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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

to be be miffed at dh regarding ils

415 replies

NameChangedJustInCase · 10/04/2012 20:31

ok, Iv gone back to the name change in case iabu. This is not about bashing my ILS or DH. I get on perfectly well with them, they are lovely.

I joined mumsnet when i first became pregnant (so just over a year ago) and after reading a few threads on here, i decided to have a big conversation with dh about what was and what was not acceptable to do when baby finally got here ie, birth and just after. I said that if possible i would want my sister and him to be my birth partner but i did not want ANY visitors in the hospital other than the two of them, which he said was alright (he wanted to have his mum and other family members come to the hospital but i said i would not be comfortable with that, he wasn't that happy but accepted it was my decision ) i also made very very clear that i did not want any family to visit for the first few days of being out of hospital, i wanted to slob about in my dressing gown with my boobs out comfortably trying to get breastfeeding established, trying to bond as a family with our new baby, resting when baby was resting. I didn't want to be running back and forth from the bedroom feeding dd, i explained all my reasons why i didn't want family there and made it very clear to him how uncomfortable it would make me feel. we argued a bit about it, he couldn't see why i would be ok for my dsis to be there and not his mum, because it was his baby as well ect but in the end he agreed that he would tell them no visitors for a few days til we got settled.

All good. Anyway, a couple of weeks later after an extremely long and traumatic labour i wake up to hear that dh had spoke to mil and told here that she (and the rest of the family) could come over. he told me that they would either be there that day (of me giving birth) or the next day as they were all excited and couldn't wait to celebrate and meet dd. i was upset, exhausted and defeated so i told him hed really let me down by doing this behind my back (whilst i was sleeping) but just went along with it. I had to go home, deal with this tiny new little person, tidy the house (i know i should have just left it but i really cant do that) when i just wanted to take things at my own pace.

I Know that dh loves me and he didn't do it maliciously or anything (he just got caught up and excited) but I still cant get it out of my mind. i have brought it up with him since but he says (quite rightly) that there is nothing we can do about it now,so i need to just let it go. aibu to still be seething about this months later and actually get the urge to slap him in the face when i think about how vulnerable i felt at the time? AM I????

OP posts:

DuelingFanjo · 11/04/2012 23:40

and I have posted several times in defence of the OP, so why not have a go at me and all the other people who have done the same too? Or does my previous posting history not piss you off as much as Math's does?

what am I missing here?

seeker · 11/04/2012 23:42

Sigh.
They are not visiting her. They are visiting him and the baby. She stays in bed, or has a bath. Unless she is such a control freak that she won't let him take the baby downstairs for 20 minutes without her.

mathanxiety · 11/04/2012 23:42

The word menz has been mentioned twice here by me iirc. What exactly is your problem with the term?

pictish · 11/04/2012 23:42

I don't know Mathanxiety from Adam I'm afraid, I'm going on this thread alone.

It's a storm in a teacup this.

LeQueen · 11/04/2012 23:45

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

mathanxiety · 11/04/2012 23:46

Seeker, you must have missed the part about the anxiety disorder. You don't think the H should have gone a bit out of his way to make sure this wouldn't complicate her recovery? She felt she had to have a neat house and be presentable for visitors.

And what better way to make a woman feel like a slab of meat who has just had a baby extracted painfully from her nether regions than to visit her H and her baby and forget all about her.

duckdodgers · 11/04/2012 23:46

OP I have already said YABU and far too controlling. But that's not really going to help you now to move on, I don't agree with you but I do think you have let your anxiety take over, both then and now, particularly if your decision was based on random crap stuff you have read here!

Im glad you get on with your ILs and you have a good relationship with your DH - the more people that are around to love your DD the better. I do suspect that you have a lot of anxiety problems anyway, not just about your DD and would suggest looking into getting help to understand and control it, as it can spiral out of control and cause all sorts of problems in life. If you cant face going to your GP there is lots of self-help information out there, especially based on cognitive-behavioural therapy.

Original poster

NameChangedJustInCase · 11/04/2012 23:46

bangs head on very large brick wall oh well, this will be my last post. Thankyou everyone who has had kind or/and helpful comments. to the rest of you...

