uNPD MIL and new baby

[Emberleaf]

I am sorry you are dealing with all of this.

Your background sounds like you cut and pasted my whole experience with my inlaws! Is your FIL a chronic enabler too? Are your inlaws so psychologically enmeshed the adult children really believe they are emotionally responsible for their mother's mental status? Yea. Sadly, I know all about it because I lived it until I learned it was always them, not me. I was not the problem.

You can not win them over no matter what you do or dont do or how wonderfully perfect you are. You will always be deficient and the stealer of son/brother. You will be smeared and slandered and you will be isolated. Character assasination is the rule not the exception.

All that stated....

Congrats on your coming baby!

Some food for thought...

1. Do not alert them about the birth. Instead wait until YOU feel comfortable or at least confident in dealing with their company. Could be 2 weeks could be 2 months...maybe more! Your dh should be the communicator and asserting the boundary...holding your space.

2. Do not let them dictate anything. My PDMIL actually tried to tell us when my flying monkey SILs would be over to visit with our first baby. I shut that shit down pretty quick. Do not justify argue defend or explain your choices. No is a complete sentence. No second chances. No benefit of the doubt as they have shown you exactly who they are.
Dh must be on same team at all times. You are a united front.

No ambush visits allowed. Dh answers door and sends them on their way. Dh makes it clear you will not have any visitors AND when they are allowed to come they stay in a hotel not your home.

3. No mental acrobatics. No magical thinking.  It does not matter what pretzel you twist yourself into to avoid conflict, they will fabricate it. Know this.
Be ready to go no contact for as long as possible because it is not just about you anymore. Do not think for a minute your children will be sacred ground. No one is safe in these situations. Do not cede any ground on this. It will wreak of weakness and they WILL exploit your good will in the name of family. Just don't.

DO Set the tone for engagement and be consistent. Be prepared for possible lawn tantrums and absolute boundary smashing shenanigans.

Stick together and dictate terms. You got this!

[piggie]

MIL has been chatting with DH on the phone over the last few weeks and keeps asking what we need for the baby. We are pretty much sorted but have told her a couple of things which would be useful. How do we know if this is genuine or from what I gather might be an attempt at "hoovering"? No one will give any sort of definite answer on whether or not they will visit us, instead saying they will "see how we feel" which is all very nice but I'm afraid I don't believe that is genuine, because 6 months ago for our wedding there was 0 consideration of our feelings. DH would rather give them the benefit of the doubt (again) than consider that they might be up to something, which I understand as he just wishes his family would be nice to us both. ☹ 

[Call Me Cordelia]

Piggie, have you given them a concrete invitation? Like would you like to visit on x date? Do you actually want them to visit? If you haven't extended a specific invitation, imho there's no visit to discuss. Waiting to be invited is appropriate. If they try to push in later you don't need to let them. As to the baby gift, whatever. You gave a couple ideas the rest is up to them. It's so hard but it does no good to be constantly trying to figure out difficult people. You do you and enjoy your baby!!!

[piggie]

Piggie, have you given them a concrete invitation? Like would you like to visit on x date? Do you actually want them to visit? If you haven't extended a specific invitation, imho there's no visit to discuss. Waiting to be invited is appropriate. If they try to push in later you don't need to let them. As to the baby gift, whatever. You gave a couple ideas the rest is up to them. It's so hard but it does no good to be constantly trying to figure out difficult people. You do you and enjoy your baby!!!

We've offered a visiting time in DH 2nd week of paternity leave but we won't know when that is until baby is actually born. If I am answering for me alone then no I'd rather they didn't visit, but I don't want to seem unfair to DH and I think that giving them the option of a visit provided they stay elsewhere is fair.

they are getting us those gifts, but so much of their relationships are based on gifts and often over the top (to me anyway) levels of gift giving, and since their mistreatment of us around our wedding, it seems odd to me to be so keen to get gifts. Also MIL had just walked back into DH life (he was vlc with her for months) with no acknowledgment of all the wrong she did before (I didn't expect her to but it frustrates me that she just gets back in). DH has said he is aware of it and what she is doing, but will just go along with it unless she steps out of line again.

[D.Dan]

Personally, I think it's a better idea to wait until after baby is here before thinking of when you can have visitors. A new baby is a lot of adjustment, and it requires more new adjustments with each baby afterwards. You might not feel like having visitors as soon as 2 weeks after birth. You'll still be recovering.

I actually didn't want visitors for the first month myself, but I also accidentally got dehydrated during labor which acted the same as blood loss. I was too weak the first month to stand for more than 15 minutes at a time. The most I wanted was for someone to bring food so I didn't have to use my meagre energy to try and cook. I got the opposite, lots of visitors visiting multiple times (uPDex's foo) whom I had to cook for.  ....yay....

As for the gifts... the truth is you can't stop them from believing that their gifts are gonna buy you and your husband. The only thing you can do is treat their gifts as if there are no strings attached. No matter what they say or do. Or just put the gifts aside and be ready to hand them back (I've only done this with the PDs that regularly demand their gifts to be returned, it usually stuns them).

[piggie]

Personally, I think it's a better idea to wait until after baby is here before thinking of when you can have visitors. A new baby is a lot of adjustment, and it requires more new adjustments with each baby afterwards. You might not feel like having visitors as soon as 2 weeks after birth. You'll still be recovering.

I actually didn't want visitors for the first month myself, but I also accidentally got dehydrated during labor which acted the same as blood loss. I was too weak the first month to stand for more than 15 minutes at a time. The most I wanted was for someone to bring food so I didn't have to use my meagre energy to try and cook. I got the opposite, lots of visitors visiting multiple times (uPDex's foo) whom I had to cook for.  ....yay....

As for the gifts... the truth is you can't stop them from believing that their gifts are gonna buy you and your husband. The only thing you can do is treat their gifts as if there are no strings attached. No matter what they say or do. Or just put the gifts aside and be ready to hand them back (I've only done this with the PDs that regularly demand their gifts to be returned, it usually stuns them).

We are waiting now, I had initially wanted to set rough dates I suppose so that I felt in control of the situation! I'm not comfortable with in-laws being here if DH is not here so if it's not in his paternity leave then it will have to wait until he is off work again (mid Feb). And I had wanted to get their visit out of the way, and also because my family are visiting later in January and I didn't want there to be any accusations of my family getting more than them (despite that being deserving).