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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

How soon would you expect to hear from a very close family member about a new baby?

84 replies

Thurlow · 02/11/2013 21:23

Genuinely unsure if anyone is being unreasonable (and the situation has the potential to spiral) here so would like the MN jury to help.

If a very close family member i.e. sister/in-law, brother/in-law had a baby (say DC4), and given mobile phones and the ease of sending a text or email even if it's not a phone call, how soon would you expect to hear the news? Or alternatively, how soon did you send a some sort of message to parents, in-laws, siblings, best friends etc?

OP posts:
Hendricks · 02/11/2013 21:41

I'd say within a couple of days or so.

#1 was born at 2340, we started telling people at about 5/ 6pm the following day. #2 born at 0555, we started telling people that evening about 8pm IIRC. The reason we left the time was two fold 1) so we could spend some time just us getting used to our new set up 2) so people wouldn't insist on visiting that evening. The fact that we never let anyone know either my due date or when I went into labour (other than childcare for number 1 when number 2 was born) helped though.

toffeesponge · 02/11/2013 21:42

DH and I hadn't planned when we would tell. DS1 was am emergency section 2 weeks early and we told grandparents and my boss within 2.5 horus.
DD - grandparents were told 3.5 hours later when DH got back to our house where they were babysitting. The next day I started ringing my grandma and a friend who was going to be able to pop in and see us at the hospital.
DC3 - grandparents told within the hour. Rest of family about 6 hours later when we got home and I texted a couple of friends. After all the births the rest of the family were told by PIL.

speak2me · 02/11/2013 21:43

I told immediate family within half and hour of having DS. Friends were sent a text at a reasonable time the next morning!
SIL recently gave birth at 30wks and we were not told for nearly 48hrs, however grandparents knew in about 6hrs.

Xmasbaby11 · 02/11/2013 21:43

12-24 hours

toffeesponge · 02/11/2013 21:45

Having read your latest post, Thurlow, that all seems a bit checking up-py and a bit intrusive.

Annunziata · 02/11/2013 21:48

Hmm. If he had time to phone work he surely would have had time to phone his parents, unless they don't get on well.

nobutreally · 02/11/2013 21:48

OK, so grandparents not hearing for 24 hours. Humm, no, even I would have managed quicker than that ... but I know even with pfb, we didn;t get round to letting my parents know for about 8-10 hours (born in middle of night). In retrospect, my mum was prob having kittens. At the time, I was so in a baby-bubble, it didn't occur to me.

I'd forgiven someone who has just given birth/watched their partner give birth pretty much anything though - not a time to hold something against someone, imo.

WorrySighWorrySigh · 02/11/2013 21:49

Oh how things change!

DF was told about the birth of his second son when the doctor battled through snow drifts to get to parents' cottage.

DF responded with the classic words 'oh dear, my wife will be disappointed, she was hoping for a girl'

SparklyFucker · 02/11/2013 21:50

There has to be a reason why he felt he could phone work but not his parents. What's the back story?

Original poster
Thurlow · 02/11/2013 21:51

Does it? Sad I know mum only called because they hadn't chatted for a fortnight or so, she just wanted to know how SIL was doing. But confused how that is overly intrusive, but hey ho.

Really I just wondered whether most people would text a sibling to say that a baby was born and everything was OK within 24 hours. As I said, I did and most of my friends did, but I just wondered if most people did too or I just had friends who were overly good at texting!

OP posts:
nobutreally · 02/11/2013 21:51

Seriously ... your bro has had a baby and your main interest is when you all get to know

Oh, and we did delay telling people who we thought would insist on coming to visit when we didn't really want them yet

nobutreally · 02/11/2013 21:53

I didn't text any of my siblings about either of my births.

I like 'em (in fact dsis was looking after my son for my second birth) but I was busy having a baby at the time...

Let. It. Go.

BumPotato · 02/11/2013 21:53

After family who were told within the half hour, I phoned a very good friend I got to know on another parenting forum (not Nethuns I hasten to add) so she could do an online announcement. I was still in the delivery suite.

