Soon to be a grand mummy but so concerned

[Mylittlegrandbaby]

Hey... my daughter is 29. She was led to believe she could not conceive naturally when she was 15. She was recently diagnosed with asd and adhd and had a very serious episode of anorexia 18 months ago.

We found out she was pregnant last month very unexpectedly. To say it was a shock is an understatement. It filled me with sheer terror for her and the baby because she's so vulnerable.

She informed the dad who has tred to financially bribe her into a termination. When she declined he started to ignore her.

I contacted the father's mother today and it was met with legal threats and telling me " they'd be intouch with a plan of action". Both grandparents were incredibly hostile and rude. The fathers father was unbelievably condescending. Its really distressed me to be honest.

On top of all of this I was a complainant in a sexual offences case and he was convicted 13 days ago so I'm feeling really vulnerable myself.

Any suggestion on how to deal with their hostility? They are literally horrific!

Its okay having all the fears for them, its part of what mums do. You're having the fears but supporting her anyway and supporting her choice which is the right thing to do. You sound like a really caring Mum & Grandma and you sound realistic too, that your daughter might need more support around this than if she was NT, but knowing that doesn't mean she's not capable of being a good mum.

Its not surprising this attitude still exists, but pretty shitty reading people inferring she shouldn't get a choice. Its still her body, and her choice and being ND or previously anorexic doesn't invalidate that. Maybe she'll need more support, so do some NT parents that seem completely competent. OP has made it clear they've spoken a lot and her daughter wants to keep the baby and that really should be the end of it. Her body her choice.

The father and his family are clearly not good people. They don't need to be involved. The father is obliged by law to give financial support but enforcing this is such an uphill struggle you might be better off ignoring them.

Support your daughter to the best of your ability but you don't have to be her only source of support. Contact local support services for autistic adults. She can be a great mum.

Don't call yourself grand mummy - there's too many threads here on mumsnet about whacko grandmothers trying to muscle in and relive their babymummy years, disrespecting that their grandchild has a mummy and it's not them. Your daughter is the mummy. You are her supporter

As someone who's had an abortion (and not regretted it) I would say never encourage this. It's got to be 100% her heart felt choice for mental safety.

I agree with everything you said except the last bit. I'm not a whacko and I'd never disrespectful my daughter or grandchild by muscling in. I want nothing more than a normal, healthy relationship and dynamic. Don't rush to judgement of my motives based on genuinely crazy grandmothers using similar vernacular.

Exactly this! And I'm so sorry you went through that. X

With respect, the OP’s daughter isn’t the only person whose mental health is at stake. This pregnancy will, if it continues, turn into a person. Who may have her own feelings about being essentially being brought up by a grandmother because her own mother was adamant she wanted to continue an accidental pregnancy, but was incapable of adequately parenting the resulting child.

It's great that your daughter has a choice, and a mother who is willing to do anything to support that choice. If you think of it from the soon to be father's perspective, he doesn't have a choice. A life changing decision has been made for him, despite him saying he doesn't want to have a child. It's not hard to understand why he's upset and unsupportive.

When the father has made his position clear, I don't understand why you took it on yourself to message the father's mother? What did you ask her, and what did she say in response? You say that the" fathers father was unbelievably condescending". Did you message him separately as well? I think we are missing a lot of the backstory here.

I would be encouraging my daughter to cut all ties and not name him on the birth certificate. Would then set about providing practical support as best as I could and creating a loving unit with your daughter and grandchild.

Yes, messaging the parents of the OP’s daughter’s ex seems like a deeply strange, infantilising move. Unless there’s a major drip feed that the ex is another vulnerable adult, and the OP doesn’t think he’s capable of making a decision on his own.

And the fact that the OP refers to the ex’s parents as ‘the grandparents’ also speaks volumes. They aren’t, currently, grandparents at all. They’re the parents of a (presumably) adult man who doesn’t want a child (who doesn’t appear to have used contraception to ensure that), and who, crucially, don’t get a say in whether he is involved in his child’s life or in whether the pregnancy is continued. What on earth was the idea in contacting them?

This whole situation involves poor judgement. Who, aged 29 and sexually active, just goes along with something they were told aged 15 about being infertile?

my daughter won't be left unsupported. I'm a former mental health worker, her stepmum is a approved mental health social worker, her grandmother was mental health nurse. She and the baby will not be left to free fall into disaster. We will give both the support they need. We will be very on the ball if perinatal help is needed. Many years ago I worked on a perinatal unit so I'll be watching my daughter very carefully.she can't be referred to perinatal services until 20 weeks but they are aware of her.

