Imagine growing up in a toxic home environment where your mom is really strict and smokes cigarettes constantly.

When you grow up and have a child of your own, would you be willing to expose your baby to this environment, or would you stay away even if it meant keeping your child from their grandparents?

The new mom in this story is in this exact situation, and she is feeling guilty for not taking her baby to her mom’s house. Is she doing the right thing?

Let’s read the whole story.

AITA bc I won’t take my baby to my moms house?

I am my mothers only daughter and there’s always been friction between us.

Growing up, she was always really strict with me and gave my stepdad all the power to control my life despite my real dad being in the picture.

Truly, I don’t have fond memories of my childhood.

Mostly, it involved lots of hostility and feelings of isolation.

Their relationship hasn’t gotten better.

Now that I’m grown (26), our relationship hasn’t seemed to improve.

When I got pregnant, my mom treated me horribly. She would always bicker with me and push me to emotional heights that were certainly not healthy for my baby.

For example, she began to make my baby shower all about her and got upset when I voiced my preferences over the location (I wanted to have it at my aunts house but she couldn’t bear that my aunt might take credit for throwing me the baby shower herself).

She also refused to keep her mind open to collaborate with my loved ones for the baby shower who wished to contribute.

She tried (and failed) to avoid the drama.

This prompted me to just throw my own baby shower to avoid all this drama and ultimately ended up having to rent a hall, which also seemed to bother her.

At the baby shower, she refused to play the game where I revealed my babies name simply because I had told my best friend already and hadn’t told her.

Tensions over the baby shower were so high that I began to cry at her house, but excused myself outside to get some air, which she and her husband seemed to shame me for, making me only feel worse.

In moments like this, I would just feel so bad for my innocent baby, who was surely feeling everything I felt.

There’s a good reason she doesn’t want to bring her baby to her mom’s house.

Now that baby is here, she is 4 months old and I’ve never taken the baby to her house, which bothers my mom deeply..

Besides the trauma she inflicted on me growing up (which I forgive her for) and the way she treated me while pregnant (which still pains me tbh), she is also a heavy cigarette smoker who as of late can smoke up to 2 packs a day.

When I leave her house, the smell stays in my hair and clothes, and I just don’t want the baby having to endure that.

I feel like she thinks it’s normal because as kids, my siblings and I were always exposed to the smoke + smell.

Secondhand smoke is no joke. They’re right to take this seriously.

My husband and I, however, are strongly against exposing the baby.

This makes me feel bad because I don’t want to reduce her opportunity to be a grandmother and don’t want to restrict my baby of any love coming her way, but it’s just so unpleasant and I can’t even talk to my mom about it without her getting very defensive.

I’ve asked my mom to limit her smoking when she’s going to come over and hold the baby but she doesn’t follow through.

She feels bad for excluding her mom.

Ultimately, I feel like I need to keep my baby from her and I feel like the jerk, especially since I refuse to take her over to my moms.

Along with the smoking, I just feel she forfeited all her privileges when she treated me badly while I was pregnant. AITA?

Her mom brought this problem on herself. All this new mom is trying to do is protect herself and her baby.

Let’s see how Reddit reacted to this story.

Her mother is toxic.

A baby should NOT be around cigarette smoke.

She’s doing the right thing.

The mother isn’t showing her love.

This person tells her how to explain the situation to her mom.

Grandma needs to stop smoking if she wants to see her grandchild.

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a daughter who invited herself to her parents’ 40th anniversary vacation for all the wrong reasons.