s/o Let mother visit stay with us after baby comes?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I could talk her down to maybe 3 nights? 4 nights? The help I mentioned earlier - she will make dinner, but then immediately afterwards will start assigning clean-up tasks to my husband and me. And she is a high maintenance helper ("Larla, what pot should I use for this? Where is your basil? Can I use the sea salt?" etc.). I'd rather just get takeout every night, to be honest.

Ick, my mother does this, too. We call it "falsetto politeness".

Ha - I love "falsetto politeness"!!!

[Anonymous]

All I needed to see was the post title when I thought "probably not a great idea" and then after reading the first 8 words, a big fat "absolutely not".

Having a new baby is stressful under the best of circumstances with the most laid back people. Don't add more drama to the situation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP again - another funny tidbit - she did say that if we let her stay with us she'd "pretend" she was in a hotel by going to the guest room at 7:30pm and staying there until 8 or 9 in the morning. There's no TV in the guest room, so I'm not sure what she'd do, or whether to even believe her, but I just remembered that so thought I would add

She's just saying that to get you to say yes. I bet she makes empty promises all the time, just to get what she wants.

No way. Put your foot down. If you don't, she'll know she can continue to manipulate you, especially about the baby.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What problems do you see when she stays with you? Is it anything that you think can reasonably be changed or just an ingrained part of her personality?

OP here. It's ingrained but if she could just bring herself to stop talking when I say "I don't want to talk about this" then that would go a long way. One example is that the last time she did stay with us, she saw the wooden scoop we keep in the sugar bowl and said that she wouldn't have thought that we would be so unhygienic. I told her that it is completely safe. She kept going on and on, for (literally!) 20 minutes, all while I told her I didn't want to talk about it, chance the subject, etc. She finally stopped when I lost my cool and started actually fighting with her, then ended the whole thing by saying "well I thought it was a reasonable thing to point out to you" as she walked out in a huff, only to later return and accuse me of making her feel unwelcome in my home. The thing that gets me is that these situations are so stupid and petty. And yet they turn into these big deals that completely ruin my day.

I'd say that a benefit of her visiting is that she tries to help, but when she does, she doesn't really help. She'll ask over and over what she can do to help. I finally say that she can weed, and then she'll decide that she needs my old weeding shoes to weed and pester me until I find them for her (all the while with me telling her to forget about it and just sit down and relax). Then she'll weed for 20 minutes, come in, sit down and say she is too old for this and she is tired and needs to rest and how could we possibly expect her to weed the whole house (which, of course, we didn't). Then she'll decide to help by opening windows if it's a nice day, but she can't figure out the storm windows, so she bugs me until I do it. Etc. I just don't really find her help to be worth the hassle or the cost.

I have a mother who drives me nuts. She is actually here right now to help out with spring break. We can easily afford help but we allow her to "help" us with the kids even though she causes me a lot of stress and probably doesn't help me all that much. My mom still nags me. She will ask me how she can help. When I tell her, she complains about it and then says that I treat her like a maid. We have even tried having my mom here while we have paid help. She drove the help crazy by following them around and micromanaging even though our paid help knows exactly how I like things.

That being said, my mom came to "help" with the baby. She nagged me to death about the baby being cold. She would put the baby to sleep on his stomach even though I told her not to. She put things away so I couldn't find them. She couldn't figure out our fancy stroller and commented every single day what a waste of money it was that we bought a complicated fancy stroller. My dad eventually broke our stroller but thankfully we were able to replace it at no cost.

The point is that I let her visit and "help" me even though I would probably be better off alone or with paid help. She is the grandmother and I want my children to have a relationship with their grandmother. Unless your mom is abusive or has a substance problem, I would probably let her visit her new grandchild.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I could talk her down to maybe 3 nights? 4 nights? The help I mentioned earlier - she will make dinner, but then immediately afterwards will start assigning clean-up tasks to my husband and me. And she is a high maintenance helper ("Larla, what pot should I use for this? Where is your basil? Can I use the sea salt?" etc.). I'd rather just get takeout every night, to be honest.

This term high maintenance helper is hilarious. My mom comments and asks so many questions when she cooks dinner. It is soooo annoying. She will also ask me to buy all these items. I buy them and then she needs to go to the store to buy the missing items. Why the hell couldn't she just buy everything in the first place instead of assigning me tasks.

[Anonymous]

I would let her come and help with the realization that she isn't really coming to help YOU, she is coming to help with the baby. And that will ultimately wind up being helpful to you.

Don't over think it. It can be a godsend to have someone just hold the baby while you get a slow moving sitz bath or shower. Seriously.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I would let her come and help with the realization that she isn't really coming to help YOU, she is coming to help with the baby. And that will ultimately wind up being helpful to you.

Don't over think it. It can be a godsend to have someone just hold the baby while you get a slow moving sitz bath or shower. Seriously.

OP here - it isn't a question of her coming or not, but of where she stays. And the earlier help examples I gave were from when she came to help with my second child. She really doesn't help much with the baby. Doesn't change diapers, etc. so I know what I'm getting there already.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would let her come and help with the realization that she isn't really coming to help YOU, she is coming to help with the baby. And that will ultimately wind up being helpful to you.

