MIL deliberately ignoring my wishes..AIBU or is she?!

[havingastress]

Quite prepared to accept it's me who's being unreasonable...

BUT I literally had the biggest stress out yesterday!

Baby due literally ANY minute, am being induced this week. It's her second grandchild.

We found out we were having a girl at the 20 week scan (with hindsight, won't find out again, but there you go!) ...and told parents and inlaws. Her first reaction was...Ooooh great I love all the little pink clothes and outfits you can get.

Now....daft I know..but I BLOODY HATE PALE PINK BABY CLOTHES!!! You know...the whole rows of the stuff in Asda, Next, M+S. it's that insipid pink. Ewww. Anyway, I laughed and told her, Oh god please NO PINK..Honestly, I don't like it and I won't be dressing my daughter in it. Please save your money!! She was categorically told for want of a better way of putting it!

My mum has bought us 5 beautiful outfits for our daughter - each time she phoned before she purchased, described how it looked and asked would I be ok with her buying it.. Totally over the top as it's my mum and I know she has brilliant taste! But I appreciated her respect, and she said she knew from personal experience how annoying it is to receive loads of stuff you don't like because then you feel pressurized into using it because you feel guilty.

MIL turned up yesterday with a bin liner. A bin liner FULL of a mix of second hand clothes, car boot purchases, ebay purchases and some reduced sale stock from Asda and Next. ALL BLOODY PINK. THE WHOLE BLOODY LOT. A ridiculous amount of clothes that I have no idea where to put. She actually said, 'I know you said no pink, but come on, it's a girl, I want her to wear pink'

I was blazing! I feel as though she is deliberately ignoring my wishes, spending money needlessly (which then makes me feel guilty) and forcing HER wishes/beliefs onto me.

I know if I get rid of them to the charity shop/ebay she will open the wardrobe and demand to know where they are. The stuff with tags I took the whole lot back last night and swopped for 9-12months plain babygros etc that will be used and we will be very grateful for.

So...AIBU or is she? And even if it's ME being U, how the hell do I get her to stop buying loads of crap that I don't want?!

The only other 'run in' I've had recently is that she told us she was coming to stay for 4 days as soon as I was out of hospital. Given that I have some medical issues (won't bore you), and it's my first baby, I really wanted to spend the first few precious days with my DH and my baby.

I don't want MIL here taking over, bathing the baby, playing happy families, telling me I'm doing a crap job of bf'ing (she's already told me I'll give in and FF already) when the baby is but a few days old (she even said she couldn't wait to take our new pram out!!) I want to get my own head around things first!

She's had a right strop about this saying I'm stopping her from seeing her GC!! Honestly..I'm not!!! She said, but I want to spend quality time with my GC. As I said, it's her second gc, not her first (first is with her own daughter, and he's only 8 weeks old) so I don't see why she can't respect my want to have some private time with my own family - DH and baby.

Just wanted to add that I agree with posters above about it being good manners to use gifts if you possibly can, but it is a bit passive aggressive to give someone a heap of stuff that is the opposite to what they've said they want!

I would just give someone money or vouchers if I really wanted to help.

She is excited about the birth of her granddaughter and wants to buy her things. You are massively over reacting.

A bit of pink wont harm anyone but if you really don't like it put them to the back of a cupboard for "oh shit nothing is washed moments" or donate them to a charity shop.

You are being a tad unreasonable. As was I for exactly the same reasons when dd was due. But when I was on the 4th outfit change of the day from the leaked nappy or fountain of vomit I was glad of any old clothes I could put her in regardless of colour.

Ladymariner 'm confused! Why is everyone saying I put the clothes into the bin???!! I HAVEN'T!!! She brought them round in a bin liner. I haven't done ANYTHING in front of her. I said thank you! I would never be so rude

I found it easy to get hold of clothes that weren't pink.when my dds were babies, they had some pink clothes and some in other colours. All shops do some other colours. I didn't worry over whether anyone mistook them for boys as it really doesnt matter. I don't quite understand why people get quite so worked up about their babies wearing pink.

The point is that you said you didn't want your dd to wear pink and your MIL has completely disregarded your wishes.

There will be lots of other opportunities for her to undermine you as your dd grows, so I think it's important to stand your ground now.

What if you decide you don't want her to eat sweets, for example, and granny turns up with bars of chocolate. She is your child, so you make the decisions for her. MIL has had her turn to raise her child her way. Now it's your turn.

I would say to her, thanks for the clothes, it's a shame that most of them are pink because, as you know, I won't be dressing her in them. Shall I pass them on to charity or do you want them back?

