To not tell people when my son comes home?

[Onthedowns]

My son was born at 35 weeks and is in SCBU for past 2 weeks doing well and hopefully another week or so will be coming home. I was discharged after 3 days so myself and DH been travelling back forth, my DH had also been working to save paternity leave till he comes home. We have a 4 yr dd and she has only been to visit once as she has had terrible cold. It's been extremely stressful emotionally and exhausting. The nurses on unit advised not to tell anyone when we come home so we can spend time as a family before the hoards of visitors arrive. SCBU don't allow visitors just parents and siblings. I want to do this also I feel very protective and obviously having to leave my son has been awful and my dd has suffered also. My DH is struggling slightly with the idea. My sil and mil have been posting on Facebook how hard it is not to cuddle him and are first to see him. My mum tends to just come in take my washing, drop me a dinner and see DC for ten mins. Whereas mil and sil sit for hours expect tea made generally don't move. ( experience with dd) I just can't have 6,7 people at a time in my house or people just sitting around for hours. The nurse also emphasised DS won't be used to lots of people holding him and dd needs time with him. AIBU in wanting DH to back me up?

Jassy that sounds fine in theory but the OP has already said she can't be having five or six people there are once, so her own mother there at the same time is just an extra body in the way

God, this thread would explode if someone had described OP's MIL as 'just an extra body in the way'. But her mum is obviously fair game.

I hadn't anticipated any more than two visitors - her mum and MIL - to be frank.

More to the point. I hope OP that your baby comes home safe and sound sooner rather than later and a year from now this all feels like a very unpleasant dream.

Why are women so insistent that their in laws are totally devoid of any emotional intelligence or common sense and therefore incapable of understanding a basic request to keep the visiting delegation small and the visit short?

In OP's situation the answer seems to be 'experience'.

My own are pretty good, but then they hate leaving their home town so we always visit them. But even when the annoy me I know they mean well, and would take a direct but polite request just fine.

Why are women so insistent that their in laws are totally devoid of any emotional intelligence or common sense and therefore incapable of understanding a basic request to keep the visiting delegation small and the visit short? Does becoming a MIL make you extra-specially stupid or something?

Whereas mil and sil sit for hours expect tea made generally don't move. experience with dd

The OP has already had this before from the inlaws. Should she pretend otherwise?

From reading MIl's posts on MN, I think part of the problem is that the inlaws seem to see it as a competition over access to the grandchild. Forgetting that there is an actual real hormonal tired bruised woman who pushed out the baby first and who maybe doesn't feel that comfortable around someone else's mother.

Their own mothers are maybe less likely to forget this as its their baby who is in pain.

*It is quite amazing how it is always the mother who is the trouble free relative who knows how to help out and respect boundaries without outstaying her welcome, and it's always the PILs and SILs who will want to sit for hours, manhandle the baby, pass it round like pass the parcel and expect to fed, and waited on hand and foot.

Every time. It's the weirdest thing*

Your paranoia bias is showing. That just isn't true.

TippyTappyLappyToppy and BErtrand there are plenty of posts and MN threads where people complain about their MILS.

Men have been complaining about their MILs (mothers of women) since time immemorial, and the sexist MIL joke that reigned supreme in 1970s stand up routines is about the mothers of women.

It is simply not true that nobody complains about their own mother.

There are posts on this thread about both sets of grandparents being a nightmare.

The difference is probably that a lot of people are able to speak more directly to their own parent, or have internalised the same types of expectations as their own parent, and dealing with your spouse's parents different "norms" (whether parents of the husband or wife) is an awkward situation for a lot of people.

The relationship with mature adults who you acquire as family when you marry their adult child has always been prone to being fraught, and especially these days where people often marry somebody with quite a different background whom they meet in a context utterly separate from their family. Of course this can sometimes make misunderstandings and clashing expectations and different boundaries more of a problem with the family of your spouse than the family you were born into.

But there are a myriad of MN threads where people have deep seated problems and conflicts with their own mothers and fathers and siblings.

