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.

The staff on the postnatal ward making me explain myself every fucking time because we're a same-sex couple and they couldn't cope with it was a low point. Especially when they did things like telling me off for trying to collect breakfast for DP who was catheterized because they couldn't follow she was a newly post-partum mother, rather than my male partner who wasn't entitled to food. That was shit.

Other than that, the first time my MIL visited she physically grabbed my quite fragile newborn off me and refused to give her back, while I stood there pleading with her to let me take the baby up to my partner to feed. She told me DD wasn't mine several times along the way, and I think it was a slightly later visit when she casually informed DP that grandparents have rights and if anything happened to DP, she would 'sue to get the baby'.

Ages before I gave birth me and DH said that we wouldn’t want any visitors for the first week- or at least the first few days- after we’d had our first baby (all our family live hours away so if anyone came up they would have to stay at our house for at least a couple of days and we both wanted time to ourselves to get settled). Gave birth at 8am, back home just after lunch (was v. lucky I had an easy labour). My parents in law were waiting at our house when we arrived home, they didn’t leave until 10pm that night. In hindsight I should have been sleeping while baby was sleeping, not sitting around a dinner table entertaining them. They’d booked a hotel around the corner for the week and insisted on coming round each day for the next week. I really struggled to establish breastfeeding, and developed mastitis, it was agony and I certainly didn’t need visitors! I remember being sat topless in the living room covered in vomit and milk on about 2 hours sleep while they all sat in the kitchen and Fil sheepishly kept ducking through to use the toilet. Luckily my DH turned them away for several days in the end and was amazing but I’ve still not forgotten or forgiven them for not respecting our wishes more.

Some of these are truly awful - what is wrong with people
I think I was very lucky

on a lighthearted note when my second son was about 3 weeks old the older one said ' can we give him back now'

My DH accidentally booked a weeks snow boarding holiday with a friend from work 1 week after we moved house and 1 month before DC1 was born. He also went on 2 stag parties The week before she was due. All in all about twos off work. Luckily DC1 was 1 week overdue. However the day after I arrived home from hospital DH went back to work (he was entitled to parental leave) because people didn't really take it in his office!
He bragged for the next year that having DC1 hasn't changed his life.
When DC2 was born by CS he did the same going back to work the day after coming home.
When DC3 was born he went to work instead of coming to the hospital.He rarely helped with anything when they were small and often stayed up all night playing computer games then was too tired to help.
I am still with this awful man - financially trapped because he won't file tax returns and says I can't prove his income etc. He is an awful father and a worse husband. I can't even look at him.

@Cheeseandlobster

Dp's friends awful girlfriend told me ds was going to hell because I wasn't getting him christened.

My dad said this to my sister about our niece. Became obsessed with it. Thought his house was possessed due to it. Staying up at night, filming things.

My MIL passed me my newborn and said “I’ll just hand the baby back to [DH’s exes name]” then didn’t even correct herself. They’d been separated for just shy of ten years!!

I was just going into hospital to have my second and was nil by mouth - my Mum said how good that would be for my weight loss.

Being wheeled to the post natal ward and the porter had left me and my newborn alone a moment while he checked us in.
A rather stern looking old lady who was clearly visiting another new mum, pointed at my stomach and bellowed that I should be doing some exercise to get rid of that flab instead of sitting around, before continuing on her way.
I was so taken aback that I actually started laughing.

I can't believe some of these stories. They are horrific.
After I had my first, a family member by marriage came round and asked why I was still fat a week after giving birth. No one pulled her up on it either and I just kind of stumbled through an answer.

I wrote a thread about it at the time, but a shop assistant took my 8 weeks old out of the trolley while I was loading my shopping onto the belt. She was unsettled (they didn't have car seat trolleys so I'd had to disturb her to put her in a baby trolley) and I was trying to be as quick as possible while making sure my 2 year old didn't destroy the displays. The staff didn't ask if she could do it either, in fact there was no communication at all!
This was 2 months before covid and if I'd known what I do now I'd have taken the opportunity to be a bit more assertive (fucking angry) about it!
It still boils my piss thinking about it.

MIL turned up unannounced every single day after I had my first baby. This probably went on for 3 months & often she brought friends with her. We would be mid dinner and she still stayed.

I feel so angry on behalf of you all, getting kicked in the teeth when you were at your most vulnerable.

I'm lucky that our families and friends are not batshit or cruel. But there is one comment that sticks with me.

With DC1 I had an EMCS and for far too long I struggled to BF with excruciating (undiagnosed) thrush and DC's (undiagnosed) tongue tie. Every single feed was torture and I shrieked and sobbed through each one and spent all the time between feeds crying and trying to pump. There was no way I could attempt BFing with anyone else watching, it was too traumatic.

When DC was 8 weeks old, we decided to go out to see some friends who were meeting in a park. We had to go by bus and it was the first time I had ventured out of easy reach of our flat. I was scared of being unable to control the situation and had a meltdown before we left.

When we got there, a friend gave the baby a cuddle and he started crying. "Awww," she said, "Isn't Mummy feeding you?" I felt utterly crushed.

I know it was just something to say and there was no malice - she had no idea what we were going through - but I still secretly hate her a bit.

