Two sets of in-laws and newborn

[user1466488499]

Hello, please be gentle with me, first timer here! We're expecting our first child next month, I'm excited, nervous, looking forward to it and also scared.

DHs parents are divorced, both re-married, with no other children so hubby is an only child and our child will be the first grandchild. This is where the issue starts with both sets of in-laws. They're mid-70s, have to be the centre of attention, don't help around the house and expect to be waited upon and taken out for meals. Luckily they live about 300 miles away so don't see them too often.

I made it clear to DH ages ago that I wanted our first 2 weeks out of hospital when he's on paternity leave to be just the three of us to help us bond as a family unit and get to know our child. I want to make sure I'm breastfeeding correctly and know I may well be sore and tired after giving birth.

Now FIL and wife have announced they're not happy about waiting to see their grandchild - problem is that because they live so far away, they'll want to stay for at least a couple of nights and they won't help out whatsoever. DH will spend his time running around after them rather than bonding with his child. As they have no experience with babies, I'll have to keep a close eye on them as well as trying to recover from the birth. I don't want my baby handed around like a plaything to entertain them. I have explained to them how newborns are very sensitive and could they wait a while before visiting but they've spent the weekend moaning to my husband who is now taking their side and says I am being unreasonable. The tiger mum inside me wants to protect and care for my little one and keep him close, not handed around to lazy in laws who won't do anything to help out. The only person I would appreciate around in the early days is my mum who will cook, clean, go to tesco etc. and be invaluable. DH says that if his parents aren't allowed to visit straightaway then neither should my parents - not getting the point that his lot are lazy and expect to be waited upon and stay for days whereas my folks will stay for an afternoon or one day and be brilliant.

Help, maybe I am being very selfish but I don't want my new baby handed around like a bag of sweets to lazy in laws who know nothing about babies and who won't help us....aargh! This is a recipe for disaster when i consider how raging hormones will be and sleep deprived after the birth....

I can honestly say I have no idea why people feel the need to blockade themselves away from the world behind bolted doors for two weeks to bond with their baby etc.

I don't mean that in a scathing way - I just don't get it.

I had a pretty tricky first birth with a ventouse delivery/lots of panic but I had pretty much every relative from both families visit just hours later. It didn't occur to me to tell people to stay away and not hold my precious bundle because they were excited to meet him!

With my second, we spent just over two days in SCBU before she was allowed home. We came home on the Friday and the following day was my son's birthday and we had the whole family party thing for him!

I managed to sort that and liked the fact that everyone wanted to have a cuddle with DD and meet the newest member of the family.

Personally, I think I'd have gone mad being stuck indoors with just a baby and DH and not thinking of anything else or seeing anyone else!

Each to their own though

We had 3 days just us 3 and then had family round on different days (DPs family has 2 sets of in laws due to divorce too) my family came first but only because they live locally. I thought I wouldn't want visitors for 2 weeks but when you give birth and you have had no proper adult conversation for 3 weeks (due to mat leave) I was dying to have adults round to talk to. As all my sisters have had kids it was good to speak to them about my experience as well.

It is entirely up to you of course but we decided how to deal with visitors after I'd given birth as I had no idea how I'd feel.

I appreciate that with your first child you are nervous but try to keep your language reasonable with your DH and don't start backing yourself into a corner.

It would be nice for your DH to have his parents meet his first child while he is still on paternity leave. Those early weekends off when he is back at work are very precious.

It's perfectly reasonable to ask that they stay in a hotel, even if you have to pay for it to make it a fait accompli. If they object it's a simple thing to point out that babies cry a lot overnight and it will be stressful to worry about how well houseguests are sleeping too. If they would prefer to stay with you then perhaps they might like to visit on weekend 3 or 4.

Honestly - the best thing that you can both do at the moment is to sound welcoming but be non-committal. Commit to making arrangements once the baby has been safely delivered and you are both home from hospital. Unless you are booked in for induction/ELCS then the dates will be all over the place in any respect. Grandparents to be who are too eager to be there have every chance of arriving before the birth actually takes place

I always notice that too ovaries - yet the people with that view point always think they are standing up for the poor excluded grandparents against all the selfish post partum mothers who won't put themselves last like good little women.