All this "its always the angelic mother and the evil MIL, every time" stuff is quite simply and blatantly untrue.

I'd rather have had the ILs than my mother. She and my dad stayed for a week. It was hard. And I had mastitis then. My sister had a similar experience.

If the OP knows from experience how the parents are likely to act, we should trust her.

Don't be daft Jassy if the MIL were there having her own separate visits and then was draughted in to be present at the same time as the mother as well then the MIL would become the 'extra body in the way' in those circumstances.

The point is, she clearly doesn't want loads of people there at once, or for too long, but if she asks her mother to be there to 'manage' that for her then she's automatically contradicting her own argument by having more people present than necessary. Her DH should be capable of telling people that visits need to be quiet and short. It's nothing to do with her mother being 'fair game.'

And I didn't anticipate it being just the mother and the MIL because the OP said this:

I just can't have 6,7 people at a time in my house or people just sitting around for hours. The nurse also emphasised DS won't be used to lots of people holding him

Clearly she thinks DH's family are only capable of turning up mob-handed.

He DH has said he does not wish to manage it for her.

She also said this is what they did with her older baby.

Yeah, how dare the OP use her previous experience of her IL's and new baby to predict the next experience of a new baby and IL's!

Totally unreasonable to use peoples previous and current behaviour to anticipate future behaviour in la la land maybe

YANBU we did exactly the same, everyone respected that. We just said "can you call and see if we are ok for visitors before you turn up as we will be getting used to a new routine and trying to sleep when the baby does". What I did to help their cluckiness was email lots of photos of the baby in SCBU and a few more once we finally got home, this helped them to see how delicate the situation was and they appreciated that I also had a thing about germs getting to the baby!

Well if her DH doesn't want to manage it for her, I'd like to know more specifically what her terms re: visitation are. Perhaps he feels there is a massively unfair and completely unnecessary advantage being shown to her mother and he refuses to have any part in doing that to his own mother.

But without all the facts it's hard to know.

Janet is she totally incapable of just asking them to keep visits short and numbers to the minimum? Or like I said, are they too monumentally stupid to understand that simple request?

There are a lot of chippy people on this thread, aren't there? OP is not talking about all MILs, she is talking about her own. I know several people who love their MILs and despair of their own mothers. That's not the case for OP nor for me.

I think this is a common enough situation: I'm close to my mum and speak to her most days, because we can happily prattle on about nothing - the plot of Corrie, what to cook for dinner, what colour she should paint her living room. Whereas for all the time I've known him DH's contact with his mum has been a dutiful son Sunday afternoon phone call plus the occasional visit (they live miles away). Then grandchildren arrive on the scene and suddenly MIL wants to be really involved in a household she's not that familiar with. Because I'm close to my mum she understands what I need, plus I can tell her to shove off without her taking it personally or thinking it's rude, but MIL is not like this.

OP's MIL appears to be tone deaf and is putting her own desire to me a granny above all else, which is pretty selfish.

From my experience, my ILs were all about the baby and wanted to spend all day cuddling my newborn. My own mum was more concerned about me.

Sometimes people do lack emotional intelligence. When I first brought ds home, I took him upstairs to bf and had mil follow me up the stairs. If I'd wanted an audience I would have stayed put in the first place. My mil was a nice woman, fundamentally kind but in the early days my ils were utterly clueless about the notion of giving me some personal space. My own mother, who knew me like the back of her hand, did not crowd me.
It is very hard to tell your ils to back off a bit. No one wants to be rude or hurtful, which is why new mums often get their feelings trampled all over and it leads to lifelong resentment and damage to the relationship, when all it needed was for the ils and dhs to have a bit of thought in the first place.

"Whereas mil and sil sit for hours expect tea made generally don't move."

Well that'll be what your husband is there for!

He can entertain them after they've seen baby for a short while.

Well if her DH doesn't want to manage it for her, I'd like to know more specifically what her terms re: visitation are. Perhaps he feels there is a massively unfair and completely unnecessary advantage being shown to her mother and he refuses to have any part in doing that to his own mother.