OP posts:

DuelingFanjo · 11/04/2012 23:47

phew.

so we're back on topic?

how very odd.

as you were.

mathanxiety · 11/04/2012 23:47

Tootles, LeQ.

JingleMum · 12/04/2012 00:07

mathanxiety you are committed though! i'd love to have you on my side on one of these threads.

the thread has turned into a general thread about post birth visitors, rather than just a thread based on the OP's situation. i still stand by GP's being able to have a quick visit before the mother takes time to be alone with her DH and DC.

seeker · 12/04/2012 00:08

"The word menz has been mentioned twice here by me iirc. What exactly is your problem with the term?"

I have a problem with the term in this context. There are times when it is a very term and should be used- there are lots of threads on here where women seem to think that men have men the right to take priority and need to be deferred to in all things. These women should be roundly condemned. But the assumption that a man has to say to his parents "sorry, I'm not allowed to let you meet my baby until her mother says it's OK" discredits both men and women.

pictish · 12/04/2012 00:12

What Jinglemum said.

NoOnesGoingToEatYourEyes · 12/04/2012 00:12

To all those saying the IL's weren't there to see the OP but only to see their son and his baby (nice sentiment by the way ), it's not that easy to just leave the baby and go off for a bath or a nap though.

She said she was breastfeeding and in those early days it seems to be one long continuous round of feeding and changing and feeding again, with a short nap in between if you are lucky.

You can't schedule a visit for a good time because there is no routine and you have no idea when that good time might be.

They tell you to nap when the baby is napping but that's not easy for either mum or baby when there is a group of visitors in the house and when I had DS I found that when he wasn't napping he was feeding, throwing up or filling a nappy. I swear that some days it was just feed, vomit, feed some more for hours on end. There were many days where I felt like I was trapped in an armchair feeding a baby who never got full, everything that went in came straight back out and left him wanting more.

I felt anxious and upset for weeks when DS was out of my sight, even just in another room or even sleeping in our room but with the light out. And I felt more violated than anything else following his birth so I can understand the need for a couple of days to adjust once you get home.

Our visitors always seemed to arrive while the midwife was with us and usually checking my stitches or positioning me to help me breastfeed DS. And I could hardly walk and was getting though a maternity towel every half an hour. And I wasn't allowed to take a bath alone because of health complications. DH's parents arrived one day and he took them into the kitchen until the midwife was finished with me but as she went to the cloakroom to wash her hands I heard FIL say to her "so you're helping him take to the tit then?"

If the OP had a difficult time of things then at least some of these were probably very real considerations for her too and even if she couldn't know that beforehand it probably hasn't helped her to come to terms with feeling hurt by her DH now.

seeker · 12/04/2012 00:13

"Seeker, you must have missed the part about the anxiety disorder. You don't think the H should have gone a bit out of his way to make sure this wouldn't complicate her recovery? She felt she had to have a neat house and be presentable for visitors.

And what better way to make a woman feel like a slab of meat who has just had a baby extracted painfully from her nether regions than to visit her H and her baby and forget all about her."

Nope. I said dp should make sure the house is neat. Although I do think one person's need for a neat house should no necessarily trip another persons's need to show their parents their new baby. And in what way is the new mother having a peaceful nap or a luxuripus bath "forgetting about her"?

Bambino81 · 12/04/2012 00:51

I don't think u was being unreasonable tbh.

I think you bonding with the baby, working out the breastfeeding, getting comfortable after the labour is more important.

I was pretty much the same when I had my daughter. I literally cried every time I moved cause of my tear/stitches and breast feeding on top of that. I didn't want ppl popping in who, let's face it, want to see how ur coping.

Maybe u should have just said they could come but only for a couple of hours.

Defo stop giving dh a hard time tho, that poor sod lol

mathanxiety · 12/04/2012 05:27

Seeker -- A man has to say to his parents 'I'm sorry but wife and I are not seeing anyone for two days' when he and the wife have agreed weeks beforehand that they will not have visitors for two days (or a few, whatever it was).

