Selfish Dad alert, anyone else have this?

[Wakefield89Russell]

Hello all,

Need rant and opinions on this. Myself and my wife have just found out we are pregnant after a IVF cycle. Everyone please for us, all lovely. However as a result of the IVF we have been really careful and not been visiting people and shielding. I am a therapist and lucky enough to be working from home. I haven't seen my Dad and his partner in over a year (long story) we aren't close but live an hour away from eachother, and have slowly built up contact. He asked if I would visit him and a really politely said we aren't going in people's houses (they both work in a hospital, so it's an extra no from me). They were in loud speaker and just kept asking me why, their house is clean etc and I kept nicely saying it wasn't against them, just a shielding thing. Then I suggested they could come visit us in garden for a quick visit. My dad's partner said she was willing to do that because of the toilet offer (we have a camping style toilet and shelter that we bleach and clean , near an outdoor tap in garden incase anyone needs wee when they visit). And they both got really defensive. I said nicely let's leave it then for moment because I need to keep myself safe and priority at the moment and my dad did a sneery laugh at me. I saw red and said "I'd do anything to see my son/daughter" and he hung up on me, something I've never done to him.

I feel like both my parents are just cold awful people that I don't recognise in myself. Anyone else have cold parents?

Is it you or your wife that has had IVF? Do IVF people have to shield for the whole pregnancy?

Can’t you meet them in a park or somewhere with a more acceptable toilet. Some people are weird about those things.

I don’t think your parents are cold, just that you are making them jump through hoops to see you.

You sound like you are making it hard. You don,t weant to go to his house, you don,t want him to be in yours. How about a mutual park/ wildlife area? For a walk/picnic.

It sounds like they've suggested one option and you've suggested another. Neither option suits each other so you've both given up/ gotten annoyed with eachother. The reality is that there are probably lots of ways you could meet that would work for both groups of people but I wonder how much you both want to see eachother.

I do feel there's a lot more to this relationship and your reactions to eachother. I do also feel you're probably being overly cautious in shielding. I think both you and your DH are probably being a bit unreasonable.

Congratulations on the pregnancy, if you want to see your Dad then it's probably worth apologising for the outburst and saying how emotions are running high / you're just feeling protective. And suggest some alternative meeting arrangements that suit both parties. How about literally meeting halfway in a public park or similar?

I don’t think you’re unreasonable to want to stay safe. I think they’re unreasonable to be shitty about your concerns - sure, they can be upset and even annoyed but it’s not on to take it out on you.

Both of you obviously got annoyed with one another. If you haven’t seen each other in a year I don’t see why waiting a little while longer will hurt.