To ask you how long you waited before visitors

[Starlightsprite]

After you had your baby?

My son and his partner had a baby yesterday morning and came home the same day. I have asked that they let us know when they are ready for visitors and they said that they will.

I am of the generation (is it generational?) that your immediate family were welcome straight away unless there were issues like the baby being poorly or the mother needing more recuperation than average and I couldn’t wait for my family to meet my babies. I already knew people were moving away from this though as I’ve seen it on here so I kind of knew not to expect to visit immediately.

So my question is what were you waiting for in terms if having people visit you? Do people just want a week to themselves in their little bubble? Or is it until you’ve had a good nights sleep? Or until yuh feel more comfortable? I just am wondering how people are doing it these days as I’m dying to meet my grandchild obviously.

There are no underlying issues here by the way, I get along fine with my DIL and son.

Yeah we had family straight away too. Tbh I think now people are more worried about having to entertain and having something passed on to the baby (in this season rightly but when there’s not a lot of sickness about I don’t think it’s necessary) and they lose out on some of the normality and loveliness of family sitting and chatting, having a laugh in the midst of a new baby. I loved the in laws coming over with a banner and welcoming us home!!

With our first we said that we wanted to wait, then rang up two days later BEGGING my mum and dad to come. With our second they visited us in hospital and waited to greet us on our way home. Though they very much came to help out and we weren't hosting them atall.

I’ve been today and it was worth the wait. To those of you that congratulated me and gave me sensible advice - thank you. To those of you that refuse to ever do something that you aren’t ready for / don’t particularly want to do and state with conviction that you won’t ’suck it up’ for anyone. Please remember that the rule then applies to everyone, chances are your retired parents don’t want to get up early and drive to your house at their own expense (because their toys are there) so they can take care of your children while you work and save you money while you complain about every aspect of the free childcare they provide you with. They’re sucking it up because they love you and want to help you. They most likely don’t want to look after your dog while you go away for the weekend, they’re actually sucking it up and doing it even though they don’t want to. All those lovely Christmas’ you had with both sets of Grandparents around your table for lunch, guess what? Your paternal Grandma was likely digging your Mum out all day but she was putting on a brave face and sucking it up because doing things that you don’t want to in order to make other people happy now and again isn’t the end of the world.

In the end I think 3 days was a perfectly acceptable amount of time for me to wait to meet my Granddaughter. But this thread has made me realise that me, my Mum and all the generations of women that came before us may well have been martyrs and we probably should have protected our peace a little more but we do / did it for our children. Only for some of you to be unwilling to ever make yourselves even slightly uncomfortable to ensure we are also taken into consideration. You never know if this movement catches on with us oldies you might find yourselves looking after your own children, your own pets, we might save our money that we’ve been generous with until now, we might not have a spare bedroom for you to move back into when your husband leaves you for his secretary because we aren’t sucking it up anymore. Of course you’ll all say that you don’t do any of that and of course I won’t believe you. I won’t be returning to the thread.

I would say a week for us. I think it was 5 days with my first and it's was a difficult birth and recovery. It was too soon. With my second it was a more straightforward birth but we waited a bit longer. It's definitely not favoured by my own parents but I'm really glad we decided. They even wanted to see the baby before their sibling had. Boundaries are super important, it's such a tough time for new mums. You don't want to feel like you have to be up and about and ready for visitors.
I had one friend who was moving away, they popped round to say goodbye, ordered us pizza delivery and it was so lovely. That's the best way, send your support by bringing round some dinner, but with no alternative motives of getting baby cuddles.

Maybe because she was the one who gave birth and really could have done with a hug from her own mum, first?

When I have kids, please let me not be this bitter as a new grandparent 🙈

Were you also the generation that could buy a house on one income and often a parent stay at home (if they wanted to)? Im fortunate I got to stay at home for the first few years as DH has a good income for our area, whereas very few of my friends could. Some went back to work after a few months due to the cost of living. The average house price in our area is about 10 times the average salary (you wont get a tiny starter home under £400k in our area yet we’re in the south west - no London wages down here). Our generation are working till we’re nearly 70, both of our parents were retired before or early 60’s. They are very grateful for that and appreciate how different it is for new parents these days.

Luckily our ‘boomer’ parents recognise how lucky they were to have detached houses, big garden on one income, holidays, never needing childcare in the younger years (which most families pay for unless you have a grandparent down the road) and even then, most pay for nurseries aswell and the grandparents actually want to do the childcare!

