Grr...bloody mother!

[spannermary]

Silly little meaningless rant alert, based on nothing but insecurity and hormones! Just got dressed up to go out for Christmas lunch with my mum, dad, DH and uncle. Wearing dress and leggings in attempt to ring the changes from my standard maternity trousers and maternity top look (I'm 24+2 and have recently exploded!).

Mum comes in to my bedroom, looks at me in outfit, and seeing my insecurity, says 'hmm...' and walks out. Feeling even worse I ask DH if I look alright.

He says I look great and slaps my arse. :)

Mum then says to him, just in my hearing, 'it's not a great view from the back.' and bursts out laughing!

DH Is fab, says I look sexy and pregnant. He is totally awesome.

Just a bit pissed off as have been stuck at home for months with HG and now I'm finally going out to lunch and my mum has sapped all confidence from me! I know my arse is huge - I'm bloody knocked up!

Anyone else fed up with insensitive comments from people who should be on your side?

...and Christmas is just beginning! Ho ho ho!

[spannermary]

...also got midwife appt before lunch and they always stress me a bit...in case something bad crops up. First time mum - can you tell?!

[Oeisha]

Oh yeah. My Mum's a little mental too.
On last 'visit' (at bro's) literally within moments of telling my SIL how slim and beautiful she looks pregnant she called me fat twice and alluded to the fact that I would never lose the weight...
...of which I've lost during pregnancy, not gained (no HG either), she knows this, and knows I'm more than paranoid about it as whilst I know LO will mercilessly steal off me, and she's growing fine, I just feel very uneasy about.
DH was still in bed, but heard, and nearly came out just to punch her...he's so pissed off with it, but then figured it wasn't a good example to set my neice.
I ignore her comments, whereas DH does the "She's pregnant, what do you expect?" comments.
Ignore her. I bet you look great!

[kiki22]

My mum has said a few times your backside is gettin huge i just say so is yours whats your excuse lol. My gran also keeps telling me to watch my weight even tho i'm 35 weeks tomoro and can still button up my size 14 pre pregnancy coat. On the other hand my gran says the same to my mum. Think it's a mum thing i wouldn't worry to much x

[SandyChick]

When mentioning feeling baby move etc I was comparing it to when I was pregnant with ds1. I said ds1 was a little wriggler where this baby so far isn't as much (24 weeks). My mams response was "well this baby has more room than ds1 had" - I was 1.5 stone heavier at start of pregnancy this time than last. I've already put 1 stone on so far too

[Flisspaps]

I don't think it's a 'mum thing' - it's just bloody rude.

Perhaps (just perhaps, not a given) your mother feels a bit :( at the fact that you're actually fertile and blooming and gorgeous and is a bit threatened by it - you being there carrying her grandchild is a reminder of her getting older and it may put her on the defensive.

Well done for fabulous DHs though

[xmasmummytobe]

I think it's awful for someone close to you to be so bloody rude and insensitive! I've come across a few people who've made nasty comments towards me about how big I am, how small I am, how much it's going to hurt (first baby too). I just think whoever it is is just trying to make me feel bad because they did and I feel bad for them.

Brush it off, I bet you look gorgeous! Best of luck for your MW app.

[buonasera]

Haven't seen my mum since I got pg but looking forward to this sort of nonsense come Christmas. She's been talking on the phone about how she liked so-and-so style for maternity clothes when she was pregnant because "it didn't show the weight so much". It's a BABY, not blubber! But then even when I was a littler she used to go on about how skinny she was until she had me and how she never ever managed to get the weight back off. I just keep reminding myself that that's all her weird stuff, nothing to do with me... and that she's only visiting for 3 days.

[HardCheese]

I agree it's outrageously rude. Remind yourself that those are her body hang-ups, not yours, and are in fact nothing to do with you at all. There do appear to be some weight-obsessed women who resent the fact that they perceive pregnant women to be let off certain body-conscious hooks, so they feel the need to reintroduce the loaded language of fatness and over-indulgence into the equation, just in case you're in danger of thinking you're OK, God forbid. Try not to let it get to you.

I'm 27 weeks with my first baby, too, and my mother has some odd hangups of her own - like she visibly hates any maternity clothes that show off my pregnant shape ( I'm wearing a lot of pre-pregnancy wrap dresses, which look nice with a long cardigan). I've trained her not to say anything, but you can see her wishing I would get a nice Princess-Diana style billowing floral maternity smock with a Peter Pan collar.

I also know - mostly from her disapproving silences - that she's inwardly horrified I'm planning to breast-feed, and have no intention of coyly leaving the room once I've got the knack of it (here's hoping). For her generation of Irish women, only Traveller women didn't bottle-feed, so she regards it as a sign of fecklessness and poverty not to be able to afford bottles, formula etc. The joys I have ahead....

[Oeisha]

Aren't Mothers the best!
Mine also doesn't like to see "too much belly". She was horrified to hear I was still in my tankini swinwear. I'm simply not spending the £50 (ast least) that it would take to get a cossy to fit my baps (main problem) and bump to wear it for a few months and not again. If I have to see the cellulite and flubber of fellow swimmers, they can see my bump, stretchmarks and all and just live with it or feck off frankly.
I know what you mean re: Princess-Diana smocks hardcheese. A significant amount of maternity tops and dresses all have frumpy-fronts (smocking, bows, layered collars, blah blah blah) and with the forementioned baps, that just looks utterly rediculous...plus, thanks to the baps most of my pre-pg tops still fit...bump has just filled the void that previously existed. Still Mum thinks it's not good and I should be thinner.
I shouldn't complain too much. She's 100% lovely most of the time, and is a great grandparent and I know she untimatly loves me and my LO and would be horrified if she actually thought through her comments and realised the harm they do and could do.

