How do I get brother-in-law to be more modest around the house?

[Anonymous]

My brother-in-law is visiting us for the week. He's very sweet, great with our kids, etc etc. There's just one problem: he sometimes wears an amount of clothing that is less than I'm comfortable with around the house. Yesterday he poured some coffee while still wearing the shirt he slept in and some fairly tight underpants. This was awkward on its own, but was made worse because my daughters (3 & 5) were there. We still haven't had the chat with them about male anatomy yet (we're lesbians so it just hasn't come up), so this felt a bit insensitive of that. I don't know how to bring this up without it being completely mortifying to both of us. Thoughts?

[Anonymous]

Maybe teach your kids that all bodies are natural and fine, and there is no need to get worked up about them?

[Anonymous]

Dude, you can't come out of your bedroom in only your underwear - you need to put on pants or shorts in this house.

[Anonymous]

I can guarantee you that your daughters did not notice anything about your brother in law other than he was wearing clothes. The way you described it, I thought he showed up to the breakfast in leather string bikinis.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I can guarantee you that your daughters did not notice anything about your brother in law other than he was wearing clothes. The way you described it, I thought he showed up to the breakfast in leather string bikinis.

This. My experience is the kids in preschool often peed with the door open and all changed together for water play day. They do not care.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I can guarantee you that your daughters did not notice anything about your brother in law other than he was wearing clothes. The way you described it, I thought he showed up to the breakfast in leather string bikinis.

My dad walked around in tighty whities and an undershirt and I recall being around 3 when I told my mom it made me uncomfortable. He got a bathrobe that went down to his knees.

[Anonymous]

Kids this age don’t care. But it would make ME uncomfortable. Your wife (assuming this is her brother) needs to tell him to put some clothes on.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Kids this age don’t care. But it would make ME uncomfortable. Your wife (assuming this is her brother) needs to tell him to put some clothes on.

This.

Where is your wife in all this?

[Anonymous]

Sibling of the BIL needs to have a conversation with him.

[Anonymous]

I'd be pissed. I don't want to see the outline of some guy's baguette while I'm just trying to drink my coffeee

[Anonymous]

Buy him some athletic shorts. Have the talk now.

[Anonymous]

"Larlo, you need to put on some pants when you're around kids."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Sibling of the BIL needs to have a conversation with him.

Yep.
You don't want the kids to grow up thinking it's OK to sit around in your undies.
I had a friend's child stay with me for a few months when the kid got a big city job. This person not only walked around in undies and shirtless, but belched, burped and hacked out loud unapologetically. My guess is this was normalized in the house where they grew up.
I could NOT wait for my hosting duties to end and turned this person down when they asked for another month or more of lodging.

So if you don't want your child behaving this way, or accepting it of others, don't normalize it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I can guarantee you that your daughters did not notice anything about your brother in law other than he was wearing clothes. The way you described it, I thought he showed up to the breakfast in leather string bikinis.

My dad walked around in tighty whities and an undershirt and I recall being around 3 when I told my mom it made me uncomfortable. He got a bathrobe that went down to his knees.

DH does this sometimes and no one in my family cares. Kids are M17 and F13. However, he would not do this at anyone else's house.

[Anonymous]

I think that boxers or boxer briefs and a T shirt is pretty common “just got out of bed” wear for adult men when around their families. My husband, dad, and Brother all do this around family and I never thought it was weird.

So - your first step needs to be to talk to your wife. If she thinks it’s weird, she should talk to him. I’m f she thinks it’s regular, than you guys need to decide together what your “house rule” is going to be.

Also - your 3 and 5 year olds need to know basic anatomy. If they had a dad or a brother, they would already, so that’s a knowledge gap you need to figure out how to fill.