The assumption that what this means is that 'a man has to say to his parents "sorry, I'm not allowed to let you meet my baby until her mother says it's OK"' is a way of saying that this woman was a whip-cracking ball-breaker. It is another way of saying that women who have a strong preference for doing things a certain way and have the temerity to persist in getting their partner's agreement to doing things that way are out of line -- which is the 'poor menz' way of looking at situations where they don't get their own way.

DPrince · 12/04/2012 05:51

Math - you say a grown man should get over being gutted his parents refuse to see the baby? Maybe this lady need to get over this. The only person here that blames the ils is YOU. I have to say I love that you think a woman wishes should be priority after giving birth and having stomach flu. Genius.
I am just thinking of it th other way round. Dad phones me and says 'do you want to come and visit today' I say 'could you confirm that mum has ok'd this, just in case she has stomach flu'. That wouldn't happen. A grown man has as much right to invite someone as the OP. Knowing its not what she wanted is the DHs responsibility. I doubt he did it to ignore his wife, as the OP says he was just excited. Damn men for being excited at the birth of their children .The ils probably didn't know the OPs wishes or assumed as they had been invited, it was ok. Shock horror, ils attending when they have been specifically invited. Bad pils. :)

HillyWallaby · 12/04/2012 06:08

I completely agree with Seeker and that hardly ever happens.

I also find the term menz quite offensive at times. Far too often it is used in a very patronising, misandric way which wreaks of ill-concealed contempt.

HillyWallaby · 12/04/2012 06:24

I don't know what the back story is with the OP's parents - I know they are not on the scene but I don't know why, or wehter they are even alive, which is none of my business and I don't expect her to tell me, but I would be fascinated to know what her stance would have been had she had a close relationship with her mother and/or father. Would they have been allowed to see the baby immediately on account of her 'needing their support' whilst the IL's and the DH were made to wait to experience their shared joy?

I get that women go through a lot in childbirth and respect should be shown for their wishes, and their space, but I don't think that gives them the right to behave in a self-absorbed and precious way.

mathanxiety · 12/04/2012 06:32

'I have to say I love that you think a woman wishes should be priority after giving birth and having stomach flu. Genius.'

You seriously have a problem with this, DPrince?

HillyWallaby, I think anyone who interprets a situation where a husband and wife have come to an agreement about visitors and the woman expects her husband to honour that agreement as the equivalent of the poor man being forced to say to his parents "sorry, I'm not allowed to let you meet my baby until her mother says it's OK" is someone who thinks women have no business asserting themselves.

A 'poor menz' apologist in other words.

HillyWallaby · 12/04/2012 06:38

Math I think you are the only person who truly thinks they 'came to an agreement.' I think most of us reading the OP think he was pressured and co-erced, and told quite categorically what was, and was not acceptable. It really didn't sound like much of a two-way street to me.

Oh god, this is reeeeeally boring now.

HillyWallaby · 12/04/2012 06:41

But she absolutely WAS saying 'you are not allowed to let your parents meet the baby until I say it's ok.' She was TOTALLY saying that. That is the entire point of the thread.

mathanxiety · 12/04/2012 06:41

'I get that women go through a lot in childbirth and respect should be shown for their wishes, and their space, but I don't think that gives them the right to behave in a self-absorbed and precious way.'

And yet the DH and his parents can behave in a self absorbed and precious way and to hell with the OP's desire for space and privacy and a peaceful couple of days to recover, having been turfed out of the hospital within a day of a long and difficult labour..

It's like Through The Looking Glass here. This man can do no wrong and the woman who delivered the precious grandchild should go to her room or take a bath, get over herself and accept that she has no right to expect agreements made with her husband honoured if they impinge on his or his parents' wishes in the slightest. She has produced the heir and she is now irrelevant and her wishes can be ignored.

And this is Britain, in the 21st century?

HillyWallaby · 12/04/2012 06:47

No. we have pretty much unanimously said that he was a bit stupid to bring them all around without checking with her first under the circumstances,a nd having however eluctantly 'agreed' he should ot have gone against his word.
But that is not the issue. The issue is that she was BU to not listen to how he felt and agree on a compromise in the first place. The issue is that she places her family above his in importance, and expects him to be ok with that. As others have pointed out, she made the situation worse for herself by taking such a hard line in the beginning.

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