[buonasera]

HardCheese, if I didn't know better I'd say you were my sister! My mum's been singing the praises of maternity smocks to me for about a month... I'm so not looking forward to meeting her off the train on Friday and hearing her say (quietly, so no men can hear) that have I noticed my work tops show off my... shape quite a lot now?

I'm hearing a bit of revisionism on the breastfeeding thing. She maintained for years that it was frowned upon at the hospital when she had me, but since I got pregnant she's been saying it was actually encouraged but none of her friends did it. Since they were all 20 a day smokers I guess we have a lot to be grateful for... I take most of it with a pinch of salt ever since she revised her account of childbirth. For years it was "oh it wasn't that bad, I just had gas and air, just gas and air was fine" and then a couple of years ago it slipped out... "just gas and air, and what was it... pethidine?" Yeah mum, that is a bit different to just gas and air.

It's one of those "I'll never do that to my kids" sort of things for me actually. My mum just lies about all sorts of stuff if the alternative sounds better than the truth, and used to expect the same off of me and my dad when I was a kid - I'd get into the most terrible trouble for owning up to stuff that wasn't even that bad, but it was the easiest thing in the world to lie and get away with it because she'd take everything at face value. It was like this sort of hyperpoliteness where you never share anything that the other person wouldn't like. My other half is honest to the point of tactlessness (the sort of person who'll say "what?" if you kick him under the table if he's saying something stupid at a family dinner) so I'm hoping this will help me not to repeat my mum's behaviour. I'd like my kids to be able to say anything to me, in the sense of really, I would actually like that, I don't just think it's a nice sentiment.

[yellowraincoat]

How bloody rude. Ignore her, I bet you look great. It's just her own insecurity.

[spannermary]

Ah thank you all - wonderful people!! I was expecting a few 'deal with it, there's some people with real problems in the world...' so your sympathy and indignation on my behalf has warmed my heart. :)

And in truth, I'm only 3lb heavier than Pre-pregnancy. We are now back from the lunch and I feel much better - the MW appt was so lovely. DH heard the heartbeat and is thrilled.

As for my mum...She spent our childhood telling my sister and I how we were responsible to ruining her back when she had an epidural at our 2 births! Now she tells me epidurals are wonderful and I simply must have one...so consistency and rational discussion clearly not her strong point.

She is lovely in other ways though: just needs to grow up a bit!

Ah, families, eh. Merry Christmas one and all! Xx

[itchyfootedlady]

mothers. feel they have the right to say anything at all to you just beacuse they once wiped your arse :) i had words with my mum on this subject extensively as a teenager, now i just smile and keep visits to a max of 2 days!
spanner, love the way they change the story to fit the argument :)

Hardcheese ....the maternity smock! So glad its not just my mum. I'm only 13 weeks and she has already started a campaign on, "now wasn't your sisters pinafore she wore for the last 3 months lovely" (answer no, she and I both hated it as it was like a giant denum tent, but as mum had bought it and sister couldn't be arsed/couldn't afford anything else she stuck with it) and "you won't be one of these ladies who wears a bikini with a bump will you" ummm, probably....baby's due in june and i'll be on maternity leave all summer.... :) can't wait to see what she buys me to cover me up. luckily i own a sewing machine and i'm not afraid to use it!

[buonasera]

My mum's away home again after being here for Christmas. As predicted she was singing the praises of maternity smocks - "it's a shame you can't get them any more, you're so neat you wouldn't even be able to tell if you had a smock on." Which made me think, first, if I hide the bump, how am I going to get a seat on the train? And second, I think most people would probably work it out anyway if I was wearing a maternity smock. And last but not least, why do I need to hide it?

Slightly shocked (but not really) to hear my mum say my cousin (who was asking!) would be surprised to hear how little weight I'd put on. In context I think she meant I'd not put on much non-bump weight. But I don't care, it's so not anyone else's business, and it's a bloody stupid thing to comment on for someone who's having twins after recurrent miscarriage. Sufficient weight gain (of the small ones, rather than just me) is something I hope for/worry about and really all I want to hear is that my weight gain is appropriate for a healthy twin pregnancy, and the only person I want to hear that off of is my midwife.

[AdiVic]

My mother in law is like this, and makes snide comments about what i eat even when I'm NOT pregnant. Of course all these digs are out of earshot of my husband, so he thinks i'm paranoid/mad/lying. Of course SHE was 6 stone when she gave birth to my other half (how she bred a decent human I dont' know). By the end of my pregnancy i weighed in at 16st something, so my arse was big to. As were my knockers, my thighs, my face......EVERYTHING!!! But, who cares as long as you and the baby are healthy:) Maybe your Ma is slightly jealous?? and a little dig is her way of making herself feel better - who wouldn't be jealous of a gorgeous little bundle, maybe her girl having a baby of her own is making her feel a bit old. As long as your husband still thinks you are hot stuff, that's what matters:)