PenguinsDontEatPancakes · 02/11/2013 21:54

Yes quite slow. But why would it 'spiral'? You shrug and move on surely?

crazykat · 02/11/2013 21:56

With DC1 my nan was the first to know as she was with me. I rang then DP (now DH) about five minutes later. My nan told my mum about ten minutes later as she was outside the hospital as she drove me there and was obviously worried about both me and DC1.

When DH got to the hospital, 20 mins after DC1 was born, he had a cuddle with me and DC1 then woke his mum up just after 5am to tell her. So our parents knew within the hour.

With the other DCs it was also within the hour for our parents, and other family within a few hours depending on time the DCs were born.

Original poster
Thurlow · 02/11/2013 21:56

Backstory... I don't know. Yes, I suppose there is, though I don't understand it. Just a general distancing of DB and SIL from our side of the family. Nothing started it that I know of, just a gradual dropping off of contact.

If they want to distance themselves from us that's fine, so very sad. Obviously if there has been something which has triggered this they may not want to talk about it and deal with it, in which case I probably won't find out. It's all their call.

I think really I was interested to know other people's timescales because I was trying to gauge whether this was related to it. I guess so. If it is, all I can do is send a card and a present and say I'd love to meet the new baby or at least chat.

Oh, and of course I'm excited. I'm thrilled to have another DN and relieved that everyone is well and things are good. I would like a photo of a lovely squidgy newborn though Grin

OP posts:
ThoughtsPlease · 02/11/2013 21:58

What else is going on here to be so concerned about waiting 24 hours?

Actually as we talking about DC4 I suspect they are all very very busy.

PenguinsDontEatPancakes · 02/11/2013 21:59

Do you know that her family were told sooner to see it as distancing?

Flatasawitchestit · 02/11/2013 22:00

After last baby we didn't tell anyone until DH brought our other two children in to see me (they thought I was just in having a check up Grin ) as we wanted them to know before anyone else. Longest three hours ever! Was ace having little one (6) saying whys your baby bag here and where's your tummy gone!

Then I called my parents, siblings and then friends.

DH has a 'different' family, they get on ok but they're not interested in anything we do. So he never called his parents to tell them. They never bothered after our first baby, not even a call to see if she was ok (life saving surgery at 12hr old) and we didn't expect anything different this time. They only met our latest addition a week ago and she was 1.

Original poster
Thurlow · 02/11/2013 22:04

Yes, her family knew as her sister came down to look after the other DC.

I don't really want to get too much into the distancing thing as that's not really an AIBU discussion and not what I wanted to get into tonight. I just really wondered what was a roughly normal timescales, especially given texts and the like. It's entirely their prerogative what they do in terms of their relationship with us, all we can do is keep the doors open. And the most important thing here is that mum and baby are both well.

OP posts:
PenguinsDontEatPancakes · 02/11/2013 22:08

I think it is within normal but comparatively slow. I am quite shocked how many people said an hour or two. Think it was at least 4 both times for grandparents.

vj32 · 02/11/2013 22:09

I wouldn't be happy about anyone calling my work to just check up on me... even if we hadn't spoken for two weeks.

It all sounds weird to me.

PuntCuffin · 02/11/2013 22:13

DC4, they might have thought no one would be that excited/interested. I only found out my SIL was pg with DC3 via a friend of the family when she was about 16 weeks, as they figured I wouldn't be fussed. It was probably 36 hours after she had DC3 before I found out via grandparents. All because of their perception that 3 and more was no longer worthy of note!

TheFabulousIdiot · 02/11/2013 22:16

They are grown-ups and can tell whoever they want whenever they want.

Floralnomad · 02/11/2013 22:16

TBH you said in the OP ' very close family member ' , which I interpreted as you are close to them which having read your other posts it doesn't sound like you are . If you generally don't talk to them for weeks at a time then I probably wouldn't expect to be told for a few days . It would also piss me off if someone rang my workplace for a chat ,equally I wouldn't be happy about my workplace giving out information about my whereabouts to some random that rang and said they were my relative.