Re: my first baby, nada's first grandkid

[Guest guest]

Oh I can sooo relate.  When I was about 6 months pregnant I was on the phone

with my dad and he said " you know, if we are going to move up there for 3

months, we are going to have to find a place to rent.  We can't stay in a hotel

for that long " (we lived in a two bedroom condo).  I said " what are you talking

about? " and my dad said " your mother said we are going to move up there for 3 or

4 months " ...This was the first I had ever heard about this plan.

For people with normal mothers, this would be a wonderful plan.  However, my

mothers offers to " help " always have been and always will be attempts to

intergect herself and to to make herself the center of attention.  Truthfully,

she would have been some " help " but it would have come with massive amounts of

attention that I needed to give her and zero nurturing from her.  The fact that

she made this " plan " without consulting me was extremely indicative of what she

was up to.

So, after getting really upset after getting off the phone I decided to send her

an email (my preferred method of communication with her because I don't have to

deal with the silent treatment) telling her that we wanted her incolved in her

grandaughters life and we absolutely wanted her to visit right after the baby

was born but staying in town for 4 months would be too much of an intrusion.

When I spoke to her next she didn't mention it so I brought it up.  Her responce

was an acidic " you made yourself very clear " .

I have a whole story about what happened when she did visit after my daughter

was born which I will email you if you are interested (she behaved horribly). 

The point is, however, that you MUST sent boundries with your mother now.  She

isn't going to like it but the sooner you start, the sooner you will lay down

the law that this is your child and you make the rules.

On a final note, I have found that having my own child has made it much easier

to set limits and to hold my mother accountable (in my head) for her behavior. 

Any questioning that I ever had about wheather she actually had a point has gone

away.  I just look at my daughter and I cannot imagine any justification for

treating her the way my mother treated me.

Best of luck with this.  Enjoy the rest of your pregnancy and store up on

sleep. 

my first baby, nada's first grandkid

I haven't been around here lately. Things have been as normal as can

be expected with my nada. But I'm now 34 weeks pregnant and nada

keeps annoying me with talks about coming over and helping (a lot)

after the baby is born and spending (a lot of) time " bonding " with her

grandchild. ly, I don't want her around to help clean and I

don't want her " bonding " the way I know she will. Yeah, I may need

help with house chores and any help should be appreciated, but nada

tends to annoy me more than help in any situation. And I'm not trying

to keep her first grandchild from her, but the way she talks about

visiting and bonding sounds smothering to me and my time with my baby

feels threatened. She has in the past, when I was an adolescent,

taken the attention of my friends from me. Usually she just talked to

no end, but it still bothered me that she didn't give me space with my

friends. So now, I feel the same sort of threat. I'm trying to

figure out how and when to tell her to back off.

I'm sure everyone has had those relatives and in-laws that are

well-meaning but overstay or somehow annoy you when the baby arrives

home. How do you deal with a nada who sounds like she wants to be too

involved? Does it sound right that I give any visitor rules regarding

the length and days to visit, including nada who thinks she has every

right to be there whenever she wants?