Difficult people during birth/pregnancy

TheHauntedHauswife

STMs or just those who have experience with it in general.. How did you deal with difficult parents or family members around the time of your birth? (Note: this is not about whether or not to let people in the hospital room, etc. Its more about how you deal with these types of people in life in general of if you dealt with them in that situation)

I have had a lot of issues with my parents in the past and they have been much much worse since ive been pregnant. My parents are taking absolutely everything i do personally because i have pulled back from them a bit to give myself what i need to heal so i can make sure i can be a better parent to my own daughter. My mother is a typical "narcissistic mother'' and my dad is just a very angry ''stubborn german'' type who only can communicate by screaming. They both have always supported and aided in each others trait and never stood up for me to the other, mostly ganged up on me. The thing is it seems like no matter what i do now or how much i pull back, they still feel entitled to be first priority in my life and every decision i make, even if it has absolutely nothing to do with them at all, they are getting offended by and confronting DH about it (because they were told they needed to leave my pregnant self alone.) I thought we had mostly gotten this by the way side but apparently DH had just been keeping it from me.

We are making some slightly controversial choices around the birth and we are NOT making them because of my parents, we are making because thats what we feel like we want for our daughter. We want a lot of the first days (maybe even weeks) to really just be the 3 of us figuring out our new little family and we arent terribly interested in a ton of guests either in the hospital or when we get home. I want to be able to just pull my boob out and breast feed and not feel like i need to entertain people. I just don't want any outside opinions, or hands involved at the beginning and DH has honestly agreed with this. Any visits are going to be limited to a time, and anytime the baby decides its time to feed, people are going to be asked to leave, its not going to be me needing to cover up or move to another room. (Again though, not what this thread is about) 

Seeing how my parents both acted in reference to my baby shower that was pretty much ruined, in part due to my mothers endless entitlement and then need to bitch about absolutely everything to people after the fact and tell them cruel false things about it, its very clear that this will be continuing throughout the birth. Her victim mentality has her endlessly blinded to how selfish and horrid she sounds most of the time. You tell her she hurt your feelings and she will tell you are wrong and your feelings are invalid. But if you hurt hers she expects you to move the earth to fix it and you will hear about it for the rest of forever. 

So if you have these people in your life or did during a previous birth, what did you do or what do you intend to do about their behavoirs when you just want(ed) to enjoy the birth of your child in peace? Did you let them around in just a limited fashion, did you keep them away entirely, did you just turn your phone off and hide it away for a few days, did you notify the hospital staff that you were cocerned, did you send them any kind of a direct message or email stating your stance prior and letting them know you wont be standing for it? How did you or do you plan to keep your birth peaceful knowing these people are going to be selfish about it. I am also just interested in general if you deal with this type of person a lot and have found a way to keep their behavoir to a minimum?

peregrinefalconx

I'm not a STM and I'm not in this situation, but I will say that you sound like you have done a good amount of work and foundation laying already. You know your boundaries--you just need to hold the line. You don't need to tell anyone you've gone into labor and can call a few days after when you are feeling well enough to express yourself to your parents about a visit. You can lie, or be firm and honest that you'll be holding off on visitors for a few weeks until you are up for it. I've been told that unless the person is coming to help YOU and not just see the baby, that they wait for a week or two. Alternately, if they are at your house and making you feel bad, you say that you aren't feeling well and you take hte baby and leave. Your husband shows them out.

Doesn't sound like there is an easy way around this. For the record, I have similar fears about my inlaws and they are perfectly nice people. I just feel really private about my birth and my new family. GL.

TheHauntedHauswife

peregrinefalconx Thanks for your reply! I have put my foot down pretty hard with them and there was a very long period in which i simply did not respond to any communications they attempted. It seemed like my mother sort of got the point a little bit but has since over the past 3 weeks or so started to slip again and has gone completely off the deep end. Being 31 weeks its just crappy timing because i was hoping she would hold herself together a little longer. Its hurtful to me to constantly be blamed for being cruel, when the cruel things i am supposedly doing are completely fabricated. Its very hard to just sit back and not stand up for myself but i have realized engaging with someone like that is just completely useless. She does not see beyond her own very narrow scope and refuses to realize that what shes been doing hasnt been working for anyone including herself. I am fully expecting her to make a very wrong move sometime soon so i will have the opportunity to simply uninvite her from meeting her grandchild until she can learn to behave herself. Shes also very much the type to come over and do some kind of help that is NOT helpful and then hold it over your head for ever that she was helpful and you didnt appreciate it. I have offered on multiple occasions to meet them in the middle but they expect 100% of what they want even if its very opposite of what is good, healthy, or safe for me, my family or my daughter.

