Did your mom stay with you when the baby came?

🔮advice

Anonymous User

29 days ago

My mom has offered to come out and spend a month with me and my husband when the baby arrives next year, and I’m kind of torn on how I feel about it. I love my mom and we’re close, but she can also be a bit challenging to be around, and she wants to stay with us that whole time. I don’t know how I feel about that level of intimacy, especially during a period when I imagine I’ll really want it to just be me, my husband, and the baby bonding and figuring things out together, and I worry that having her there could mess with that. She mentioned coming to the hospital in the birth and I was like “ummm, no!” At the same time, I’m also worried about how hard this is all going to be and whether I’ll be able to handle it all on my own. It just feels like a lot, and I do want support and help, but I don’t know if I want all the baggage that comes with having a parent living under the same roof while I’m recovering and trying to figure out being a mom. I’m sure I’m not the first person to go through this, so I’d love to hear from others who have been in a similar situation. did you have your mom (or MIL or anyone else) come and stay with you after the baby was born, did you regret it, or do you wish you had asked them to come. How did you navigate that whole situation? I’m not due for many months but I’m already stressing.

Anonymous

•

29 days ago

This so depends on the type of relationship you have w your mom and if she’s going to be actually helpful. My first child was born when I was a single mom and I actually lived with my mom at the time. I would not have survived if I hadn’t! My second was born when I was in a partnership so while my mom was around a lot - I would have low key loved if she was there 24/7. That said, my mom is amazing with babies and very practical - I never needed to ask her to empty a dishwasher or fold clothes, she just did it as a reflex. However - I have friends who still dread when their moms come to visit now that their kids are older and wouldn’t have wanted them there permanently after the birth. One thing I know for sure regardless of your circumstance is you need so much more help than you think you’ll need as a first time mom, and if you have a good relationship with her and she’s helpful, it might be a godsend! But totally depends on who she is and your relationship w her x

Anonymous

•

29 days ago

Awe thanks for sharing this. Yeah, I guess since I’m the oldest infojn really know how my mom is gong to behave. Like is she going to step up and help empty the dishwasher like you said or is she just going to sit back and give me feedback and ask “what’s for lunch?” Ugh this is so hard!!!!

Anonymous

•

29 days ago

Echo what Amy said about what kind of relationship you have. And also what you want to learn through the experience: I’m, honestly, a youngest child with a bunch of chip-on-my-shoulder issues and can lose my confidence to others’ opinions easily, and I think I really needed to feel like I had room to get to know my own child and my own experience first. But we all need some kind of support. I’m lucky to have a great, comfortable relationship with my mom (though it hasn’t always been that way) and she’s amazing with babies. My parents live locally and were still working, so she didn’t stay with us but made herself available when she could, and mostly snuggled the baby, provided a listening ear, or fed us. That worked for us, and she made herself available for other chores but it was honestly easier to just deal with our own house than explain things to people. My in laws came after about a month or a bit sooner (we were being cautious about people traveling, too) and didn’t stay with us but kinda spent the whole day at our house. My spouse had talked with them ahead of time about specific ways they could be most helpful (mostly baby bonding, meals, tidying, giving us a break for a neighborhood walk), and that was positive for all parties. They appreciated having clear roles and ways to show up they knew would be well received, and we appreciated feeling heard and supported. I love them and have a great relationship with them too, but realized that I was super self conscious nonetheless. So I wasn’t always at ease, but it was really really positive, and I just think, honestly, neither my spouse nor I are at the place in any of our relationships with any of our parents where dealing with a baby in the middle of the night would have been less nerve racking with our parents around. I have one friend whose dad helped out with night duty while they stayed at her house, and she loved it. Our parents would probably never do that even if they could. And, I’ll say, I had some friends with harder recoveries than expected, and so that became a game changer (and also, sometimes changed their support plans). Comments and advice and annoyances floated here and there from parents, siblings, friends, randos, but some of them were helpful, and the rest we laugh about. Stuff was really hard the two or three weeks we kept to ourselves, but building our connection (with each other and baby) and our communication in that time was important and formative to my husband and I’s relationship, and we had the foundation for that coming in.

Anonymous

•

26 days ago

I can help in terms of sharing my experience. I'm a first time mom to a 3 month old right now. My mom stayed with us for a little less than 3 weeks. My mom and my husband are from different ends of the earth. He's more Americanized and she's very Traditional asian parent. Different sense of humor, different way of doing things. From household chores to basic mannerism. (his parents also stayed for about the same amount of time). Pros: • she really took care of me • food prepped (I think my milk for baby came in fast because of this. And I'm so grateful for it. She stuffed me up with protein!) • showed me how to start caring for my little one so that I had a starting point • she was able to calm him with her own techniques and lullaby • she was able to create her own memories with him Cons: • she kind of took over and my husband didn't get to really bond with my baby in the first few weeks (he did but didn't). Like we didn't get a chance to just figure it out together • because of cultural differences, I was stuck in the middle and that added to my stress • she would constantly come in and complain like an asian mom • my husband felt like he was walked all over in his own house, that caused friction/conflict between us • she kept saying she wanted to go home and she wasn't happy/bored —————— I say, talk to your husband first and decide what you guys want to do and your expectations.