Just wondering other people’s views, and if I'm just on some post pregnancy hormone frenzy but we live next to my MIL, we have done for a year now in a house she owns (we pay the bills but pay no rent). I now have a five month old and since his birth I've really been struggling with her. I'll say that she was always the matriarch, twice divorced professional lady with her own business with two devoted sons. Since the birth, the dynamic between us has changed. She irritated me early on by coming over the last evening of husbands paternity leave to hangout with us and baby and I felt this was encroaching on our time as a new family. Since then she has interfered, with her opinions (I know she is entitled to say what she wants) and coming across on occasion critical and undermining our/my ability to care for the baby (I have read that this can be really normal unfortunately). My husband obviously finds her a support and i always try to remember this but i haven't found her supportive or helpful especially since baby arrived. she made a bad joke in the early weeks how she wouldn't help with house work and she pays someone to do hers and doesn't do ironing but that she'd hold the baby whilst i did it. She had the nerve awhile ago to say to my face how I’d had a good labour and that we have a good baby and that we were having an easy time. I snapped back and catalogued the difficulties we had had (yes the baby hasn't been colicky but there have been other difficulties like all first time parents might experience. Breastfeeding was a nightmare for months due to jaundice, a tongue tie and then thrush so the first 3/4 months of feeding were terrible. Anyway, MIL sees the baby once a week as she has hosted us for Sunday lunch since baby arrived and I may seem ungrateful, but I don't like seeing her every week and if anything, would prefer to reduce the contact. If she could, she would definitely be coming round more she is only next door after all. Anyway, she has recently said to husband, that she doesn't want to cook Sunday dinner anymore as she's not getting the time with the baby because she's busy cooking. We usually arrive and eat and spend a couple/ a few hours with her afterwards for her to have cuddle time. I’m trying to tell myself to appreciate what she has done, and that she lives on her own and that it’s good for hubby and for baby and that I can retreat and keep out of the way more as baby becomes more independent and that somethings just change.
but I am posting this as I don't know where to turn, I feel suffocated living next to her, and I just want space and time to be a new family. I feel the same with my own mother (she would be seeing the baby more if she could) she also sees baby once a week. I think it's more intense with the MIL as she lives next door and in fairness to my Mum she helped us loads with meals and with house jobs and I suppose she is my Mum. There are other things I could list about the circumstances which are difficult such as I don’t value the free house, it’s in a poor area and out of the town, i have no connection to the place and I feel very isolated (both physically and emotionally) and have done since the baby arrived. my emotional state is hanging by threads quite frankly though I am doing my best in trying to get out and meet other Mums at groups. Am I being unreasonable and just psycho Mummy for not wanting a weekly date with my MIL or to be her neighbour? Sorry for the jumbled essay but feel better for finally saying how I feel...