A post on the baby shower board made me start thinking of this. How competitive are your mother and mother in law when it comes to your baby/future baby? Do they get competitive with time/gifts, etc or are they pretty chill? My mom and mil live across the country from eachother so they dont argue or anything, but already things have come up that I didnt expect, like my mom finding out and being hurt that my in-laws knew I was pregnant before she did (it was unavoidable- they were in town for a visit the DAY I found out and we were going wine tasting) and them both wanting to specifically buy the crib even though we needed other nursery furniture too. They both insisted THEY wanted to buy the CRIB. haha.
Anyway...just interested to hear what other fun I have to look forward to
Re: Mother vs. MIL
My Mom and MIL are both local, my SMIL lives about 6 hours away. A lot of the battles were about who got to see DD when, and how much- it was like they were keeping score. My mom was really upset that DD spent the night at my IL's before she spent the night with them, but my mom has a crazy work schedule and couldn't keep her when we needed the help, and my IL's had set up a nursery and could watch her whenever (which usually ended up being on a weekend). My step-mom and dad tend to spend significantly more money on DD than either my mom or MIL are able to and I think they realize that now and don't try to compete.
It's always going to be a competition, just wait until your LO is old enough to show a preference- there's nothing worse than them being with one and they can't stop talking about the other.
Both my MIL and mom are great - I haven't witnessed any real competitiveness w/ dd at all. They do, however, interact completely differently with her.
MIL lives nearby and babysits quite a bit. She also likes to buy the grandkids lots of stuff - mostly trinkety stuff (dd gets lip balms, hair things, purses, shoes on occasion).
My mom lives about 4 hours away - we see my parents 6-8 times a year. My mom is goofy with dd - they do projects, read books and are just generally silly together. My mom does buy her things occasionally, but usually its a couple shirts at a garage sale or something, or she'll send a small package with some little goodies for Halloween or Valentine's Day.
Despite that my Mom and MIL have met each other in passing many, many times, the competition seems to be entirely one-sided-- my Mom.
Up until becoming pregnant I hate that we live about 1.5 hours from each set of parents. The biggest hassle with that is they are in opposite directions. Now that I am pregnant I am thankful for it. This means one grandma won't get an advantage of proximity.
We have already told our parents we will come to their houses once per month on the weekend (Saturday or Sunday) and then we get the other two weekends to our family. This has seemed to go over really well. Plus we will also do other family stuff with them but they will get one weekend per month that is theirs.
I haven't seen any competition per say. My MIL has made one side comment to the nature of has my mom left anything big available to get us or is she going to buy it all. I have specifically stayed out of this. I figure I cannot control how one spends their own money and it's not my place. If my MIL is so concerned about things not being left for her to purchase, our registry has been done for about 2 months now so she is free to shop as she pleases.
All I will say is we are going to make an effort to give each set of grandparents equal time at least until the "newness" wears off. Then I don't think it will be that big of a deal. I am concerned about my ILs as they do not have to "share" their other grand kids as my SO's brother has sole custody.
At least my MIL or my mom is not very vocal. They will just deal and stew. I am most concerned about the birth at the hospital over who will get to see/hold them first. At least with twins each grandma can hold a baby at the same time. I am actually more concerned someone other than my SO will try and hold them before I get to as I am having a c-section.
06/12 - BFP!!!!
Beta #1 15dpo - 256
Beta #2 18dpo - 1097
6wk U/S on 07/02 ~ TWINS!!!
EDD 02/21/13
09/10/12 Found out it's two Boys!!!! Sam and Jake
Jacob and Samuel born 1/29/13 at 36 weeks.
The only person who gets bent of shape is my MIL, due to the fact that my dad and step mom have a lot of money....so she feels insecure about her position in our lives in general.
We made sure to tell his mom first, just due to the fact that she would get really upset if my dad and stepmom knew first....my mom didn't care when she found out, she just was happy for me and my dad and step mom completely understood. We also live closer to my family than his (Recent moved to another state), and I don't know if that has anything to do with that. this will be the first grandchild on my side of the family for both my parents, and this would be his mothers third grandchild..and i just wanted my family to be able to share that special experience of having a new grandchild for a few years (we plan on moving back near his family) since she has already gotten to experience that.
So i think it's inevitable for certain personalities to get their feelings hurt.....it boils down to an insecurity and it's just about making sure that they are aware that no matter what they are important to your life and the baby's life, and their position is just as special.
Both of our moms are generally pretty good. My ILs are local (live about 2 miles from us) and my parents are 3 hours away. The ILs obviously see us/DD more often, and get the advantage of babysitting when DH and I go out, whereas we see my parents about once every 6 weeks or so. MIL doesn't seem gloat-y about it, and my mom doesn't act bent out of shape. So it works.
The only thing that bugs me is that sometimes MIL can seem a little territorial around DD with US. Like she sometimes comes off as "expecting" to see her a certain time, or she'll bug us to "let" her babysit, stuff like that. But nothing between her and my mom.
I think families will always have a little bit of tension about stuff like this.
My family lives 10 minutes away, and we see them probably 3x's a week. This really seems to bug my ILs, who live 4-5 hours away. We typically see ILs every 6-8 weeks. They haven't really said they're jealous per say, but they'll say stuff like, "how are the (lastname)'s doing it? were the (lastname)'s there with LO?" etc. ILs have more money than my parents, but they don't really buy LO a lot of stuff, and if they do, we try to hide most of it from my parents and just say we bought it. Additionally, we don't bring up to ILs when my mom babysits or we all go to church together, etc.
Seems silly to rub it in either family's face about how much money or time the other spends on LO, so we just avoid talking about the other family in front of them, kwim?
GSx1 - 05/13/2013
GSx2 for T&B - EDD 6/21/2015 - They're having a GIRL!
Granted, I SAH so that makes it easier for me to see my mom, but MIL rarely even tries. Up until about a month ago, she saw DS once a month and he had no idea who she was.
I think MIL is just at a different stage in her life and being a grandparent isn't top on the list. DS is her first grandchild and she just really isn't into it. My mom has 4 grandkids all 2 and under so she's really into them right now.
My mom and MIL are generally fine with one another. Since having DS, though, I have noticed that my MIL is a very jealous person and I find it annoys me more than my mom. My parents are more financially capable of helping us out with buying some of the expensive things that we need for the baby. My MIL will sometimes make comments like "I wish we could help you out that way." I never really know what to say to that. I'm constantly reassuring her that she helps in other ways like babysitting, but its getting old.
My parents live a 2 hour plane ride away and ILs live a 30 min drive away. So, they see DS all the time. When my family comes out to visit (which is maybe 4 times a year) my MIL will make a comment like "I won't get to see DS this weekend" For one thing, it's not like she sees him every weekend and for another, one weekend isn't gonna kill you.
Then, DS starting calling my parents Grandma and Papa. He called ILs Nana and Papa. MIL keeps asking me what DS calls my dad. When I told her he calls him Papa she said, "well that's weird because that's what he calls FIL" I wanted to ask her what her point was. I just said told her that he calls him that because that's what all my nieces and nephews call him. It's like she's possessive of the names. The annoying part is that she keeps asking me, like maybe one day the answer will change. Sorry, this post just brought out some pent up emotions that I had to get out ;-)