PILS put me off having children...maybe forever

[HollyWoods8224]

Myself and my partner have been together for 7 years, we aren't parents... yet, we aren't even trying...yet

My in-laws and I aren't best buddies there's a lot of water which hasn't yet passed under the bridge, they are very 'old school' (see; close minded, racist, interfering). Their home works on a women should be seen and not heard, male breadwinner, his opinion is the only opinion, when in their home I bite my tongue and respect that.
Our home doesn't operate the same way, my partner is fully supportive of us being 50/50, sharing income, house work and compromises. he told his parents to respect that (they didn't initially, still don't, but its bearable).
I'm also very guarded and keep things to myself - or tell select people with the expectation that its doesn't get passed further - anonymity of the internet has been great for working on this!

My in laws are VERY present in our lives and because they are family i'll roll with that as much as I can, mine are also involved and we're close but they live further away so we see less of them.

I truly dread sharing the happiness of having a baby with his parents and with my mother (i'm close with my dad, we're peas in a pod in terms of being private) - and i feel horrible knowing that its incredibly selfish of me!
FIL feels entitled to be involved in all aspects of our lives, MIL struggles with boundaries and privacy at the best of times, my own mother over-compensates (i think) for a lack of parenting when i was younger.
I don't want to them to feel entitled to this, I don't want them sharing my news, I dont want them coming to doctors appointments, i dont want them to know the gender, i dont want them touching me, i dont want my them buying things we've decided we dont want, i dont want to have to tell them why they cant be in the room when it happens, or come over in the weeks following.

So... while its not happening yet, and I know I am being unreasonable about sharing what i hope will be a stupendously happy time.... is there anyone else who's overcome similar fears, are these fears semi normal? Are there selective bits of this that we can reasonably expect to keep for ourselves? Or do i have to just suck it up and suffer through open season?

I don't want to them to feel entitled to this, I don't want them sharing my news, I dont want them coming to doctors appointments, i dont want them to know the gender, i dont want them touching me, i dont want my them buying things we've decided we dont want, i dont want to have to tell them why they cant be in the room when it happens, or come over in the weeks following

You don't have to allow any of this OP.

Becoming a pregnant woman doesn't mean that once your body contains their grandchild it's open season. You still have self agency and the absolute right to say 'no' to something!

You can tell them not to share the news, if I told anyone this, family or friend or acquaintance, and asked them not to share and they did, I honestly don't think I would want to continue the relationship. That's not unreasonable at all.

I don't know anyone whose parents or parents in law went to their doctor's appointments.

Touching you can simply say you prefer not to be touched, or feign that you're feeling sore or something. Again, touching you when you've made it clear it's unwanted is completely unacceptable

So what does your husband make of all of this? Would he respect and support your wishes and boundaries in all of this?

I'm due with my first any day now I have similar thoughts at times.

In terms of appointments and giving birth, you don't have to have anyone there. My DH and I felt under pressure to tell family as soon as I went in to labour and were trying to figure out how to stop anyone turning up. We realised we don't have to tell anyone, we're just going to wait until she's born and at home!

In the nicest possible sense...calm down. You are in control of most of that.

Appointments, gender, birth, name... Don't tell them until after. Problem solved.

Touching you - tell them not to.

Buying things - tell them you've already chosen the big things. If they want to pay for one you could let them. Alternately let them buy clothes, then, if you don't like them, use them for a home day, take a photo, charity shop.

As for them wanting to visit, limit the times.

One thing to think about. Children thrive when surrounded by extended family who love them. Your child may not be like you. Set boundaries with your child's best interests at heart - not your personal needs regarding privacy. The good thing about boundaries is they can be moved if necessary.

My DH and I felt under pressure to tell family as soon as I went in to labour and were trying to figure out how to stop anyone turning up. We realised we don't have to tell anyone, we're just going to wait until she's born and at home!

Such a good idea!

Plus most people would be delighted to just get a call saying the baby has arrived.

I don't know anyone who would just show up at the labour ward so you must have some pretty invasive family members

When I said set boundaries with your child's best interests at heart I meant AFTER they are born, in case it wasn't clear. Part of that should be what works for you, but it should be about them too.

Think very carefully about moving further away geographically. Is there anywhere else you’ve always wanted to live? Is there a better place to live for raising kids, or just for your current job?

