AIBU to not understand the new trend of no one visiting newborns?

[FatTory]

As the title says really. I read many posts on here about people not wanting visitors for the first few days/week after having a baby. I don’t understand this at all. Why wouldn’t you want your family and friends to meet your new baby? Yes, I understand women often feel grotty after giving birth but serious complications aside, does it really matter for half an hour?

My friends and family were invaluable after I gave birth, holding DD’s so I could shower/eat/stretch my legs. I breastfed both of them and them holding the baby never impacted on my ability to feed or bond with my daughters.

Even relatives I don’t particularly like or get on with were welcome to come and see the new addition to our family.

We had nobody for the first few days and then both sets of family visited the following week.
they were fine with letting us get settled first, and we took photo's (no fb then) of the first few days and showed them.
They stayed in b&b for about a week and visited when they liked/all day
I don't think it mean, it's up to the parents and what is right for them.

Village you also assume that all visitors will provide help, love and emotional support. That isn't always the case!

Can we class the first week as “as soon as you’ve had the baby?” Surely by day 7, a quick visit with Grandparents is not a big issue?!! I am completely baffled by this, I really am.

You’ll all change your tune when you are Grandparents

Well, lets hope we know better than call a new mother nuts, bonkers and awkward for not doing things exactly as we think they should be done, eh?

There are people completely banning all visitors for x amount of weeks. Surely not all people who want to visit the baby are overbearing and abusive??

As a matter of fact, it's the insistence on visiting new mums and their babies almost as soon as the umbilical cord is cut that's the new trend. Didn't used to happen.

It's made new mums feel incredibly defensive on behalf of their babies. I really don't understand why these families can't see it for themselves.

I think it's really polarising - some people can't wait to show off the newborn and don't mind being seen looking a mess, others are more private. I'm in the latter category myself and while I didn't enforce a no-visit period, I was gutted when MIL and SIL turned up at hospital uninvited when I was feeling utterly drained, hadn't slept for 2 days, in a lot of pain, blood stains everywhere etc. And hen they sat for a few hours yabbering away holding my baby. I just wanted to be on my own with DH getting some sleep or establishing breastfeeding.

I’m 100% behind the fact it has to be a convenient time for the new mum, i’ve stated that. What I struggle with is there not being a 30 minute slot of convenience at any point during the baby’s first week for loving, close family.

I didn't even think to say no visitors the first time. Then l found myself with some of my side and some of dhs side and a friend or two all around my bed. So l was like a hostess at a dinner party introducing everyone and chatting away after a forceps delivery that left me in bits. I thought this is mad. So next 2 times no visitors except grandparents on both sides. I would never leave grandparents wait but my dh was good for subtle hints if anyone overstayed.
I am a gm myself now and all l wanted was a quick peek and l was away. If you dont make a fuss couples may not be happy either so its tricky for grandparents to get it right.

I have three....each time I felt awful for a week afterwards and got mastitis each time. I didn't want anyone apart from very close family visiting, all family lives over 100 miles away anyway so it could never be a quick pop in.

MIL visited for a couple of days a week after I had DC1 but she just expected to be looked after and didn't help, so we left it a month with DC2 and DC3 and then she stayed 3 nights.

My brothers were all several weeks and I was the same with their children too. Why would you want to impose when someone isn't feeling their best? The baby is still going to be there in a couple of weeks.

That’s great if you have family who aren’t idiots. My ex sil, after I had ds3, who was in NICU for a week after being poorly after birth on oxygen, iv antibiotics etc. The day we got home (she didn’t visit me in hospital I had no visitors except my exh and my sister on first day. She threw a wobbler about her children never having held such a small baby etc etc baring in mind this is a fragile baby id hardly held, my older sons were upset at seeing their little brother so unwell in an incubator etc and we had her round playing sodding pass the parcel with him 2 hours after we got home. Can’t remember what my ex said at the time but she was very persistent and she is quite entitled. This is why people don’t want visitors right after birth

Often blanket bans on all visitors are easier than dealing with the drama abusive and overbearing families mete out when they are excluded and others welcomed.

We had no one since we were 350 miles from relatives. I would have loved visitors. I find the 'my little family' people odd. There's a lot of them on here.

I was and will be more than happy for friends and family to come and visit when im home- my friends and family will happily help out, bring nice food and wont overstay their welcome. And i want to show off my new little treasure haha.

