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.

My mum, sister inlaw and PIL were in the waiting room from the time I was taken in until I had him 17hours later.. my midwife was amazing and let them all come meet him as soon as we were back in the room and it was 4am..

What am I reading? Grandparents normally come to the hospital as soon as the mum has a knickers back on don't they?! Bit of an exaggeration, but as soon as they can get there post birth and assuming there were no complications as OP said? If family and friends had waited until I'd had a good nights sleep they would have waited 2 years with my second!

With my first he was born late in the night but my parents, mother in law, sister, brother in law, mother in laws partner some random child sister in law was looking after all came to the hospital the very next morning. It was wonderful!

Once home (the next day) there was a constant stream of visitors of varying relations and friendships, if I was feeding (breast) I'd just warn them and say I don't mind if you don't. Again, wonderful, and wonderful to see everyone's love for me, my husband and our baby.

The visitors soon drop off and very quickly many mums complain about loneliness so enjoy it while they are there I say.

Some young people can be so precious and self absorbed these days.

My parents visited us in hospital and my in laws visited the day after we got home.

In the hospital day one. Stopped for a pub lunch on the way home (was day 3 by then though, tricky birth, EMCS) so had met most of the village by day 4

Definitely a recent thing - I am told by friends that during antenatal classes parents were told to keep family away so that they could bond with the baby. In one case for over a week (and no, there were no particular issues with either health or relationships). Seems crazy to me but new parents are very receptive to what they are told by experts I think. From experience they tend to loosen up when number two comes along and they need the free childcare

In hospital and the day after we got home. I liked seeing people and showing them my new babies. It perked me up to be visited in hospital as the stays on the busy, noisy wards when you're trying to recover from a c section can be quite stressful.

Everyone’s different. I think it’s such a vulnerable point in a woman’s life and no one should feel pressured into having visitors when they’re not feeling up to it. Even straightforward births can feel traumatic. It’s a huge and gruelling undertaking, we often underestimate this.

I wasn't precious about keeping my baby to myself and allowed visitors, but it was more the recovery from the birth I found really difficult with visitors and figuring out breastfeeding etc.. I think sometimes "the bubble" is because people don't want an audience in the early newborn days.

Most PPs aren’t saying when they had their babies which I think is quite pertinent. If your kids are now 30 it’s not really relevant to what the norm is today!

I had my DC is 2021 so Covid restrictions around visiting. My DH could only visit for an hour a day.

My Mum came round the day after we got home. MIL about a week after. Absolutely “favouritism”. I was sore, upset, exhausted and I wanted my Mum. Not my MIL.

Whether you met your grandchild the day after they were born, 3 days or week why does it matter? Why do people need to see them fresh out the womb? Unless you can’t see them until they’re walking I really don’t understand why it matters. Or why people take offence to it (not saying you are OP).

With DS1 I got home from the hospital at about 6pm and my PIL were sitting on my driveway when my DH got up at 8am. They live 3.5 hours away. I was exhausted and not ready for visitors to stay. I love my PIL but that was too much.

DS2 my DDad and BIL came separately to the hospital to see me and even though that was a much, much longer and more difficult birth with post birth surgery, it was lovely to see them. Probably because they came for half an hour each and brought goodies and I didn't have to entertain them.

Very much depends on the couple and their parents.

When I had my child, I was married to my ex-husband and his parents came to visit in hospital. I had a good relationship with them, and actually preferred seeing them in hospital when there's no expectation at all to host. I was kept in for 4 days though as I was unwell and needed IV antibiotics.

I have since remarried. We don't have children together. I have a good relationship with my in-laws but I find my mother-in-law very overbearing and emotionally intrusive (she's lovely, but I am very reserved and she is an abundant toucher and gusher). I would hold her back for a week or more if I could, just to give me time to adjust to the new world order and routine and steel myself for the onslaught. Just because you have a good relationship with them, doesn't mean you/your husband are necessarily what they need right now.

I have a complicated relationship with my own mum and it wouldn't really matter when she said she was going to come, as she either wouldn't turn up or would only stay for an hour.

I think if you'd like to see your grandchild sooner rather than later, ask when they're free for you to pop in and say hello - you won't stay longer than 30 minutes. Say it and mean it. It's the entertaining people and having to be 'on' for hours that's the most daunting part for many of the new mums that have an instinct to take a nested babymoon.

No but then neither should they be left feeling neglected and ignored with no visitors

Wow, I can't believe this is told in antenatal classes, seems so sad and peculiar to me. I'm in my earlier 40's and had my kids 12/14 years ago, so not really old!😄But I do get the, an 'expert' told me so it must be true, feeling with your first I suppose. Gosh, how sad.

DC1 - emergency c-section and my mum and sister were allowed into the recovery room about 4 hours later! I was delighted to see them, but then the stream of people started and it was awful.
I was in hospital for a week afterwards as I lost a lot of blood, Was fine for MIL and my best friend to visit on day 2, but then half our family wanted to visit and if became overwhelming. People stayed for ages and I had a catheter in, was trying to establish breastfeeding and felt like shit.

Wheh we finally got home there was a visitor most days and MIL came round every day and constantly wanted to hold our baby and fuss around him. I hated it.

DC2 - planned c-section, only in hospital for 48 hours. Only my mum (and DC1) came to the hospital.

MIL came on day 3 for a short visit. DH had a word and she was less overbearing.