OP I had a house guest who only wanted to hold the newborn all fucking day and didn't even put her own cups in the dishwasher, complained the meals I cooked were "too heavy" (pasta pesto type quick stuff and bakes and casseroles that my toddler liked and I could eat one handed - she "only wanted a few bits" - which she implied would be no trouble but meant a varied and extensive hot and cold buffet prepared and set out on the table for her to pick at because she does that at home when she has guests ...) She thought she was "helping" by parking herself in my breast feeding chair and holding out her arms for the baby and staying there directing me to make her cups of coffee and tea, criticising the level of housework I was doing and trying to set me tasks "You'd better get on and wash the floor while I'm here to hold the baby" barely two weeks after a cesarean section and demanded I drive her to go on a clothes shopping trip for herself as she felt she hadn't packed quite correctly for the weather...

She still reminds me how great it was that she came to help me and how she doesn't know how I'd have managed without her

She hogged the bathroom for hours and complained that the shower wasn't good enough and that there was no mirror in her bedroom and would I tell my husband to put one up... She had to be made to give the baby back to be fed unless he did a dirty nappy, in which case she couldn't give him back quick enough.

The two weeks she stayed massively damaged our relationship and dominates my memories of DC2 ' S newborn weeks.

The guest was my own mother. After DC3 was born I told her to stay in a hotel and visit briefly and not immediately after the birth. It was much better.

I'd rather have had several extra toddlers to look after than a selfish adult house guest in the newborn days.

Don't let them stay in your house until the newborn phase is well and truly over.

Have the same rule for all guests yes - the rule is no house guests and no guests over meal times. They can stay in a hotel and go elsewhere to eat. Your mother can visit on the same terms and coincidentally won't need a hotel, but that's just the luck of the draw.

I think you're not being entirely unreasonable, however, if you phrase it as "IL don't know anything about babies" when neither do you yet, then you will look VU.

I'm sorry but I find the viewpoint of the mum's parents having more visiting 'rights' than the dad's parents really grating, I can understand it up to a point but not allowing his parents to visit in the first few weeks whilst hers come round would piss me off if I was in that situation.

I'm sorry but I find the viewpoint of the mum's parents having more visiting 'rights' than the dad's parents really grating, I can understand it up to a point but not allowing his parents to visit in the first few weeks whilst hers come round would piss me off if I was in that situation.

I don't think that the mum's parents have more visiting rights per se. I just think that the mother gets more say in who stays the first couple of weeks. I personally was happy for my mother and then MIL to stay but not my father or any other men because they wouldn't/couldn't help and I didn't want to practice breastfeeding in front of them. Before the two weeks paternity leave that wouldn't even have been in question.

I don't understand the PPs saying I wouldn't be able to wait. You bloody well have to wait. That's completely selfish and not thinking of anyone but yourself.

Slightly different situation here, as we live in a different country to both sets of GPs so both would have to come and stay/stay in a hotel, which I just couldn't imagine making them do. ILs are on another continent and MIL once hinted she'd like to be here for the birth, which, given the distance involved, would mean a long stay, of at least a month. I was adamant that I didn't want either sets of GPs there, partly due to different cultures and ways of doing things. I wanted a short amount of time for me and DH to get to know our baby and figure out our way of doing things. I also wanted my DM to be the first to come and stay - not because I dislike my ILs, or even because of the distance - but because I knew she would be the most helpful to me.
As it happened, DS arrived late, and DM arrived only 1 day after he did, while we were still in the hospital. It was THE BEST THING ever. We got home, DH and I curled up on the sofa, DM cooked, cleaned, made me go to sleep, brought us both tea, plates of cut up fruit, whatever we wanted. Yes, she had her time with DS too, but she was an absolute godsend to us both. She stayed out of our way too, she wasn't always 'there'. She completely understood what we needed. If DMiL had been there, she may (probably would) have been just as helpful and understanding, but I would still have felt that she was a guest in my home, in a way that my DM isn't and that I had to look after her.

My DF (separated from my DM) also wanted to come asap but he decided to give us a week after my DM left so that we had our own time. When he came, it was just as lovely, but much harder work. I felt like I was looking after him more, although he was very helpful in his own way whilst making more work by being helpful in said own way

My point is, that yes, everyone wants to see the baby, but this time isn't about the baby so much, it's about the Mum, and what she needs. It may seem unfair, but unfortunately, a new Mum is probably going to want her own mum there over anyone else. And if it's her best friend she wants around, than that's what should happen too. Everyone else should understand, including DH and the ILs. I know I would, if it were my DiL, even though I would want to be there straight away.