Don't over think it. It can be a godsend to have someone just hold the baby while you get a slow moving sitz bath or shower. Seriously.

OP here - it isn't a question of her coming or not, but of where she stays. And the earlier help examples I gave were from when she came to help with my second child. She really doesn't help much with the baby. Doesn't change diapers, etc. so I know what I'm getting there already.

She asks what she can do to help - tell her to read to the toddler or hold the baby or build legos with your big kid...or tell her to vacuum the living room, heat up this frozen casserole...

If you start thinking now of the things you could have her do you might find that she really is very helpful.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would let her come and help with the realization that she isn't really coming to help YOU, she is coming to help with the baby. And that will ultimately wind up being helpful to you.

Don't over think it. It can be a godsend to have someone just hold the baby while you get a slow moving sitz bath or shower. Seriously.

OP here - it isn't a question of her coming or not, but of where she stays. And the earlier help examples I gave were from when she came to help with my second child. She really doesn't help much with the baby. Doesn't change diapers, etc. so I know what I'm getting there already.

She asks what she can do to help - tell her to read to the toddler or hold the baby or build legos with your big kid...or tell her to vacuum the living room, heat up this frozen casserole...

If you start thinking now of the things you could have her do you might find that she really is very helpful.

Is she good with older kids? Can she watch them while you rest and recuperate with the new baby? Can you think of ANYTHING she could do that she wouldn't be high maintenance about it? If not, decline.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would let her come and help with the realization that she isn't really coming to help YOU, she is coming to help with the baby. And that will ultimately wind up being helpful to you.

Don't over think it. It can be a godsend to have someone just hold the baby while you get a slow moving sitz bath or shower. Seriously.

OP here - it isn't a question of her coming or not, but of where she stays. And the earlier help examples I gave were from when she came to help with my second child. She really doesn't help much with the baby. Doesn't change diapers, etc. so I know what I'm getting there already.

She asks what she can do to help - tell her to read to the toddler or hold the baby or build legos with your big kid...or tell her to vacuum the living room, heat up this frozen casserole...

If you start thinking now of the things you could have her do you might find that she really is very helpful.

Is she good with older kids? Can she watch them while you rest and recuperate with the new baby? Can you think of ANYTHING she could do that she wouldn't be high maintenance about it? If not, decline.

OP here. Older kids are in daycare. But I'm confused - I'm asking about having her stay in a hotel vs in my house when she when the new baby is 3 or 4 weeks old. Are you guys suggesting to have her not come at all?

[Anonymous]

Don't have her stay with you. Don't do that to yourself or your partner. She sounds like my in-laws - all sorts of promises and helping, etc. but really it is just another mouth to feed and person to take care of when you have a newborn and no sleep. You are going to want peace, quiet, and sleep any time you can get it. You don't need another mouth to feed.

Let her stay at a hotel, that way her time is concentrated and you guys get some private off-stage time to decompress.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would let her come and help with the realization that she isn't really coming to help YOU, she is coming to help with the baby. And that will ultimately wind up being helpful to you.

Don't over think it. It can be a godsend to have someone just hold the baby while you get a slow moving sitz bath or shower. Seriously.

OP here - it isn't a question of her coming or not, but of where she stays. And the earlier help examples I gave were from when she came to help with my second child. She really doesn't help much with the baby. Doesn't change diapers, etc. so I know what I'm getting there already.

She asks what she can do to help - tell her to read to the toddler or hold the baby or build legos with your big kid...or tell her to vacuum the living room, heat up this frozen casserole...

If you start thinking now of the things you could have her do you might find that she really is very helpful.

Is she good with older kids? Can she watch them while you rest and recuperate with the new baby? Can you think of ANYTHING she could do that she wouldn't be high maintenance about it? If not, decline.

OP here. Older kids are in daycare. But I'm confused - I'm asking about having her stay in a hotel vs in my house when she when the new baby is 3 or 4 weeks old. Are you guys suggesting to have her not come at all?

NP here. Have her come but YOU decide where she stays, how long she hangs out (10 hour marathon visit or a few hours each day) and what you need her to assist you with. Give her specific tasks you know she's good at like making a certain dish or vacuuming. I'm going to dealing with this this summer, and my parents want to stay for three weeks after the baby comes, but in a hotel or rental house. We don't have a great relationship, either; every visit ends in a conflict with my mother going against very specific instructions or my father starting a fight over politics because he's bored out of his mind and won't take a walk without my mom.

[Anonymous]

Now is not the time to give her another chance at staying with you. Things went better on her last visit when she didn't stay with you, stick with that. You can always try letting her stay with you when the baby is a few months older and you have recovered from the birth and are more settled. Even 3 or 4 weeks out I was still a hormonal mess and wanted some privacy. You don't have to tell her she can never stay with you again, just not right now.

[Anonymous]

Hotel. My wonderful in-laws who ordinarily stay with us when they visit stayed in a hotel (their idea as far as I know unless DH suggested it without telling me) when they came to visit the week we had our second baby. It's a tough time to have even helpful houseguests, let alone stressful ones.

[Anonymous]

These are all excellent points. I sent her an email a couple days ago summing them up - that it's just not a good time for second chances, etc. She still hasn't written back... so we'll see how well it goes over.