Reading this I've just realised how our families could have veiwed our situation as something sinister. We've only just started inviting family from further a feild to visit our 22 month old dd. Although she has met all the imideit family at a couple of family parties and meals, she's not met most of the aunties, uncles and cousins who'd consider themselves close to us and our parents. Up until now we've had so much going on in our lives it's not something we've been in a position to cope with, much of which we'd never have been in a position to comfortably disclose.
Dd is beautiful, happy and fun. But in her short life she's scared the hell out of us on more than one occation and we've spent more time worrying about her than enjoying her in the first year of life. She is healthy and appears so outwardly but has some minor health problems and had one potentionally major health problem. We really struggled to cope with how worried we were and the uncertaincy of what was happening. As first time parents it hit us hard because as well as getting the idea of being parents into our heads we had so much more than we ever expected to deal with.
For us it was really hard to tell people what was going on with dd because we didn't know ourselves. So while we would mention about medical appointments that made us unable to visit or have visitors we were always vague about what they were for. When we knew more about what was going on and told the ils what we knew they reacted terrably putting us off telling anyone else. Mil over reacted and dramatised and told us how terriable it was for her to have such a potentially ill grandchild. Gmil under reacted and brushed it all off, insisting there was nothing wrong with her and that the very able doctors we'd been dealing with were wrong. It was all they could ever talk about after that, the questiong, second guessing and dealing with their emotions was more than we could handle and we really had to keep them at a distance just to be able to get through the day. It was only two people's reactions and although everyone wouldn't react as they did it was enough the risk not doing it again. My mum only found out what was going on when a referal letter scared me stupid and I took it to her to ask if it really was that scarry.
Dh would actually used the phrase 'respecting dd's privacy' because it was a safe phrase to say. It was given to him by one of the nurses we saw when he mentioned how tough he found to deal with his faamily when they asked about appointments. So baby is fine, we're respecting her privacy, was the update everyone got after an appointment because it stopped the info train and any other difficult follow up questions. We also worried about her condition following her around for years once she had grown out of it because gfil's breif patch of shingles is still wildly discused six years after he passed!
Dh battled socail phobia for years. He would have prefured have got married in secret. Mostly recovered now he still doesn't like to answer the door unless his expecting somebody. Even at his worst he was still happy to talk to my family on the phone and skype my cousins. But the idea of them visiting would have sent him into a blind panic.
I was funny about recieving present's for dd. Again thanks to gmil, who called and screamed down the phone at us when dd was 3 weeks old because her sister was yet to recieve a thank you card from the gift we'd only recieved a few days earlier. After that getting a present would 'set me off again' until I knew the giver had recieved a thank you card. So at times when I was using every free momet to rush between appointments, a gift could act as the straw that broke the camle's back. People who asked what would be useful were sometimes asked to wait a few weeks before sending anything to us and then asked to send things through my parents so I could pick them up when I was ready to deal with them.
It does just hit me that your db and sil could be in the same situation. Maybe a bad experience has put them off being open with the rest of the family until they really have to, we know we'll have to be open with our siblings if and when they start families of their own. Keeping things normal might be how they cope. So don't take it personally, I doubt it's just about you or your mum.
To add one final thing, I was sent in the middle of everything was a bar of chocolate, a book and a short note from my god mother saying to be kind to myself and that she'd still be there whenever I was ready and to use the time I would have used to reply to her to put my feet up!