That said, you might feel absolutely fine after the birth, have a pretty easy baby from the start and feel ready for visitors earlier. In that case, you phone them up and say, come on over.

the men couldn't/wouldn't help

why on earth not??

I was a stepmother before I was a mother and it was extremely important that life went on as normal for my stepchildren. They came to see their new sister in hospital on the day she was born. When I came home they were in and out as usual. My father in law visited. My parents came (but stayed in nearby hotel, as they're quite old.) Friends came round. It was good for everyone to see the new addition to the family.

And it was good for me. I didn't want to be like a prisoner. Life goes on. I sort of don't get this 'Oh you need time to bond.' The bonding just sort of happens. And it is also part of a kind of larger familial/social bonding.

For millions of years babies have been born. And they weren't born in some kind of ultra-controlled, privatised environment behind locked doors. They were born into families. Into communities.

"They were born into families"

This times 100.

Well yes, but families that were used to living close to each other and being in each others' homes. And quite often those close knit communities were pretty unpleasant for women in them.

My experience first time (DH's 3rd time) was my sister in law came to stay with her two kids and my 2 step kids stayed too. DH went to work still. SIL has MH problems and her medication makes her sleep a lot, so I was left looking after 4 kids and my newborn while she napped during the day and I also had to cook dinner for everyone as she didn't feel like it.... 2nd time round, NO visitors!

For me, absolutely nothing to do with the baby - fine with the baby being held etc.

Was all about me. I didn't want people in my house whilst I was trying to heal. It was bad enough hobbling from bed to settee, let alone having to keep myself decent whilst doing so.

Second baby, MIL carried out of the hospital for me, but my recovery was a lot easier the second time (well, except for afterpains while feeding, those were agony) - plus the baby took to feeding instantly. Still would prefer no-one staying, but didn't have as much discomfort so less of a problem with what I was wearing and what I would have to do to be presentable for visitors.

user1466 - I get what you mean. I am 35 weeks pregnant and we've already said that we only want immediate family to visit in the first few weeks and only if they agree to make themselves a drink, and preferably bring something edible or offer to help around the house!

I'm not going to have people round who expect to just sit in my living room and cuddle the baby and have a drink brought to them until I feel like OH, baby and myself have recovered and have had time to get used to each other.

OP you have my sympathy. I was in exactly the same situation as you with my in laws when we had our first. They live so far away that seeing their grandchild would entail staying with us for a long weekend. I think even if you have a great relationship with your in laws, having house guests at a time of such change and when you will be feeling hormonal and vulnerable is a very different proposition to having someone stop by for a couple of hours. I was getting very stressed about this, as I didn't want to be learning how to be a mum in front of an audience and feeling that I'd have to put on a show of 'coping' if I wasn't. Also little things, like having to be dressed and looking presentable for 3 days because I had guests, when I'd probably prefer to be in my pjs etc.
The compromise was that my in laws visited at the end of the first week but stayed in a hotel. We explained to them that we didn't want house guests, as the baby would most probably be up a lot of the night disturbing them and I'd be breastfeeding so needed some privacy to do that. They were fine with this. We also tried to frame it so they didn't just spend all their time with us, e.g. they went out for meals on their own a few times. I still found it a bit hard going as I was so shattered, but it was a good compromise and helped keep family peace. If your in laws are reasonable, they should understand that house guests and a new baby don't mix. I'd really try and avoid it turning into in laws access v. your mum's access to their grandchild and just focus on the practicalities of not wanting house guests at this time. (I'm assuming your mum is local, so stopping over isn't an issue). BTW my DH was also feeling a bit stuck in the middle, and the hotel option made him feel more comfortable too. Good luck!

The bonding stuff is overstated. You'd bond wherever and whatever the circumstances.

I'd put my foot down at houseguests but suspect you're being a little naive maybe about being home with a new baby and babies are not so 'sensitive' as you imagine (it wouldn't give a toss who or what was in your house). ;o)

I'd welcome them to come and see the baby as soon as they want to, but ask them to stay in a B & B or Travelodge, or wherever.

As for needing help, you're unlikely to be a total invalid. (I did a ful school run with newborn in a sling, another baby in a pushchair and 5 year old walking, within 2-3 hours of giving birth the 3rd time and could honestly have got up and out of bed and gone about a normal day within half an hour of all my births, although maybe I was lucky). Unless you've had an epidural or there's some reason to lie prone for a ccouple of weeks, you will probably enjoy baby more if you just get on with life.