Geographical distance will be your friend. At least the dropping in will be less. On the downside, when they visit it will be a multi-day or multi-week onslaught. Choose your number of bedrooms carefully.

I think you’re being very reasonable, and your foresight is good. Don’t wait until your mental health is down the proverbial like mine.

Or do i have to just suck it up and suffer through open season?

I believe you have to be incredibly strong and experienced to not use this coping strategy. But, from personal experience, it can eat away at you, your sense of self, and your relationship with your husband.

It takes two to set boundaries OP.

You ring fence yours and don't allow them to breach that.

I mean doctor's appointments? How would they know that you even had a doctor's appointment? And sex of the baby- tell them it will be a "surprise". They don't even need to know whether you have had a gender scan or not.

And I agree about a PP and labour. You don't need to tell anyone, your OH can call after the happy event- they don't need blow by blow updates, or even to know you have gone into hospital.

You see what I mean by defining your own boundaries. Leaving it to them to draw the lines you may not agree.
But you are allowed to define your own boundaries too- give your big girl pants a hoik.

I think this is a great opportunity for you to learn how to draw clear boundaries. It sounds like you've been landed with people who are not good at respecting conventional social niceties (neither my parents nor inlaws would have dreamed of insisting or even asking to be present at scans, appointments, the birth...), which is tough, but hoping that they will magically learn to be respectful is going to be a lot harder on you than sucking it up and clearly, nicely, firmly making your expectations clear in the first place.

@speakout put it really well. I'd add that you need to be clear early on with your expectations in a way that they can't later claim that they didn't understand. Sit them down at a family dinner and spell it out.

"OH and I have been talking, and we've decided that we are not going to find out the gender of the baby."
"We've decided we don't want any pictures of baby online, so please do not put any up, even ones you've taken yourself."
"Our choice is to have just the two of us in the delivery suite and at the hospital. We'll call you once baby has arrived safely and we've had time to recover."
"We've already chosen the pram/cot/playgym etc that we want. If you are thinking of things for the baby, we would love [insert item as applicable]."
"We would like the pleasure of sharing our news with the wider family in our own time, so please allow us to do that before passing news on."

Email afterwards if you feel it needs further reinforcement. eg "Thanks so much for listening to us on Friday. OH and I really appreciate that you will support us in our decision to XYZ."

Also, have a clear plan with your OH what the consequences of ignoring your expectations will be. Ie if they share news before you have a chance to, they get to find everything out at the same time as everyone else in a group email in future. If they buy you something you've already said you've got in hand, you ask that they return it in favour of something else.

Thank you all for your messages,
You are right, all of these things are in our control - my partner in the past has put it in the not worth arguing about basket but he is getting more peeved off also, and when I suggest how he would feel if it was my family he immediately backs me up.
You have reassured me that I need to say it, and it’s ok if they don’t like my boundaries, they just have to respect them.
I am working on it, and I know it’s not ideal for them either to learn me - they obviously know their son, but they don’t know us together, and we need to show them that for them to respect it.
Since New Years we’ve been working on knocking, rather than walking in, a few interrupted ‘baby making practice sessions’ so far but we’ll get there!

Since New Years we’ve been working on knocking, rather than walking in, a few interrupted ‘baby making practice sessions

Sorry what does that mean?

Do you all share a house?

Perhaps that's when staying over on special occasions.

I think you need to be more structured and firm with your boundaries.

You don't need to tell anyone ANYONE that you are pregnant until you start to show.
You don't need to tell anyone about appointments, or going into labour, or what name you are going to choose. They can speculate as much as they want, and talk about it until the cows come home, but you don't need to take any notice. Just tell them when you have named the baby.

Re everything else, put up some restrictions. Agree with DP how often you will see them and stick to it.

Tell me they don't have door keys?

I feel sorry for you OP...you sound v v smothered. Tell your DH this.
Can you move away physically a little?
DO live your life, have your dreams happen and get on and have your family. If you are a secure, assertive mum you will be just fine. You have to learn how to deliver a very firm NO THANK YOU! And for them to understand that you have personal boundaries. They need a bloody good talking to. Your DH, who sounds great should do this.