I didn’t have any other visitors for 2 weeks after that. It was bliss.

But human beings haven't changed that much in a generation surely? Same physiology, same hormones etc

I quoted both mine and my DDs experience. And seeing as I have two DGC under a year old that's hardly out of date

You are massively misappropriating the advice given. No antenatal classes are telling women not to have family visit for a week. They say that parents should be doing the feeding, the rocking to sleep, basically the care of the baby in the early days. Lots of “visitors” want to give the baby a bottle, cuddle them when they cry etc but you don’t really need an “expert” to tell you that in the early days it makes sense for the parents to do it.

With DC1 all the GPs visited while I was still in hospital, so the first couple of days.

DC2 was born at home and my sister looked after my toddler while i was in labour, brought him round to see the baby then took him back to hers for the first night for a sleepover with his cousins. The GPs all visited a day or two later.

With DC3 my in laws were at my house looking after DC1 and DC2 while I was in hospital and were obviously there as soon as I went home. My own mum visited pretty soon after.

So basically, they all saw all of them within the first 72 hours, more or less. It was fine. They came, they cooed, they helped a bit, they left. I didn't fall apart or sink into post-partum depression from the outrageous intrusion of it all. No babies starved due to my inability to establish a feeding routine because I let the in-laws over the threshold for a few hours in the first month.

I would not have wanted my baby taken away from me like that in the early days, and don’t think it’s reasonable to expect all new mothers to be happy with that. The bond is such an animal thing for a while and I hate the pressure on women to be cool with having their baby whisked away and especially out of sight as if it’s a favour to do so, when it’s just people prioritising having a newborn cuddle over the mother or baby’s needs.

I didn't allow anyone to visit me in hospital with any of our children (my eldest is 10, youngest is 4). I think it all depends on how the mother is and the sort of relationship she has with you. I saw family a few days to over a week later with our children, I don't get the rush to see a new baby. You will always be told "mum and baby are doing well" when a birth announcement is made, reality is "mum has lost nearly a litre of blood and had a baby pulled out with a pair of salad tongues, she can't currently sit, stand or walk properly, don't pop over anytime soon" is what it should say really in some cases. Even if she wasn't ripped up to her armpits she might just want a week+ to have some time with her baby and husband, I loved not being bothered the first week, my third child I had during covid was great for this.

It's entirely up to the mum and how she feels, whatever you do don't go pressuring her to see the baby, I think this is always the difference between your own mum and mil, your own mum wants to see you and know you are ok, your mil only wants to meet the baby, there's no interest in wanting to see you or make sure you are ok, if this was the case you'd be happy to wait until she is recovered and feels more herself before you are badgering to visit. So I'd say 1 week+ for meeting a new baby even if you are a grandparent.

I would have been perfectly happy for visitors in the hospital, but it wasn't quite the way it went.

Mum was in the room with me with my first. She had to go home not long after though. My dad popped his head in to say hello as they were leaving. The rest of my family met baby a couple weeks later. My in-laws was about a week later.

With my second it was late COVID times. The rules were lifted just over a week later. My in-laws weren't allowed to come up to visit me on the ward as they had my eldest with them. I wasn't allowed to take my own baby off the ward to go and see them. I'm still sad about it as they had done us a huge favour at very short notice, and I would have loved them to have met their new grandbaby ASAP. My family met baby about a week later. My in-laws was about a month.

There’s so much stuff pushed to new parents on social media these days about agressively NEEDING strong boundaries for the first 2-3 weeks. My parents came the hospital the same day baby was born and my in laws came to our house when baby was 3 days old. I loved seeing people doting on the baby and how much joy they brought.

Human biology hasn’t changed but society has. Surely you believe things have changed for women throughout generations?

Thankfully now women are less inclined to “put up or shut up”. They are gradually becoming more able to put their own needs first and not that of an excited grandparent, if they feel they need the time to mentally or physically recover from one of the biggest traumas the human body can go through and survive.

Of course women are not a homogeneous mass. Some will feel “revived” by having people visit and others will feel drained. Neither are wrong. One isn’t better than the other. It just should be perfectly acceptable for a woman to say, my body has just been through hell, please can I have 24/48/72 hours to recover? Since it literally makes no difference to anyone whether they meet a 24 hour old baby or a 72 hour old one.

Not every woman is the same.

Some women are in shock after they've given birth and just wanted their own mum.

Some women struggle to bond with their baby and having other people around doing a 'better job' of bonding makes them feel worse.

Some women have horrific labours - long, or hard - and just don't want people around them while they recover.

We need to normalise people taking what they need and not being so judgemental. No one - not even grandparents - has the right to see us or our children, and the first time you meet your grandchild is as magical at 5 days old, as 5 hours.

If the OP's son and dil don't want visitors for 2 weeks, fair play to them. It's their baby, not a fidget spinner. They're getting what they need.

If you were well up for seeing people within a few hours or days of giving birth, fair play to you. You got what you needed.

My parents and his mum visited that night and then sister and his dad visited when I left hospital. Everyone's different but personally I liked my family there as I had a section and it was our first baby so appreciated the help !

My Mil visited me in hospital, I am not sure how many days in, as I was there for a while. Traumatic delivery- c-section and pre-eclampsia- so it wasn’t for a few days, maybe day 4 or 5. With dd2 I had another section but I wasn’t in for long , and I would have liked visitors as soon as the catheter was out but only my DH came with our toddler, the grandparents visited once I was home.