What's the worst thing someone did when you had a new baby?

[Cuddlyrottweiler]

Another thread reminded me of this, it's probably tame compared to some of yours though!

MIL called my DH in from another room and told him to take my newborn, crying baby off me and give him to her. After I'd refused several times, because I knew what he needed and couldn't do it. Luckily for our marriage he saw the look and my face and told her no.

My first baby was sadly stillborn and we also discovered at her birth that she had Down syndrome. My mum said to me that "maybe it was for the best that she was stillborn".

Speaking to local old guy neighbour in a shop - how's the baby?, doing fine etc.
Then he says "Of course you can't tell if the mind's all right yet."

I immediately turned away from him and spoke to someone else.

I made it very clear to DH and his parents that I intended to breastfeed DS1. DH's father (FIL) made it very clear he disapproved, and always made rude and unhelpful comments when we visited:

• "DS must be hungry (whenever he cried), you can't see how much he's getting"
• "he's a big baby, needs a proper feed"
• "are you still at it (after 15 mins)? Give him a bottle and he'll be finished in no time."

MIL always claimed she "couldn't" breastfeed because her milk "never came in" but I suspect FIL wouldn't have let her anyway.

Once when we were staying at PILs I went for nap in the afternoon and woke a few hours later with my breasts painfully full of milk. I called downstairs for DH to bring DS up to me and FIL came up and said DH had taken DS out for a walk in the pram. When I said he needed a feed, I swear PIL smirked and he said "oh we gave him a bottle, seeing as you were asleep. He was very happy. He loved it." They had clearly planned it and bought formula and bottles in advance.
I WAS LIVID with them and with DH for being so spineless.
I then spent the next half hour in the bathroom with a hot flannel trying to express my milk down the sink to alleviate the pain .

I had my first and only DC at 40. I was on the Tube with her when she was little, maybe 2 or 3 months (I was going to meet a friend who was also on mat leave -- we did a lot of days out at free museums and galleries, having discovered they were excellently baby-compatible).

Anyway, also on the Tube was a heavily pregnant teenager with her family (mum and gran perhaps). I hadn't noticed her, but as she got off she looked me straight in the eye and said: 'Mothers are getting older every day."

When I got to the museum I went straight to the loos, thinking I must look really haggard, but I wasn't particularly. I mean, no-one would have mistaken me for a 25 year old, but I really wasn't a particularly old mum by London standards.

I now realise this was probably more about her than me .

Oh and day 5 my breasts were like rock hard watermelons, I answered the door to the midwives already in tears. I sobbed through the whole time they were here because I was in agony with the engorgement and daughter couldn't latch due to how swollen they had got! Midwife told me I'd got flat nipples (they aren't actually that flat but were stretched 500 times their usual size!) and also made a comment on the 'funny shape' of one of my nipples and giggled to her assistant about it I was still sobbing when they left but more in complete embarrassment and hopelessness to be honest.

Oh gosh I remembered another one. It was Christmas day, I was laid recovering on labour ward, hooked up to all sorts, having just given birth in very traumatic circumstances the day before. Because of my blood pressure, the staff were keen to keep me calm and had kept saying I might be allowed home on Christmas to see DD. But by 10am it was clear I wouldn't even be allowed to postnatal by the days end.

So I had a little cry about missing Christmas and letting down our 2 year old DD. Everything happened so quickly, there was no time to organise anything for her with her grandparents. When the midwife came in she took one look at me crying and asked what on earth I was upset about(baring in mind me and DS nearly died the day before and I was so sick I couldn't sit up, I think tears were perfectly justified in any case) once I explained what was wrong, she shot me a disgusted look and told me I was ungrateful and stupid to be upset, because unlike me, she wasn't even supposed to be here(keep on mind I was rushed to hospital on Christmas Eve and had an emergency induction a week early. I was not supposed to be there either) Her boyfriend had dumped her and her plans to go to his home country for Christmas were obviously canceled, but since my DH was with me I should suck it up and be happy. My DD was only a child, not a grown up missing Christmas like her so she would get over Santa not turning up.

Can't say she didn't deserve being dumped really. And DD did get over it, Santa had heard about what happened and did a special delivery for her on New Year's Eve.

Dh’s family is all boys, his brothers had boys, we had a boy. When I had my twins Fil said “Oh MORE boys!” Ironically when sil and went on to have have a girl each he made even less fuss of them.

A family member said I had deliberately created a gay son (in her mind, very bad) by not circumcising him. Same person kept telling people she was the skinniest family member now, because I guess it’s a competition with her. DH was keen for me to keep my baby weight (I have a history of EDs) and lost his shit. They didn’t speak for a year, and again aren’t speaking now.