My daughter was told several times, by gynae consultants, she would need help to conceive. It wasn't a one off conversation. Until last year she hadn't had a period naturally when she went into recovery from her ED. Bare in mind she's autistic too, I'm guessing her thought process remained the same once they started. She has severe pcos. Part of the reason she developed her ED is because she struggled with being told she had fertility issues (clearly not now). she struggled with the fact her body didn't work properly so used food as a control.

I'm not going to dignify this with a response other than WOW, you make so many assumptions and projection!

I am astonished by the number of posters still suggesting OPs daughter needs to abort. The OP is not the woman who is pregnant. She sounds like a wonderfully supportive mother who has already discussed at length with her daughter the challenges having this child will bring and the kind of support she is able and unable to provide. Part of being pro-choice is accepting women will continue with pregnancies in circumstances we might deem imperfect or inadequate. Even in cases where it’s fairly certain that social services will have to remove a baby from their mother at birth you still cannot force a woman to terminate. Even if the pregnancy will almost certainly kill the mother you cannot compel her to abort. The only possible situation I can think of where someone other than the pregnant woman would make the decision would be if she lacked capacity. That’s got to be extremely rare.

Not much advice but just wanted to say i wish you had been my mum and grandmother to my children you sound absolutely amazing ❤️ Best of luck

Thank you so much. I'm trying so hard in a difficult situation. I've had to bite my tongue on this thread a fair bit. I love my daughter so much and all I want is for this to be positive for both of them. This message is so appreciated.

❤️

Thank you. And this is entirely the point. Nobody should forced to end a pregnancy because it doesn't suit someone else. The baby will massively affect my life but I'm respecting daughters right to choose. Ultimately, whatever the outcome, I will be the one supporting her... and the baby. I know if she's pushed to end the pregnancy it will have catastrophic consequences on her mental health. I'm not going to do that to her. Even though a termination is the most logical route it doesn't mean its the one that should be taken.

Cut contact with the family, do not give the child his name and do not put the father's name on the birth certificate to certificate.

If they want to behave like this, your daughter actually holds all the cards.

If he reaches out after the birth and turns out to be a better father than expected then she can have that conversation then. You don't want somebody like this having any rights or say at this state.

No I didn't regret it so it's okay, but that's because it was my choice without cohersion 😊.

It filled me with sheer terror for her and the baby because she's so vulnerable

You said this in your OP about how you felt when you found out she was pregnant but your OP is about dealing with the father's parents. It all seems like a recipe for disaster. Why was it that you contacted the baby's father and not your daughter? It's hard to know why they responded so badly without knowing how and why you contacted them. I think a lot of people would react badly to finding out their son was going to be a father with someone who said they couldn't have children.
If they are wealthy is it more possible that they might try and go for 50/50 care. Would your daughter be ok with that?

It will cost the father £232 to get a court order to get joint parental rights. It takes 4-8 weeks. Not putting the babies father's name on the birth certificate isn't the easy solution Mumsnet seems to think it is.

This is how is happened.

My daughter informed him of the pregnancy. There was a back and forth over options. At some point last week he attempted to bride my daughter financially to end the pregnancy. She didn't respond so he began ignoring her. I contacted him and asked him to consider his position carefully as being a revolving door dad isn't an option. I was polite, non judgmental and friendly. I also reached out to his mum asking to chat. I then received a very grandiose message from his dad. This threaten ME with legal action ( not sure what he thinks I've done, but hey!). He also stated he would get back to me with "his thoughts and and more importantly a plan of action". His wife then sent me an unpleasant message, nothing of substance, just legal threats again.I gave them the EDD and my email address. This morning I messaged telling him I would not be spoken to disrespectfully or brided or threatened and told him to only use the email address in future contact. Any further hostile behaviour would be documented and contact would cease. I then blocked them on all platforms, as did my daughter.

And that actually worries me more than any issues relating to the upbringing of the baby. If they start at the point of threats and bribery who thr f*ck are these people!

"Bbbbbbbby"
"It will cost the father £232 to get a court order to get joint parental rights. It takes 4-8 weeks. Not putting the babies father's name on the birth certificate isn't the easy solution Mumsnet seems to think it is"

And that actually worries me more than any issues relating to the upbringing of the baby. If they start at the point of threats and bribery who thr fck are these people!

This is what would worry me the most too. Your daughter sounds vulnerable and the fact that you've already got involved by contacting the father's parents suggests that she might struggle to deal with the potential shit show. Would she be ok with the Dad having 50/50 care of the child? I think that's extremely difficult even for separated parents that get on well and that haven't got any MH issues going on. Having a baby can be extremely challenging in the best of situations but throw in angry ex's then it makes everything a million times more difficult. The fact they have money might make it more likely that they won't just abandon the child. I'm using 'they' rather than 'he' as it sounds like the parents are the type to become involved too.