Family announced my babies birth

[ruthkinlan]

Hi there ladies, am I overreacting? I recently gave birth to a beautiful healthy baby the birth itself was long and traumatic resulting in an emergency cesarian. Afterwards I was taking directly to recovery and had not had a chance to hold or even get a proper look at my baby.
When I finally got out of recovery hours later and baby was sleeping I picked up my phone to message friends with my happy news. I knew my hubby had informed just close family.
When I looked at my phone there was countless Facebook notifications. It turns our a family member had announced my babies birth on Facebook while I was in recovery having not even got to hold my baby yet. This announcement included gender, name, weight and even a picture of my child. To make matters worse I rarely share personal info on FB and had stated I did not want any info about the baby on FB. All family knew my feelings on this matter. I feel incredibly betrayed and cheated out of getting to personally share my wonderful news with closest friends. I've tried to gloss over the matter and not let it affect my happiness but I just can't look at the family member without feeling very angry with them.
Am I justified or overreacting?

FIL rang round DH's entire family to tell them we were expecting when we told PILs about our first. I mean, technically we didn't tell him not to, but... yeah. I was only about 9 or 10 weeks along and was so upset. This time we didn't tell them until I was past 12 weeks just in case he did it again and expressly told him not to ring everyone. He still did. And had the gall to whinge about being told "late". Sod.

So - OP - every sympathy, it sucks. But congrats on your lovely baby!

SIL and FIL both did this to us. If we have another baby then we won’t be telling them until last.

Congratulations on the birth of your baby, OP!

I would be unbelievably angry with this situation. Unfortunately, however I have seen this sort of thing before on FB- people who aren't a baby's mother/father rushing to announce the birth/post photos. I think people like the attention they get from doing this.

My aunt did this to me - not intentional as far as I know and it really didn't bother me at all, although I had other people commenting 'I can't believe she announced it before you' etc. I was the one with the newborn, the breaking of the news to me was a non event it's the arrival that's special not how people find out about it?

I seriously cannot understand why people do this. It’s not their news to share, it’s yours. I would be fuming too.

I'd be annoyed that it was published online. I'm a private person so I don't post anything on facebook. Someone doing it for me would make me angry.

I'm not bothered about sharing news personally. In fact, I feel awkward and don't really like the attention. Unless it is a couple of people who are specifically told not to tell anyone anything, I work on the basis that everyone will find out. If you don't want everyone to know, don't tell anyone.

I became pregnant whilst working in a school and told the Headteacher confidentially straight away out of professional courtesy/to explain the need for medical appointments etc.
I was only 10 weeks pregnant when she mentioned to me in passing that she was announcing my news in the weekly newsletter to the parents "so that they didn't find out any other way and feel that we'd kept them in the dark"!?!? Wtf?!
Needless to say, that was met with a resounding NO! from me. I hadn't even told some friends family the news yet and was waiting until the 12 week scan.
Unbelievable.

NoTreble that's rubbish!! Good job she mentioned it to you so you could veto!! I was told not to announce my pregnancy as 'the parents don't like change and it'll panic them '. I was 27 weeks and q big and had parents coming up and whispering congratulations to me. I didn't know whether I was meant to be telling them or not! It was rubbish not being able to say as I'd previously had two miscarriages and would have liked to have shared some good news.

OP, my work friend announced my first baby's birth to the extent that people were asking HER about MY baby's birth!! Erm, you what? Needless to say she was not told before other people the next time around. I don't think she was being malicious, just didn't think. Still rubbish though :-( congratulations on the birth of your little one though

My "D"SM did this to me when I had DS earlier this year. Me and DP had agreed that we would announce the birth after MIL had met DS. MIL has mobility disabilities, so wasn't able to visit him in the hospital unlike his other DGPs. We told DF and DSM this when we saw them a few days before DS was born.

DS was born in the morning and visiting hours weren't until the afternoon, so after things had settled I sent a photo of DS to DM and DF to let them know they're first DGC had arrived safely. About an hour later, DP saw he had a whole bunch of Facebook notifications and saw DSM had posted an announcement with the photo (that I hadn't sent to her, so she must have gotten it off of DFs phone). Me and DSM have always had a terrible relationship (I could fill an entire thread about her dickish behaviour throughout the years) and I refuse to add her on Facebook, so I wasn't even tagged in the announcement! Most of the comments were from her friends and coworkers, people I have never met, congratulating her on her new Grandson. Safe to say I was absolutely livid!!

When I confronted her about it later, she simply shrugged and said she was just so excited about her first DGC

YANBU to be pissed off OP, and if you want to definitely let them know you're upset, but then let it go. Don't let it ruin these precious moments with your new baby. Also congratulations

This exact thing happened to me. My step mil posted it on facebook. Like you I had an emergency c section and hadn't even had chance to see my own baby yet properly. What made it worse was at around the same time she posted I was being rushed back to theatre with a massive bleed and was very unwell. Not her news to share. Congratulations on your baby op.

Urgh, people seem to feel such entitlement when it comes to babies! I'd be absolutely fuming in your shoes and I hope when you're up to it that you were able to articulate your feelings loud and clear!

Not quite the same, but I have a friend who seems to think she's somehow sharing my pregnancy and when I mentioned dh and I think we've felt a kick, her reaction was 'whoop, can't wait to pop round for a feel myself'