough thought it was as cute as mom did.
"Of course everyone had something positive to say, except MIL," she wrote. "Her comment was, 'He looks embarrassed! I hope you don't plan on keeping this style!'"
Although the mom recognizes it's not that big of a deal, the comment still got under her skin.
"Really," she wrote. "So instead of saying something nice about how cute your grandson looks or you know, not saying anything, you try and shame me for it? It was a picture of him watching cartoons, how does that equate to a 2yo looking embarrassed? They don't even know how to be embarrassed at that age."
Parents on the thread totally understood her plight.
They suggested she get back to MIL with a witty reply.
"Tell your MIL that it would be absolutely silly to keep that hairstyle, and that it's only temporary until your son's hair is long enough for pigtails," one person wrote.
Others reassured the mom that her MIL was unnecessarily clutching her pearls.
"My son is three and has been growing out his hair to look like Thor, he also wears it in a ponytail and loves it," one user wrote. "People ALWAYS feel inclined to comment 'oh I thought he was a girl! Time for a haircut.' People are stuck in gender norms, I don't know why it matters."
Remember that old adage "If you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all?" Yeah, it applies to MILs too.
These stories are based on posts found on Reddit. Reddit is a user-generated social news aggregation, web content rating, and discussion website where registered members submit content to the site and can up- or down-vote the content. The accuracy and authenticity of each story cannot be confirmed by our staff.