Life won't be a bubble of 'the three of us'.

As for family only being welcome if they're useful - dunno about that either. My dad was elderly by the time I had kids - and fit for his age but I wouldn't have expected him to do the washing up or change a nappy (he was happy to do those things throughout the 1960s/70s). My in laws were chocolate teapots in terms of usefulness. Didn't matter. Anyone who wanted to fawn over my babies was welcome - I didn't see them as potential 'help'. You are unlikely to be as helpless as you imagine.

This whole "they were born into families" is getting ridiculous.

That situation is totally UNLIKE what the OP is describing. A situation of communal living, where everyone mucks in, in a relatively supportive way is NOT what she is facing. Instead, she has family who arrive and demand to be waited on hand and foot and taken out and entertained, who offer absolutely none of the communal support THAT IS REQUIRED.

You don't ever find women on Mumsnet saying 'I don't want my lovely, utterly supportive, completely helpful in laws to visit'. They say 'My inlaws are selfish and demanding, I'm going to be tired and I don't think I can deal with their demands'. The answer that comes back is always 'Just say no'. But actually, that doesn't work in some cases. Some people ARE so selfish that they WILL insist on having their own way in spite of being told openly that it's not appropriate, and you end up with a situation of sulking/conflict. Having to say 'no' and to police boundaries incessantly when you are vulnerable is not fun. The answer is then 'Oh you should be no contact, they are toxic'. It's either one extreme or the other, with no recognition of the many grey areas inbetween.

Just because your families are lovely and reasonable and your experience is wonderful, doesn't mean everyone else has such supportive relatives.

For millions of years babies have been born. And they weren't born in some kind of ultra-controlled, privatised environment behind locked doors. They were born into families. Into communities

Well said.

ydnbu

I didn't put my foot down first time and massively massively regretted.

My god there is no way I would want 'guests' staying when I had just had a baby. Give them a hotel list.

YANBU

It's horrible how after somebody has given birth (which is a massive ordeal for many women - some feel fine quickly, but many are still in a mess physically for several weeks, and 25% have the kind of major abdominal surgery that gets you signed off work for 6 weeks plus if it isn't a baby that is being removed) all people can do is bicker about exactly "fair" "visiting rights"

New mothers (regardless of whether it's the first baby) seem to be expected to put themselves last in a way that doesn't happen after any other massive life event let alone inpatient surgery, which is what a cesarean is (and huge numbers of mothers have unplanned cesarean sections).

Many posters on here seem to be of the opinion that when a baby is born the woman who has born it should prove that she is not possessive of the baby she has just spent 9 months carrying and delivered at some personal physical cost by opening her home to those who are, apparently, entitled to be possessive of the baby (pretty muchany other blood relative but fist and foremost the grandparents) no matter how physically and emotionally uncomfortable that makes the new mother in the vulnerable state many are in in the weeks following giving birth.

There is pretty much no other point in a woman's life at which she will be so often told to suck up physical and emotional discomfort and inconvenience and that what she wants in her own home does not matter.

It is a strange situation and the people with the point of view are the surprisingly often the same ones who in almost all other situations would fight for a woman's right to decide who sees her in a vulnerable state.

The "do you think you are the first woman to have a baby" line is just poisonous and nasty - birth and death happen to us all, and other significant life events happen to billions of people every year, but having a baby is the only one people are jeered and sneered at for not being utter self effacing about - perhaps because it is the only thing that only women do so it can't be that difficult. ..

For millions of years babies have been born. And they weren't born in some kind of ultra-controlled, privatised environment behind locked doors. They were born into families. Into communities

Well, in some places that's true.. in others that's not the case at all.

Still in Asia for example, confinement is common. I didn't see a work colleague for 6 weeks after she had her baby - she and the baby stayed in the house, no visitors (he mother lived with them and still does).

I don't think my parents are especially lovely. It was always a difficult relationship. And my father in law is very frail and impractical.

But it wasn't about judging their loveliness or fitness to do this or that. Just that everyone was excited the baby and I wanted the baby to be part of a large and loving - albeit imperfect - family. I felt that a kind of generosity with my new born baby paid dividends for us all. What you give, you get back.

I suppose that if the generosity isn't there you can put the barricades up. However, doing that will have its own drawbacks.