[Casey677]

Does anyone else have friends with completely different parenting styles?

Ok, brief background. My dh has a friend and former roommate who he went to college with, worked with in FL, and were both offered jobs in SC at the same time. Both of our families moved here. I get along ok with him, but his wife and I are very different.

Anyway, they have a four month old boy and we have dd who is 2 months. Any time we get together, I feel like they are trying to get us to compete in a contest. Ex: "Ooooh, she's not doing (insert whatever here) yet??? DS started doing that way younger than she is." Or make me feel like I am not doing enough. Ex: "What do you mean you are not planning on taking her to Gymboree classes?"

We had dinner last night and I had gotten pretty excited to see other people besides dd & dh, since we are new to the area, we don't know a lot of people yet. I was really hoping for conversation that did not completely wrap around the babies....even a weather conversation would have been nice. It didn't happen, but I did try!!

I just can't figure out why they always try to make us feel like bad parents. Last night they royally laid into us about dd sleeping in our bed. I did not set out to cosleep, but she only wakes up once in our bed compared to 3 or 4 times in her crib. My sleep is very important to me, lol! They do things that I would never do as a mom. But I can't imagine saying anything to criticize them (ok, so I said it to dh on our way home). Some examples: letting their 4mo old scream at the restaurant to teach him that they won't pick him up while he is crying (they eventually did, but only after all the other diners around us were getting annoyed... they actually turned their backs and refused to look at him while he sat there and cried!), knocking his fingers out of his mouth and loudly saying NO, and last, not feeding a hungry baby because it wasn't his scheduled time to eat.

I just don't know how to deal with this. How do I tell them that their "advice" is not needed? And how do I continue to keep my mouth shut when they do things that I think are wrong... this wouldn't normally be an issue, but it is hard to take constant criticism when the people criticizing live in a glass house. UGH!!! I need new friends here!!!

Casey