To want to cancel Christmas?

[Bridie20]

For context -
We are due to travel home (150 miles from where we live) for the Christmas period. 19-27th December - our wedding anniversary is within this time. We have booked an Airbnb (where we stayed for our wedding) and planned to host both sets of parents there.

However, since booking this I fell pregnant. Baby is likely to be between 1 and 3 weeks old on 19th December when we’re due to travel back.

AIBU to think we should cancel and just stay at home? I’d be happy for family to come to us if they stayed in a hotel (2 up, 2 down, tiny house- no spare room for guests as it’s in use as a nursery. Tiny kitchen) and we could have picky food, maybe go out for Christmas dinner or whatever.

I’m scared to even ask DH because we’ve been so excited about it, his parents don’t drive and we might spoil Christmas. But I feel like our time as a family unit with our newborn is more important than Christmas? And the idea of packing all that stuff at potentially 1/2/3 weeks postpartum 🤯 never mind having 8 nights away from home with a newborn… eek!

What would you do? FTM so absolutely no experience of travelling with a baby and how easy/hard it is.

Stay at home.. no question. You can travel next year.

Stay home. Forget hosting them at all. Or get a takeaway if you feel the need to feed them if they do visit. If your Dh dares to respond negatively kick him in the balls and ask him if he'd fancy travelling 150 miles with that sensation! There is no knowing how you will be physically or emotionally so don't put yourself under the stress of even thinking about it. Tell family tomorrow that you won't be travelling and if they choose to come and stay in a hotel you probably won't be up for cooking but can offer takeaway.

Blame whatever medical professional you have advising you at the moment. Be clear that they were shocked that any/every person going on this trip hadn’t already cancelled it, out of care for you.

Send one email to this effect, then don’t engage in any debate about it. You’ll only figure out how impossible it would have been once you have the baby. Don’t believe anyone who tells you it’s doable, it’s really really not. For reference, I wouldn’t have been up for it even a year later with a one year old. The baby’s routine was so closely linked to my sanity, it felt like madness to mess with it!

I honestly thought some responses would tell me to get a grip and stop with the PFB nonsense… thank you so much! It has been niggling away for a while but now that I’m 30 weeks and the idea of birth is starting to become very real, I felt I had to think about this fully.

Sorry to drip feed but I might also add that this Airbnb would cost us £800, almost a full month of Mat pay (I’m splitting mine evenly over the time) so even more crazy. ILs have offered to contribute but mine haven’t - I think it’d make more sense as someone has mentioned to offer to help them out instead.

@underneaththeash I love your idea about blaming the midwife! 31 week appt next week so we might have a very long chat about it then

I hadn’t even thought about me and how I will be feeling - just how we’d deal with baby! The more I think about this, the more batshit it seems. My baby is measuring over the 97th centile too so a c section or other intervention is very much a possibility!

I really appreciate all of your replies and caring wishes! Xxx

It's really unlikely you will want to be going away with a newborn baby. It's also really unlikely you'll want to host Christmas that soon after giving birth.

I was very tired, I had a few post birth health issues, was establishing breast feeding and generally a bit overwhelmed by it all for the first few weeks. That was with just being at home and DH being off work to try and help with things. Going away and entertaining really weren't on the agenda at all!

Do not host them and do not travel (chances are you won’t be able to) Not advisable to travel that far with baby in car seat when they are that young. Suppose you need a c section? Suppose baby isn’t putting on weight and is being monitored by health visitor or midwives? There will be loads more xmas- you will never get this time back.

No Yanbu, for all the reasons stated already. I’m sure your family if they have any kind of decency would completely understand and wouldn’t be expecting you to accommodate the Christmas you had originally planned.

Best to get things out in the open now to avoid any confusion and time to make alternate arrangements.

Surely your mum, or anyone who’s ever had a baby, has realised what a huge ask it is?!?!

I agree with everyone else, cancel and stay at home.
Do not offer to host anything, at all.
God I remember after having my first baby one evening I ended up with a house full, it was awful.
Stay in bed and eat chocolate.