MIL walked in when we were not long home with our first, looked around the place as though it were filled with vats or nuclear waste and not merely a bit untidy because we'd just got home with a newborn, and declared that we 'obviously weren't coping' (we were feeling just fine until she turned up!). Pleased to say, DH threw her out!

Mi mil arrived at the hospital drunk as she had “wet the baby’s head” on route.
Had a strop when dp and myselg said she couldn’t hold our newborn!

DD is birth injured and has cerebral palsy. At my SIL house for a family party and SIL's friend turned to her little daughter and said 'you could have turned out like that', nodding in DDs direction. Never attended a gathering there again.

@Cocolapew

DH ended up wrestling the phone out of MIL hands because she was trying to phone an ambulance when DD1 was a few days old. Because she was crying while I prepared her bottle. She also wanted to report me to social services for cruelty for letting her cry. Mil also turned up on the doorstep with her Bible to tell me my DDs were going to hell because I refused to Christen then.

Fucking hell!

@goldierocks

Short walk to visit my parents when DS was 10 days old. I was recovering from an accident I'd had early in pregnancy, plus a third degree tear & sutures from the birth.

On the way home, at the top of a steep hill with an A road at the end of it, (ex) 'D'H gave the pram a big push and let go...the pram started rolling away at speed, with DS in it. I obviously ran after it, then burst into tears when I caught it (DS fast asleep).

Ex then screamed at me for making a scene and that it was my fault for not being able to take a joke.

I'm so glad he is an ex!

Another MIL story. DD was only a few weeks old, MIL was holding her and she was screaming like mad. I kept asking for her back so I could settle her and feed her and MIL kept insisting she had raised 2 of her own and could settle her herself.

In the end I just went and took her off MIL and went to sit in the car to feed her.

Those screams were breaking my heart and my boobs were leaking like crazy. How she couldn't see how distressed she was I will never ever know.

If my mil had given my bf baby formula she would never have seen it again.

@goldierocks

Short walk to visit my parents when DS was 10 days old. I was recovering from an accident I'd had early in pregnancy, plus a third degree tear & sutures from the birth.

On the way home, at the top of a steep hill with an A road at the end of it, (ex) 'D'H gave the pram a big push and let go...the pram started rolling away at speed, with DS in it. I obviously ran after it, then burst into tears when I caught it (DS fast asleep).

Ex then screamed at me for making a scene and that it was my fault for not being able to take a joke.

I think I'd have murdered the cunt there and then. Or shoved him in a wheelchair and given him a great big push down a massive hill with a busy road at the end of it all whilst making sure the brakes were jammed on it

My MIL was trying to force me to breastfeed my baby, she lives 5000 miles away. Everytime she spoke with me she would keep hammering home how breastfeed was best.

I got PND very quickly after baby was born, my MILs constant nagging pushed me towards wanting to commit suicide 😞

My husband told her to back off, l don't know how much more l could have taken.

I'll never forget fil taking a bazillion photos when they came to see ds1 on the post natal ward less than 24 hours after c-section and saying "we won't share these because you're not looking your best"

Not surprisingly because I had hardly slept in 48 hours, had a major operation and still had a catheter in but yes ok...

@HyacynthBucket yes thank god he is my ex.

These stories are making me grateful I had a baby in the middle of lockdown, 300+ miles from any family

MIL and FIL came to pick me and our premature son up. No car seats in those days so as I was stepping into the back seat with DH and son MIL grabbed baby off me and sat in the front seat with him. I was so young and quiet and shocked, I said nothing.

About 4 weeks after my 4th baby was born I went to a playgroup with my friend and my baby fussed the whole time and just wanted to be fed the whole time so I was a little harassed and spent the whole time sat down feeding her. I was also a couple of days away from moving house and it had been a stressful time with our buyer being a nightmare and me trying to arrange schools for my other 3 children etc
Was chatting to my friend in the car park outside and she said "I'm not being funny but you desperately need to dye your hair". I know I looked a mess all my grey coming through but I had a new baby, breastfeeding, lack of sleep, 3 other children and a messy house full of boxes ready to move. My hair was the least of my worries. At the time it did upset me and I had a little cry on my way home. Now I think back and think wtf?? Why would you say that to a friend? Even if you thought it!

The midwife visited when he was a couple of days old and told me his heartbeat was “dangerously low” and to call an ambulance immediately. Total panic. Full MOT at the hospital showed it was slow but within normal levels, they said he may have been affected by birth drugs, had just woken up, and was just a chilled out sleepy baby.

I had a scare in my third trimester so was in hospital having tests. Turns out everything was fine. I was still lying in my bay being monitored when a senior midwife came in in her civvies, looked at my babies strong heartbeat and said "You must be having a boy", when I said, "No, a girl" she replied. "A girl, don't expect her to ever care about you then."

What a weirdo!!

Got given a box of 4 forerro rocher