At the hospital my parents are more than welcome to come this time round again as they are very sensitive and thoughtful, plus my mum always comes laden with goodies and things that i might need!
My MIL on the otherhand is not welcome until i say so. She is rude and overbearing and last time i had to have the midwives throw her out as she just wouldn't go. I was tired, wanted to feed my daughter and she just settled down holding the baby and wouldnt fuck off. So this time round im putting my foot down about her. When she comes to our house, again she just sits there and holds the baby and expects to be waited on from morning until night.
I suspect that is why some people want to avoid visitors.

loving, close family that's the issue. They may consider themselves loving, close family but the mother, or father may not. And their idea of help is not always that helpful.

By day 7 the full horror of my birth injury was only just revealing itself. Sorry, but I don't want to discover I can't control when I shit in front of other people.

It v much depends on the visitor, of course. MIL visited with disabled and poorly FIL. They stayed at our house, expected to be waited on and driven about. DS was very ill indeed and I was expressing bf to freeze while dealing with super specialised formula. Was awful.

What I struggle with is there not being a 30 minute slot of convenience at any point during the baby’s first week for loving, close family

Right. What about all the people who don't have 'loving, close' family nearby? Those family members have to travel for hours to visit - 30 minutes is completely unrealistic if they've traveled a long way. I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of friends whose close relatives live in the same town/city. Mine would have a 8 hour-trip.

And it remains that calling people 'nuts' and 'awkward' for not being the same as you shows a lack of understanding that people have very different lives.

@VillageFete you're being gobsmackingly self-absorbed and blinkered. It's fuck all to do with anyone else when a woman decides she wants visitors after giving birth and not a chance in hell I would have just gone to bed and left my newborn with family members.

I would never criticise anyone who wanted loads of family visiting immediately, so I don't aappreciate being criticised for not wanting that.

Just open your mind a teeny tiny fraction and try to understand that not everyone is the same as you. It doesn't make them "awkward" just different.

And I'm not a "my little family" person. Quite frankly I wanted to shut myself away from everyone, even DH and baby at times. I was so, so broken. But baby fed almost constantly for weeks and weeks.

We don’t want people visiting for the first few days because our families live 4 hours away from us so if all they travel up as soon as baby arrives and I’m kept in hospital it means that family may have travelled for hours and not been able to visit with time restrictions because of the sheer number of people.

By making it clear we want to limit visitors we can make sure the main people (MIL, my parents, our siblings, our Grandparents, baby’s cousins) meet baby first and not too many at once rather than all our local friends, especially as DM is a teacher so unless her work was able to find cover she wouldn’t be able to come until the weekend.

For numbers for the main family I mentioned that’s 27 people, all of whom have said they will be travelling up to meet baby.

If we lived in the same city as family it’d be different and we wouldn’t want to delay family visiting, after all if we are exhausted it’s easier to ask someone to come back later if there’s already a houseful if they live 10 minutes away and just turned up on your doorstep than if they’ve drove that far.

Surely by day 7, a quick visit with Grandparents is not a big issue?!!

By day 7 we were only just home. I didn’t mind grandparents but anyone else, no.

VillageFete

I don't think anybody is trying to imply that there isn't a convenient 30 minutes for visitors. It is merely that they don't want visitors.

but fuck me, you’re just awkward if you can’t find a convenient half an hour in the first week of the child’s life

A half hour would be absolutely fine by me. Regrettably my family are unwilling (either due to distance travelled/because they don't give a fuck because their needs are more important than mine) to limit a visit to half an hour.

@VillageFete
Why is the expectation that the new mother must be malleable despite just have given birth? Why isn’t there some expectation that relatives can be more understanding and wait a week whilst mother recovers and feels ready for visitors?

Essentially you are putting needs of GPs and other relatives above new mother and baby (baby isn’t going to remember any of the other relatives and will potentially be distressed being passed from person to person). It’s really disgraceful that you think everyone else’s needs trump mother and baby.

YANBU. Mind you, I've never got that not going out for ages after having a baby thing either.

Would never occur to me to put off visitors. Even though dh's parents are overbearing I don't put up with it. Went into Pizza Express on the way home with dd2 (horrid pregnancy, her twin died at birth as we knew she would) - just needed normality, and on way home with dd3, popped into school to pick up nos 1, 2 and 3 having had a quick glass of Bolly with lovely next door neighbour first. Dcs are now grown up and not damaged.
But that's just me - don't like fuss and "me time".