love2bamom
12-01-2010, 08:31 AM
I am on your website and wanted to write about an issue I am having with my in-laws and ask for some ideas on how to deal with the situation. My husband and I have a 3 year old daughter. Every since she was infant, guns have always been a concern of ours. My in-laws don't seem to have the same concern as we do. My father-in-law typically carries a gun in the back of his pants and sometimes on his ankle. My mother-in-law carries one in her purse. When my daughter was about 6 months old we went to dinner and when we got back to their house I saw my father-in-law pull a gun out the back of his pants and off his ankle. That made me realize there was an issue with guns that we may need to deal with. My daughter was about 9 months old and we went to my in-laws house where they were target shooting outside (brother-in-law is SWAT officer). We brought our daughter in the house and told them they needed to unload and put all the guns away. We took our daughter in the other room until we were told it was safe. Of course our daughter was crawling at this point and began to head for the kitchen (where the guns were and we were told it was safe) and was headed straight for a desk that had a loaded pistol sitting on top. My husband immediately went and moved the gun out of the area. Another instance is we went to breakfast and my daughter was playing with my mother-in-laws purse (the zipper, but didn't open). A few minutes after my daughter moved on to play with something else, my mother-in-law said she had a gun in her purse. We left the restaurant immediately. There have even been loaded shot guns leaned against the wall in a room my daughter plays in. Through these instances, my husband was having talks with them about the dangers of guns and we didn't want our daughter around them. They must not have taken us serious because instances kept happening. To this day, we have not allowed them to watch our daughter. It has been about 6-8 months since we have seen a gun at their house or on them, so my husband is now taking the position that we should allow them to begin to babysit/watch our daughter. I am still not comfortable with them and don't trust them. This is creating turmoil in my marriage. How should I deal with this? Any suggestions? Another thing I don't understand is when my husband was growing up gun safety was a big deal with his parents. When he got his first BB gun, they made him read the instruction manual and his dad quizzed him on it. His dad also kept the guns locked up in a safe. I don't understand why they aren't like that now with guns. Please help.