Oh and we met at ‘home’ so ILs and parents live within 10 miles of each other, which is why we always go home to them for Christmas instead of them coming to us. But I still think two hotels for a few nights would make more sense than us going up! And will definitely offer to contribute to their costs.

This was ME!!!!
My advice is STAY AT HOME

DS1 first Christmas, he was born 22nd and we travelled 2 hours on Xmas eve to stay with MIL (who is fab and did everything to make us comfortable including giving us her bedroom etc)
We really wanted to show off DS1 to family etc but as nice as it was

• the 2 hour journey was stressful with making sure DS was fine and stopping to feed/get him out of car seat etc.
• I was still bleeding, sore and leaking milk, limited on clothes to wear as obviously only took a few and didn’t realise how many changes of clothes I would go through
• worried about bleeding/leaking on MILs bed
• trying establish breastfeeding in someone else’s house
• not feeling like I could just go off and have a bath/shower/nap when I wanted
• did I mention the leaking/bleeding?

With the other 2 babies I stayed home and let people come to us, even with them staying with us and having to host it was much much better.

Cancel. They will understand. You will be sleep deprived, in a strange house and if like me teary. I didn't have a traumatic birth but I was very anaemic after. It's not a good idea!

Stay at home, I’m sure they’ll completely understand. Definitely try to see them though - you’ll appreciate having them round more than you realise!
All the best, the first few weeks with your first is such a special time

Honestly - stay at home and enjoy your first Christmas with your baby. We had so much pressure out on us for our child’s first Christmas, we ended up rushing around all day to fit everyone in. It spoilt our first Christmas as a family and 5 years on I still feel bitter about it.

Stay home there is always next Christmas for a big event

Stay at home, book hotel rooms for them instead for a short amount of time over Christmas (2 nights ideally, 3 max) and book either somewhere to go out for Christmas day meal or very easy oven able buffet stuff. I think going out is doable though as newborns are portable on a short term basis. I remember quite a few meals with a baby sleeping in the carrier or pram next to the table.

I would stay near hospital, home.
Babies are very easy and adaptable to travelling etc (unlike toddlers) but new sleep deprived parents aren’t!

With Ds1 I had an EMCS and then a week later was in the cardiology unit with him as they suspected he had a heart defect. It was stressful just being a new parent without the added stress of a potentially life changing medical condition for Ds1.

When I stepped out the shower in the morning I had to hold breast shells against me as I poured milk and Dh would help dress me, firstly because of those leaky boobs and needing help putting a bra on but also post c section bending down to put knickers on was awful.

Cancel now, everyone should be understanding as a baby totally changes everything. There is the hormone crash post birth, the I feel like I have just run into a brick wall tiredness and it is lovely to just pull up the drawbridge and enjoy the first few weeks together as a new family.

Two week old baby family down the road for Xmas dinner I spent most of the visit in a bedroom trying to get screaming baby to latch on. Midwife had to call in on boxing Day NEVER again. Stay home you'll be so tired both of you, still bleeding, sore. You'll be in no Frame of mind to entertain

OP just another voice saying this plan will not work. Aside from any physical stuff you have going on, mentally you will be hard pushed to work out what to pack, let alone everything involved in hosting Christmas! I can't get my head around neither of the parents suggesting you may not be up to this and offering to host instead!

Also, if all parents live so close to each other, could they drive up together? You could offer to contribute to petrol money if your parents cover their own hotel.

I was back in hospital 10 days after the birth of my 2nd baby with mastitis and a uterus infection. Also loads of stitches after first baby, no way could I have sat in a car for 3 hours.

Babies are often late - you may well be giving birth!

Stay at home, let them visit you after Christmas for a couple of hours, and enjoy your baby's first Christmas. Your midwife will definitely 100% FORBID travelling and you'd be mad to ignore them

Congratulations, hope everything goes well

I was readmitted to hospital 4 weeks postpartum because I had sepsis from an infected c section wound which was only detected on my last HV appointment so my son and I were readmitted. I wouldn't be going any where.