Oh, and don't work on knocking, just block the door with a suitcase or chair whenever you are in there. They'll get the message.

Speakout: my partner works in the family business, if he asks for time off his father demands to know why, if my partner doesn’t oblige with details he feels like his job and relationship with his dad is at stake. And then FIL tells MIL that OH can’t have the time off, MIL offers to come with me and appears at our house in the morning for breakfast, I say thanks but I really just need OH, OH is given time off but FIL needs to come too as they’ll go straight to work after, then all of a sudden everyone ends up at my grandmas dimentia assessment where I just wanted OH to hold my hand (true story).

I’d never want him to lose out on his family (as nuts as I think they are, they are his) over me being too precious.

I obviously can’t know what they’ll do until it happens and I am literally imagining all the things they COULD do based on how they’ve been in the past and getting scared off by could’s and ifs. (Which is dumb of me!)

You just need to set boundaries early on and then they know what to expect. When you say just walking in, do you mean walking into your house without knocking? If so I think that'd be the first thing to stop before any baby arrives.

There's a lot of things you can keep to yourself surrounding pregnancy, you don't have to share any of the things you'd mentioned. As someone with quite interfering in laws I can totally see where you are coming from though. It has taken us nearly 2 years (and quite a few big fallouts) for my in laws to understand that as adults (we are mid 30s!!) we need our privacy.

Having learnt from the mistakes with our first child we kept a very low profile with the second pregnancy. We even lied about the due date (told them it was 3 weeks later) and didn't tell them anything until the baby was born. They visited when we said so and never turned up unannounced. It's been amazing second time.

With our first child they were far too involved and my mother in law expected updates during labour, she threw a strop when our daughter was a week old because she was upset that we waited 3 hours to tell them our daughter had arrived! Those 3 hours were amazing, we spent them in the delivery room together where there was no phone signal. She didn't get that she wasn't the centre of the universe and we hadn't actually thought about her once in that time!!! The in laws also drove around looking for our car to see if we were still in the hospital or if we'd gone home, because I was taking so long in labour, madness!

Just don't over share and make sure you're firm from the beginning.

I really don’t know how this feels at all. My mum died the year before my twins were born, DH’s Mum lives three hours away and has met our boys 3 times in 19 months. No fathers around, so the boys really don’t have grandparents in their lives on a regular basis.

On the one hand I massively appreciate the privacy and not having grandparents comments on our parenting, being weird etc. On the other hand, we have no help or support at all and I’ve never had a “break”, no date nights, no little trips away... nothing.

I think you definitely need to talk to the parents on both sides about boundaries and things that bother you because you are an inherently private person. But I would start this now so that by the time you have a baby, adjustments have been made. Having family around to support you and have a relationship with your kids is so valuable, as long as they can act like reasonable human beings.

I would also stop having sex when you visit them - I’m sure walking in on that isn’t helping matters!

We did share a house for 6 months while we saved which I don’t think helped boundaries, and bought our own a year ago and they’ve found it hard having an empty home again. None of our parents get keys, we used to have all the doors locked 24/7 when the knocking thing was first a problem. It felt silly that we had to lock ourselves in, rather than them having to knock

I honestly think not telling people things is a bad way to go it seems to be popular advice on here especially with pregnancy birth and babies but I think it just keeps the bad behavior going.

Tell them how things are going to be don't be sheepish don't compromise stand your ground.

Haha TammySwanson, we do limit our frisky times to our own home, OH manages to resist me when we visit his parents lol.
The interruptions are when they walk into our house without notice.

Let me get this right... they’ve walked into your house while you were shagging more than once?! Did they not realise what they’d done the first time?

Shamelessly place marking:
Yes, they have.

Can your OH get another job, otherwise working for his dad will just mean he is controlled for the ready of his life.
Reminds me a bit of the Broken Wineglass thread

Your partner needs a job away from his parents.

The bit that scared me was when you said "my PILS are VERY present in our lives."

That's not good!

and you whilst is supportive to an extent works for his dad? And his dad has no boundaries and is intrusive and a little crazy????

This is not looking good. YANBU.

I echo a PP - please seriously consider moving away by at least 200 miles. With no spare bedroom. Surely you are both employable elsewhere?

Sorry but the current situation sounds awful and I think you are 100% right to be worrying about the future.