I also agree that it would be odd for her to be looking in your cupboards. Set some boundaries now and stick to them. Good luck.

Pick the "nicest", "smallest" outfit from the pink. Then dispose of the rest. Either dress daughter in outfit once when Granny is visiting, then dispose, or have big baby and sadly none of the outfits were the right size?
Good luck!

I think YABU and you sound very controlling, your DM calling you to explain every outfit and ask your permission to get it sounds like she might be afraid to do otherwise.
Sorry if this sounds harsh but I couldn't believe how ungrateful you sound. Hopefully it's just pre-baby jitters.

I don't understand all the outrage over babies wearing pink.

everlong Absolutely. I'll be delighted. Honestly. As I said, the only things I've been able to purchase myself have been ebay purchases. We are not made of money!

It was just the sheer quantity and the fact it was ALL PINK. Not like one odd outfit. The whole.bloody.lot. As if to go, there, you'll HAVE to put her in pink now whether you like it or not!

Plus, I guess I'm a girl who would rather receive ONE beautifully thought out gift (new or second hand) than a bin liner full of stuff...Does that even make sense I probably am being somewhat unreasonable...

What does your husband think?

scary this is EXACTLY why I'm concerned. I'm worried about how it will progress over the years.

I have actually been through the bin liner. I took the tagged stuff back last night and swopped, as I said previously. The rest of it, there are 4 super cute tops, a couple of pairs of leggings and a dress which are lovely, so I have washed them. The rest of it, aside from being pink, is all the wrong sizes for the wrong season - as in, when the baby is 12 months old (ie winter next year!) they are pink floral summer dresses! So they're totally unsuitable anyway!

havingastress you do sound really stressed & quite understandably. Can your DH/DP back you up a bit and stand between you and MIL? Or could your DM even negotiate a bit for you if they know each other/get on well? It would be a shame to spend the first few weeks arguing with your MIL, getting upset and maybe making the relationship difficult.

I totally get where you are coming from as I can see I am going to have similar issues myself. Part of the problem is that my DM and MIL (while both lovely people) have totally different parenting styles so I have little practice in how to handle someone with no boundaries who ignores my wishes and statements and interferes/advises a lot. We also have similar (argumentative) personalities which doesn't help.

havingastress I didn't say that you put the clothes in the bin, it was another poster who said to "chuck them in the bin in front of her" which I thought was an awful thing to do

I think like someone said pick your battles. Accept the gifts,you don't have to use them. You never know,you may be glad of some extra clothes when you are tired,the washing is mounting up & the baby is pukey.
Being hormonal is an excuse that only goes so far but I do understand.
Pink isn't the devil!

When baby is here you will pretty quickly realise that unless you want to be stressing about the washing all the time then having lots of clothes is much more useful than one pretty outfit

Also don't assume because something is 12-18 months if will fit in that 6 month period. Ds us wearing 12-18 trousers today, he is 3 in two weeks!

so you need to tell her that that's the reason.

"She'll be 8 months when it's getting warmer- she won't be able to fit in that 0-3 months dress or outfit"

DH is totally with me. It annoys him too that MIL ignores our wishes. (not just over this, in general I mean)

My MIL is lovely - she means well I know that. But she is very very different to my own mother (who incidentally I have a fab relationship with) and family and very very different parenting styles.

The only problem with DH is that I don't think he explains things very well. I'm going to ring MIL tomorrow to explain WHY I don't want them to stay for 4 days immediately after the birth and ask that she respects that.

Yabu. It's a gift for goodness sake. Just smile sweetly, say thankyou and only put them on DD when you know MIL is visiting. There are so many things I swore I wouldn't buy/play with/ feed/ dress my son in, all went out the window when everything gets shat on and a pink frilly babygrow is the only thing left.

Whilst I do see that you mil has boundary issues, two things struck me reading this

Firstly, she's an over excited gran and that's actually lovely
Secondly by the time your dd has vomited up over the sixth baby grow that morning, you'll be grateful for anything to put her into.

Can't you try to me mil half way? I know you have a right to say 'no pink' but please don't stomp all over her feelings

E320 I like your thinking.

I don't think 'being excited' is an excuse, tbh. I was pretty excited for friends/sister when they had babies but didn't use that as an excuse to trawl the boot sales for loads of stuff to fill their houses with. In the SE especially, people live in small places. I think the most helpful present is food -- ideally the sort that can be microwaved? Or like the OP said one small, thoughtful thing that relates to them.

Of course it's the thought that counts and all that but I put a lot of thought into what I get for other people so if someone came round with a bin sack of something like that I would be a bit inwardly