My Boyfriend Put My One-Year-Old Baby in a Potentially Dangerous Situation, But am I Overreacting?

A mom writes to the Mamas Uncut Facebook community with a frustrating story about her boyfriend, her baby, and a backyard full of dangers.

Thousands of moms use the Mamas Uncut page on Facebook to get their pressing parenting questions and concerns answered and addressed. One user writes:

Am I over reacting or is this as serious as I feel about it?

My boyfriend (of almost 5 years) and I have a 1-year-old kid. We were all outside this afternoon playing and mowing grass. We have a huge yard and only have a push mower, so I was trying to be helpful and help mow instead of making him do it all himself. He didn’t like this and it apparently hurt his man ego or something.

So he leaves our 1-year-old at the edge of our back yard where there is a ditch and high grass field. Not to mention the slide (which the baby knows how to climb by himself), the gas tank, and baby pool. (He claims he dumped the pool out but I never checked to see if this was true. It was full earlier.) But yeah, he leaves our kid by himself like that to come up to the front yard and just stand there hollering and cussing at me to let him mow the grass because he wants to mow the side first.

I asked him where TF is the baby, and he ignores the question and is still hollering about the grass. I said the baby can get hurt back there by himself and he tells me I need to go get him then. I’m so beyond angry that he put our kid in danger to be petty about some grass.

I don’t even want to be with him anymore if he doesn’t give more of a shit about his kid than that.

– Mamas Uncut Community Member

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The community, as always, came prepared with some great advice about this boyfriend baby danger situation. Let’s break it down.

Send Your Boyfriend a Clear Message

“Solution:
Step 1: Knee to the groin
Step 2: Tell him if he ever places your son in danger again, he will be lucky to retain his nuts.”

“Talk to him about it, then leave if he doesn’t care or does again.”

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Everybody Makes Mistakes

“It was a stupid move on his part. It was a terrible lapse in judgment. But we all make mistakes. Is he a good dad and husband that made a mistake or is this a pattern of disregard? Seems stupid to tell her to leave when this one snapshot of their lives is all we know.”

“If this is the first time he has ever left the baby like that we all make mistakes! However if every time he is watching the kid and you do something he doesn’t want you to then that’s a repetitive issue!”

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A Practical Solution

“I say let him mow the grass problem solved.”

“Let him mow, watch your child. Problem solved. There are a lot of bigger things than this that will come up. Leaving? That confuses me. If your relationship is good why would you leave because he wants to mow the grass AND keep track of your child when he mowing?”

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We think communication is key here. The community raises an important point: Is this a recurring behavior of his, or a one-time thing? To frame it another way: has your boyfriend ever put your baby in danger before? If it’s the former, you should try explaining how that pattern of behavior consistently makes you feel and ask him to work with you on a solution. If it’s a one-time situation, it is still worth talking to your partner and letting him know how you feel. Together, you can come up with a plan for how to avoid such fights in the future.

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