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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

'Six weeks we waited and waited for you!' AIBU or is SIL a CF?

64 replies

BunsOfAnarchy · 16/10/2018 00:08

So SIL1 decided to berate me on a few things over the phone the other day, one of them being that it was a massive piss take that i never took my DD to my FILs until she was 6 weeks old and he waited and waited and waited for me to come over....

FIL lives with my BIL and SIL2 about a 5 min drive away.

I mean...I was a bit busy recovering from birth, trying to establish breastfeeding and generally just busy with my first born, trying to make motherhood work!....and not driving till she was about 8 weeks due to discomfort. I cant see the issue! Please tell me im not alone in wanting to live in a coccoon post birth?!

DD is 26w now.

OP posts:
BewareOfDragons · 17/10/2018 20:30

I'd have hung up on her. Please do so next time she kicks off in such a ridiculous manner on the phone. And then let your DH deal with her.

CoughLaughFart · 17/10/2018 20:43

@CoughLaughFart I'm using the app  How am I to know how many 'pages' there are? How the hell do you know what I was doing when I read the OP? How dare you tell me what I have time for and what I don't?! Troll off!

This is the most ridiculous response I’ve ever seen. For a start, every thread shows how many replies there are, even if the app doesn’t show how many ‘pages’ (who knew that was such an inflammatory word?) there are. It’s just common courtesy to actually read the thread you’re posting on. ‘How dare you’ indeed. You’re making a massive twat of yourself.

PeapodBurgundy · 17/10/2018 20:44

DD is 8 weeks, I've refused to take her and my 2 year old on a over 2 hour each way bus journey with two changes in each direction when all but 2 of the inlaws drive and it's 30 mins by car. Only one of them has young children. There's at least two spaces in the cars of the drivers so room for lifts to be given. They all live in the same town, which isn't that big, so not a huge inconvenience to get a lift for the non drivers.

They're furious. I don't give a flying fuck. They've been invited to visit her here, MIL has been once, none of the rest of them have bothered. Their problem, not mine.

Sasstal67 · 17/10/2018 20:49

Start as you mean to go on and resist their attempts to browbeat you into subservience. If not you'll pave the way for a lifetime of this behaviour and ridiculous expectations towards both you and your child. I speak from decades of experience.

LouH1981 · 17/10/2018 20:54

No way, YANBU! Have a look at StephDon’tBuyHerFlowers blog post about ‘pulling up the drawbridge’ - it’s about exactly that...concentrating on you guys as a little family without any unwanted outside pressure of visits, demands etc. You did exactly the right thing xxx

MissConductUS · 17/10/2018 20:57

It's beyond me why people expect the infant to be paraded around town like a captured war trophy. If they want to see the baby they can come to you when you want them to.

HarveyNickNacks · 17/10/2018 21:01

*YABU

I know a grandmother who has seen her first grandchild only 4 times in 3 months because her DIL doesn't like visitors. She's only seen her DGD when son and DIL need a babysitter and has to travel to them to do the babysitting, they are an hour away.

Its breaking her heart*

Well to be honest the example you give isn't really a nomal situation and doesn't really compare to the OP's post. The OP has clearly explained why she couldn't drive to visit relatives. And quite frankly from your post it sounds like her DIL can tolerate visitors when they fancy a night out. She should try saying no. It might be hard but they are taking the piss.

nicnacnew · 17/10/2018 21:23

Nbu at all. Don't know what it is with in laws. Is your dh the youngest by any chance? My in laws expect is to visit then all the time, while neither of them work, they have a car, have been told they are welcome at ours anytime. But apparently its too far (2hrs) but they can go to US to visit other grand kids.

MemoryOfSleep · 17/10/2018 21:37

YANBU. I think it's easy to forget that those first six weeks of parenthood fly by in a haze of tiredness and pain (at least mine did!) and you owe nothing to anyone.

yorkrose · 18/10/2018 09:54

Memory of sleep - totally agree with you.

Congratulations op, enjoy your new baby. Explain to SIL it hasn't been intentional and explain re health/recovery reasons.

yorkrose · 18/10/2018 09:56

Thought I wrote unintentional! Brain didn't connect with fingers! I don't have a new born as an excuse!

NonaGrey · 18/10/2018 09:58

Did they actual invite you to come round OP?

Call up and say, “we’d love to have you all to lunch/dinner/coffee on Sunday?”

Because if not then sitting at home waiting but not asking is weird.

yorkrose · 18/10/2018 09:58

Oh no I give up, I was right the first time!

PLINKY · 18/10/2018 11:05

I don’t think you’re being u. Post childbirth, I found I was very out of sorts. My body didn’t feel like mine. There were some temporary physical problems to sort, which meant that at that particular time, I was in constant discomfort. Emotionally I was a happy wreck. I had a lovely new baby and yet I felt vulnerable when I thought about the long term responsibility. I felt I could just about cope with looking after my new baby, my little home, the occasional coffee and sleep and more sleep. The last sentence encompasses a million tiny unrelenting lists of tasks to do, every day and all day. You will be exhausted. Top that, with joining a new family, and that will add to your list of issues to be ‘ dealt with’ . I’ve always felt that as a woman, I was expected to be a vessel of unlimited good. These expectations have been demanded from other women too and it was, certainly for me, too much. You said you were being a ‘cow ‘, I don’t think you are, its more about you taking on the role of being ‘good’ all the time. I don’t think we have to do that. We can drop that role just by calmly and without fuss saying to ourselves. ‘I’ve never been so tired and if I’m not doing absolutely EVERYTHING it’s OK’. If I said to you today, please go out and sort out the management and advertisement of a brand new company how much work do you think that would entail? It’s the same situation. In terms of your sil, I might be wrong but it sounds like your in laws are not particularly kind and caring, if they had been, you would have gone round and it would have been a pleasant family event. But as the very full days and nights changed to weeks, it got harder and harder to go over. I don’t feel that it is the right of grandparents to be around their grandchildren if they are hard and cold people. I would be scared that they’d find failings and taint the privilege of that special right. In any case, your father in law came over to see the baby. What I would say is that always try to be civil to your in laws, they are after all, your child’s biological inheritance, but at the same time don’t expect anything of them. That way you will never feel you have a right to behave like they have been. Try to understand your sil’s point of view, so that you can deal with her and just try to explain how you are feeling at the time. In time, you may even become friends.. that’s the funny thing about life, a drama today feels insignificant 18 yrs down the road..In the meantime, you are so lucky, you have a lovely new baby, a supportive partner, a healing beautiful body. Be happy 😊

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