So if new parents want a few days to recover after going through a life changing, hugely emotional and most likely very painful event, hopefully nobody would be nasty enough to hold the odd days babysitting against them later down the line. Very sad if anyone has that kind of transactional relationship with their child.

Oh gosh, I don't know what happened to the post trail as I only read the opening one. But this seems like it got quite heated. Just to add to my previous answer/opinion. We don't use grandparents for childcare ever. They've never stayed with them overnight or without us at any point and they've also never travelled to us, we always travel to them (both sets) I think every family have their own circumstances and maybe emotions have taken over the last few days.

Three DC, visits all straight away.

The information about Boomer parents here is socially & financially incorrect.

Same as us, we see ours together as a family. However, if it was practical, ours would have happily done childcare for us in the younger years (and they wouldn’t have held it against us that we saw them a few days after giving birth!) 🙄

Really? I must have imagined both grandads had normal middle class jobs, lived in large detached houses, big garden, both Mum’s stayed home the primary years and no one worked past early 60’s. Several holidays a year in retirement and we both (me and DH) had foreign holidays as children and fantastic childhoods.

I’m so glad we had that but denying that the new generation of new parents have a much harder job of getting a decent house, garden, being able to stay home etc is ridiculous. I went to public school from a normal, good middle class income. I don’t know anyone who could even touch private school fees in our area (even with excellent jobs).

Grandparents straight away - they are usually so excited. Most parents seem to go out with their newborns straight away these days, so can't see a problem with visitors - but only if they are willing to muck in, make a cuppa, pop to the shop, walk the dog... useful visitors.

Wow, I can't imagine being so bitter about my son and DIL wanting a bit of time to adjust to being new parents, or my Dil needing to recover a bit more before she felt comfortable with having visitors.

I would be more than happy to wait, as a future mil. I won't forget how hard being a first time mum is. Or an anytime mum even!

Same!

My last baby, my MIL was there when she was born (by accident as she decided to be born at home and MIL had come to do the childcare for the other 2!) so she met her immediately and then my parents came over a couple of hours later. I have always loved showing my babies off straight away tbh!

Baby 3 went to a family wedding at 3 days - she met literally everyone! 😂

Both sets of parents came the next day- once we were home, with both DD. We than had a 2 week baby bubble before Siblings/friends and everyone else were invited

The main point is the majority of decent grandparents don’t mind helping (if they can and its practical to) with abit of childcare. Most fully appreciate how hard it for this generation of parents just to get the basics paid for these days.

I didn’t realise offering to help with abit of babysitting was decided over what day you first held the newborn. Honestly how ridiculous for the OP even to raise that.

None of your examples include someone who has recently pushed a baby out of their vagina or had major surgery and is now an overwhelmed new mum who is in pain, learning how to breastfeed and feeling vulnerable. That is the difference.

There seems to be very little consideration for the new mum and as always, she is expected to put everyone else before herself. It's a good thing that it seems to be changing and more new mums feel able to say no, in a few days/a few weeks.

I know OP isn’t coming back to this thread but her last post just goes to show the person she is. Can’t even phantom why a new mum might need a few days to recover from birth before saying things like this. Saying things like new mums should “suck it up” or being so bitter about someone refusing to do something they’re not ready for. We’re literally talking about new mums who have been through labour or c sections…. That might need a week to get back on their feet. OP’s response is so bitter and cruel, you can just imagine the sort of MIL she is, hence the post in the first place not even giving DIL 24 hours before making a post about wanting to visit

We had 1 day at home just the 3 of us and my parents came the next day. Husbands parents the day after. Siblings a couple of days after that. We had just under a week just us again and friends came after that.

“I’m never going to baby sit for you because you made me wait 5 days to meet your son whilst you were still bleeding and aching from your stitches, how dare you!”

We had visitors the same day. I wasn’t up for it and they were pushy. If I could go back and wait a few days I would!

Straight away for immediate family, in the hospital. Friends and extended family after a few days. Xxx

My Mum actually had post-natal depression which she hid very well in the early years (as a child I wasn’t aware but she told me later on). It’s heartbreaking to think of that generation of Mums who were afraid to say something wasn’t right (and many Mums still are even today) and felt they had to ‘suck up’ anything.

Everyone is totally different and the OP doesn’t seem to be able to grasp that everyone needs a different amount of time to feel up to vistor’s. You don’t then hold it against a new mum further down the line.

The last post just screams bitterness, not happy new grandparent.

Family & friends all visited whilst I was in hospital . Afterwards if they didn’t visit me, I was visiting them.

I find the whole no visitors in the first month or the anti MIL people making them stay away most bizarre