[quote gindreams]@NothingEverChangesButTheShoes

How can you be pleased someone has died in agony

That's pretty vile whatever they said [/quote]
I thought that too

Gosh what awful people there are out there. Babies and childbirth makes others take over and act know alls.
Sorry for all your experiences. The health care ones don't surprise me.
My own are nothing compared to above.
The one that annoys me still many years later. I have a medical condition so on medication which needed monitoring during pregnancy. I am going back to the days before the internet, mobile phones and scans.
I phone the dr to get an appointment ( which I got that morning )
By the time we got home the house phone was ringing and did all afternoon. Mums friend's daughter was a receptionist and had rang and told her mum and my mum ,who told all the family.
I was only in v early stages of 1st pregnancy and ended up telling no one. Mil guessed, said I had that look about me.
Thankfully I got on very well with inlaws most of the time.
Made the big mistake of telling my mum when I was going in to hospital to be induced. The phone calls were a disgrace, and various ones rang pretending to be mother or mil, it stressed me out no end . Midwives went on break telling me baby would be hour, within 15 mins I felt something and pressed several times for help dh asked how I knew, between breaths I let him know and he ran for help. 2 midwives with feet up having tea and smoke . By the time they got cleaned up and to me I was delivering the head dh came and did most of it .( he is a farmer) the result was that despite a 9lb + dc was poorly and ended up having to move to a hospitaĺ with proper facilites .
Fil was ill and old when same dc was born and I had a lot of stiches so loaned me his doughnut cushion ( It meant so much and that was his way of showing kindness)
Dc1 ended up in scbu as it was called and this was in another hospital miles away.
I mind leaving hospital without my baby and other mothers were being escorted to their cars or transport and all flowers and that. I just felt lost and no one asked me what I had. People avoided me. The hv was a b**ch when dc did get home. At one of his checks told me seriously he was far too long! Neither of us are tall, but there are tall family members. There was always something stupid she nit picked. Dh bought an answering machine to monitor calls.
Dc2 I decided to change hospitals near the end of pregnancy. I went for a check up and dh brought my bag as he said I was in labour ( I laughed ) they kept me and only mil knew. We had a lot of trouble with family who did not agree and I was scared they would turn up at the hospital at the one time and stressed me no end. Dc2 was like all babies in nursery and some parents brought them out at visiting time. The woman in opposite bed had a real crowd in and they were admiring baby and saying who it looked like ,then dc arrived and we chatted before we would go get dc2. He kept looking across and got agitated I was annoyed at his behaviour. Then he allowed that he was sure that the other baby was ours. By that stage it had been bottle fed and hugged and kissed by countless people. I wasn't sure.( awful thing to say but I wasn't sure and didn't think it could be possible) We got a nurse who agreed to have a look as he so agitated. It was our dc .Everyone apologised and it was an accident. We joked about it , but nurse in charge of nursery got told off and the babies got double bigger bands. It could have been much worse.
The specialists all along missed a genetic health problem with dc1 which was not diagnosed until almost an adult. No one ever listened to me, I was neurotic , what would I know?
There are other rude things and one awful I dare not say .

7 months after giving birth I attended my cousin's wedding. My aunt exclaimed: "oh congratulations, I see another one is on the way!" I was not pregnant. She has form for saying stuff meant to embarrass you then feigning ignorance.

@Cryalot2 you’re baby was swapped with someone else’s?! Thank goodness your husband noticed! It’s scary how supposedly common this is

*your

Everyone invited themselves to our house when baby was 2 days old. I had had a really tough pregnancy and difficult birth, just got home from the hospital the day before, was trying to learn how to breast feed, cracked bleeding nipples and hormones raging. Came into my living room to 15 people who had decided to turn up (arranged without me knowing) to "help me". They brought takeaway and left all the mess for me to clear up, made me pose for about 50 photos. I sat and cried and they told me it was really helpful of them to be here when I had just given birth. I told them as politely as I could that it was the opposite. Still furious about it and it has now really changed my views on them and made me quite resentful!

My exH fucked off to spend time with another woman on a "business trip" for 5 days, less than 24 hours after the birth of our second child, leaving me alone with a toddler & newborn.

I’m literally aghast at reading some of these. My experiences are nowhere near as bad as some but after coming home from hospital with DD (the second time as she was readmitted with dehydration and was quite poorly) my MiL was there to meet us. The first thing she said to me was “god your feet are still so fat”. Id been in induced labour for 3days ending in a crash section when DD’s heart rate plummeted and that was followed by 2 days on the postnatal ward trying to establish bf plus another 2 days on the children’s ward. So yeah, was already feeling a bit crap and sensitive and that really pushed me over the edge. Other gems include her telling me I didn’t know what I was doing, that I was cruel not giving her a dummy etc etc. Unsurprisingly we’re not close and she’s not really involved in our lives now

My youngest was poorly and despite various hospital admissions I was made to feel crazy. He ended up needing open surgery at 6 weeks old. Turns out MIL had been kindly telling everybody I had Munchausen's by proxy 🙄 I despise her!

My cousin tried to convince my parents that they should persuade me to hand over my child to her as she wanted one and I had one… she was 29, I was 25 so it wasn’t like she was having a children’s strop… I also didn’t know she’d been invited by my parents to be a godparent. Suffice to say she- and they- were kept well away from my family unit :)

My midwife told me to shut up during labour (because she was trying to fill out paperwork).

My MIL hated me for taking her youngest son away from her. She convinced him not to attend prenatal class with me and actually had the audacity to ask "How do you even know it's his?" To my shame I lowered myself to her level and shot back "Because I haven't f*ed anyone else!" Not my proudest moment but hormones + that level of unnecessary BS got the better of me.

My sister in law took my baby’s pram from my room without asking me and I had my baby’s first gp check up so I got told off by the gp for carrying my baby in my arms to the appointment… I explained the situation and the gp felt sorry for me
Let’s just say I am not close to my sister in law…