To think new mums are sometimes misled with the amount of ‘help’ to expect

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Friend recently had a baby and was speaking to me a few weeks later about how no one had ‘helped’ her in the early days. She has a v supportive partner who had 4 weeks off and did at least his fair share and then some but she meant friends and family really. The books she had read said when guests come she should go nap or ask them to do washing etc when in reality she felt cheeky asking them that and no one offered or started doing tasks/chores around the house. Something on social media suggested saying people could visit only if they bought a meal which she apparently suggested to a sibling who came with no meal and thought she was joking. Despite having all their family come, coo and bring gifts and support them emotionally she feels really let down.

It made me think actually that all sounds like normal family behaviour and telling women their visitors will roll their sleeves up and run a hoover around or bring meals is unrealistic. Some family will and it would be lovely to have that obviously but for most people it’s them and their partner who do everything. It certainly was for us!

I don’t think she’s been ‘misled’, she’s suffered as she’s spent too much time on social media and now feels entitled. Emotional support from family is more than many get, and if she needs help with washing up she needs to use her words and ask. Unless it’s a very traumatic birth I can’t see why anyone would offer to do basic household tasks though really.

Agreed. Maybe once upon a time this was the case, when female relatives weren't working (read: mot really allowed or only allowed jobs that weren't worth it) and bored.

These days, everyone is too busy and overwhelmed with their own lives to start doing someone else's cleaning or looking after their baby whilst they have a snooze.

Yes I think it’s true that new mums are misled. And I think it’s a crying shame. We wonder why so many women get PND etc… we just need to look at how unsupported many new parents are. “It takes a village to raise a child” isn’t quite the thing, IMO. I think the truth is “mothers need a village to be able to raise a child, healthily and happily”. We’ve lost the “village”, even within our extended families.

DH and I had the baby, therefore the work was on us —and the only help I really needed was with breastfeeding (which didn’t work, despite multiple sources of advice). Honestly, unless you have older children, I don’t see the ‘work’. It sounds to me as if half the ‘work’ comes from hosting family and friends. All our families were overseas and friends at a distance, so we saw no one for three weeks and did nothing but eat, feed and sleep. I don’t think either of us thought about housework.

I had my only baby at the start of Covid.

When I say I think I have a form of ptsd from
that time because of having absolutely no one in the house for six months with a newborn, at the time I needed my village most, I am absolutely not joking.

I don't think it's too much to expect close relatives eg mum, sister, mother in law to say something like "would it be useful if I ran the hoover round?", "do you need someone to hold the baby while you shower?" or "can I get you any shopping?" if they visit. But it's crazy to expect everyone to do this - for a start, lots of people would be embarrassed at implying that someone's house wasn't clean enough.

I do think the attitude of "you're here only to help me, not to enjoy the baby at all" is weird. It's totally possible to do both.

Yes, many women don't understand the extent to which they'll be hung out to dry after having DC. The good news is that women are wising up to it and those who don't really want kids regardless are voting with their feet.

The village existed back in the day when women didn't work. I was born in 78 in a friendly estate where mums didn't work and they all hung out together supporting each other. That isn't the reality these days. It sounds like this mum is forgetting that her friends have jobs and busy lives. Looking after a newborn is hard but you need to learn how to juggle it without people dropping in with your dinner.

Wow, expecting guests to do the washing?! They’re guests, not carers.

Don't get me wrong, having a new baby is hard but I think you're right here. I definitely slept when the baby slept and caught up with tasks outside that. I didn't need anyone (apart from DH) cooking me meals or doing the dishes but then I'm of the opinion that can wait if something like sleep comes up. I only have one so maybe when the second comes along what you've described is required?!

I think this is from a time when food was made from scratch and washing wasn't done in a machine.

I wouldn't have expected friends visiting to meet my baby to do anything other than give him a cuddle and drink a cup of tea (made by me). They all bought little gifts for him, which was nice.

My parents and PIL could see I was exhausted. DS had silent reflux and slept very little. They offered me time to nap and I gratefully accepted. If they hadn't I would have asked for help. My Dad cooked me freezer dinners. I wouldn't have expected help with housework. Your friend's experience was the opposite to mine. Thinking about my peers I'd say they were all offered help by parents and in laws but there was variation on whether they took them up on it.

I would say my PILs were quite pushy. It was exactly what I needed, I embraced it and our relationship is stronger because of it.

My DH did an equal share but was off for 2 weeks. 4 weeks off is a really good thing but not the norm. I needed less help when he was off, obviously.

ETA The notion of sleeping when the baby sleeps is not something that you can do if your baby doesn't sleep/will only sleep upright on you. I think there is a key difference in experience between those who can do this and those who can't.

I agree it's massively misleading, and I cringe whenever I see 'advice' on how to handle family members bouncing around online!

The truth is, people are pretty selfish - coming over once the baby is born means people are coming for baby cuddles. I think it's not just social media - people say nice, comforting, helpful things about what they'll do when baby is born and how they'll help out prior to birth, and then completely forget about it once there's the opportunity to actually do something practical!

Yabu and yanbu. Thus used to be the case 100% when women weren't expected to work and also run a household which many of us do now!

Also, this type of support isn't supported in most of the western world now. The ideology of, 'it takes a village', doesn't really exist any more. In this sense anyway.

And yabu, if you have a baby, you know you have to raise them and juggle tasks. What will she do if she has more kids?

I didn't expect any outside help. That's what DH's paternity leave was for. If I was a single parent I might have expected or wanted more extra help but all our visitors were there to meet the baby and sit round and chat. I wouldn't have wanted them to start washing up or something.

This, everyone wants a village but no-one wants to be the village.

People only want the village when they have had a baby. Not many provide the village for others before this point. Also ‘village’ seems to have been misconstrued as people coming to help you in a one-way fashion.

I think it's not realistic to expect much help in 21st century UK. I don't think it's unreasonable to want help though.
We are not designed to do the newborn baby bit largely by ourselves and it's really fucking hard. Nobody can be bothered to make the effort anymore here.
DH is from a very different culture, the way we do things here is thought of as torturous, verging on impossible.

She isn't being realistic. She had a supportive partner who helped her for a month. Friends aren't going to to come round and start washing up. Why would they?

My mother brought a couple of meals and a cake and did washing up while she was round, in the first couple of weeks. Mother in law offered to move in and look after the baby but didn't actually end up lifting a finger with anything.

I wouldn't have expected friends to do cleaning, they did make their own tea but they were there to support socially not with housework I would have said.

My partner did the shopping and meals, I did the washing up and laundry myself from day 3 , everything else was just left to slide for a few months, although my partner could have done it, if he wasn't so lazy and felt housework to be beneath him!

It's more with the second baby that you really need the help, so the toddler gets some attention too, but no one seemed to offer the second time round - the excitement had clearly worn off

Yeah its a social media thing there are loads of people on about a village and all this. Wouldn't expect anyone to do my hoovering....and if her dh had 4 weeks off then that's a massive bonus. She just needs to crack on, she would make herself miserable comparing herself to others with their village.

Presumably all the people she’d taken meals to and done housework for when they had babies reciprocated?

I found that people saying they were ‘coming to help’ meant they wanted to hold my precious newborn whilst I catered for them/ tidied up.
The only person that did actually help was my best friend who tidied up for me, took out bins, loaded dishwasher etc. And brought food!

People always say this, but it's not easy to be the one to found the village. The village should be being built from the ground up, over years of small reciprocal acts, but society isn't built for this.

Lol yes this !