Looks like the MIL has found this thread...

Why are you doubting the OP on what she's said regarding their selfish need to see the baby regardless of what is best for baby and mother? The facts are all there, and if anyone acted this way regardless of the relationship they have to the OP then they're quite right not to be the first invited back.

A couple of days more won't hurt anybody especially if it's on hospital recommendations, they will surely understand that.

It's so important that your DD spends time bonding and you all spend time together. You will know yourself when the time is right to start accepting visitors.

It's understandable that the rest of the family are desperate to meet the new baby, however maybe to soften the blow and if you can be bothered share some photos of the DCs together once you are all home, and give them updates on how you're all doing.

It is brilliant advice, and it really works to just start out with family time, especially with another child, we did it and I'm really glad we did, put your baby and child first, and if family don't like tough, it is too important to get wrong.

OP, of course you are not being unreasonable. The nurses are giving you a very clear message about the best course of action for your baby and for you- you need time to bond as a family, your older child needs time with the baby, she needs her parents to spend quality time at home with her and not tending to the demands of visitors, your baby needs to used to a new environment, and you need time to recover from the birth.

The demands of grandparents and aunties should be a very very long way down the list. But yet again we get the posts whinging about devastated grandmothers not getting their turn with the new toy baby, and how out of order it is for the new father to put his children and wife first. ( I want preferential visiting rights! I am most upset and devastated! You've just endured a traumatic birth, your premature newborn has been in SCBU for several weeks, you've had barely any quality time with your older child, but ME ME ME ME!)

There are plenty of threads where a new mother doesn't want her own parents or relatives visiting for hours or weeks at a time, particularly when they are completely selfish and demanding. But it isn't unreasonable for a new mother to ask for help and support from her own mother while the new mum is so focussed on the baby. In the OP's case, she knows that her mother will provide practical help and emotional support while the ILs will expect waiting on and grab the baby- she has proir experience of this. And she knows from experience and current conversations that her DH cannot or will not manage their behaviour.

I have no anti- MIL bias by the way- my own MIL was the first family member to hold each of our babies. That's because she went out of her way to be helpful to us , babysat when younger DC was born, and insisted on giving us time together as a new family.

YANBU although I can understand why your DH doesn't want to upset his parents by having them 'excluded'. I'd agree with DH to come home and go dark for a few weeks days before then having a coming home party. Preferably where you get to sit and your family run around helping to make the in laws feel bad. Also hope that 4yr DD plays along instead of telling GPs that little brother has been home for weeks days!

Why are you doubting the OP on what she's said regarding their selfish need to see the baby regardless of what is best for baby and mother?

But her OWN mother is allowed to come! Which part of this are people not getting? She either is able to receive visitors or she isn't. If she can let her mother see the baby straight away she can let her MIL see him too. If her mother can be told 'only 20 mins please' then so can her MIL. It's not difficult to grasp. It should't be a competition about who sees the baby first/most but it seems to me that by laying down strict rules to one side of the family but not the other, you unwittingly create a competitive atmosphere where one side (usually the MIL) ends up feeling resentful and rejected.

If I said to my DH 'I want you to tell your mum she can't see the baby until I am ready, oh and by the way my mum's coming over later to see the baby' I would not blame him at all for being a bit 'WTF?' about it.

No sorry tippytappy I have repeatedly said I am barring in laws. I am happy for grandparents to visit but the difference with my dd was that my mother sat for 5 minutes with baby, then tidied up, took washing or dropped dinners. Then went home, same with my dad. She is no saint just a fact and like others of others of said she is concerned regarding my welfare. Mil hasn't done anything and I don't think my DH should be waiting on her hand and foot either. He needs time with his family too. I don't want anyone sitting for hours in fact to make my mother more of a saint she suggested to me to limit visitors. There are also extended family we don't see for months on end but get gooey over a newborn these people are down the list.

Sorry not barring in laws!