My issue is definitely not doing it. DH and i have discussed that if its time to breastfeed or baby seems overstimulated or anything like that he will 100% be asking people to leave either the house or the hospital room. We have also discussed that if i find guests are staying too long, becoming intrusive or are overall just carrying a negative vibe into our house, I will be taking the baby upstairs quietly and that will be his cue to try and wrap up the visit quickly. I also asked him that when visitors ask to come over that he pre-inform them that it will be a short visit and we also plan to put a sign on the door warding off uninvited visitors as well as disconnecting our door bell.

I just continue to hope (which is probably silly at this point...) that there is something we can do or say to my parents for them to get the point that our world does not revolve around them and will most certainly revolve around the baby. 

Disneygeek77

I suspect my dad has a narcissistic personality disorder.  I mean I am not a psychologist or anything but from what I have researched about the topic, that is my suspicion.  In a way, it was actually a relief because for years I genuinely thought my dad was just a stupid person and that is why he had trouble holding a job or why he made such dumb decisions, but once I came to terms with my suspicions, I know how little control I have over him.  I only have control over myself and my family.  

For me,  I had to get to a point where I didn't care if I upset them or hurt their feelings.  I knew deep down I was doing what was best for myself and my family and my kids well being came before their feelings.  If I made firm boundaries, I stood by them and didn't back down.  They knew I couldn't be manipulated and I meant what I said.  Most importantly, they didn't know they got to me and I didn't get emotional.  No yelling, no tears I would just shrug them off and say " Ok, I don't care and I am going to hang up / leave now."   I honestly think my non emotional response is what sent the message that I meant business.  

So, if I were in your situation, I would tell them ahead of time what you want.  Let them know you don't want visitors at the hospital and if they decide to show up, they will not be let in.  If they show up at your doorstep, you tell them through the door you are not having guests now and close the door.  If they call your phone, you delete every message.  You call them when you are ready for visitors.  If they decide to give you the silent treatment because of it, just laugh it off as best you can try not to let it bother you.  Give them the clear message you won't be manipulated and you frankly don't care how upset they are.  It is ok if they are disappointed, but the burden isn't on you to make them happy.  Keep telling yourself that even if your parents tell others that you are mean, selfish, horrible, terrible or whatever...that doesn't make it true.  Just because they think it / say it, that doesn't mean that what they say is true.  You are a good mom and doing what you can to protect yourself and your family from their toxicity.  

kwife15

I'm a FTM so no advice on baby stuff but I do have a toxic mother I've had to deal with. Eventually, I decided to cut her off from my personal life to protect myself. I minimized information about me that I give her and make sure nothing she knows can be used against me in any way. I prioritize my family and values that are important to me and us in the long run. It is still difficult at times, mom is mom, but much better than having her hurt me and dangling everything over my head all the time. I have a relationship with her and am nice to her, just in a distant way that allows me to be so.

TheHauntedHauswife

Disneygeek77 I totally get the relief you mean about understanding that its likely beyond just them (likely a personality disorder) creating this strange behavior. I have not engaged in ANY type of negative commentary with them since I think about July! I learned that pretty soon that there is no arguing with someone like this, there is also no reasonably talking it out, and no meeting in the middle, and no compromising. It was drilled into them many times by DH or my aunt or whoever that i would 100% not be responding to anything negative and i continued to uphold that and have not broken that once despite their attempts.

Honestly the issue at this point is seemingly lying with DH. He still allows my mother to send him those messages and while he does not usually answer in any kind of argumentative or detailed fashion, he will say things that are just kind of like to the effect of "i understand how you feel'' type comments. However, DH lost his own father when was a late teen and its something that plagued him since. He cannot understand why i would choose to not have my own parents in my life when he had one taken from him. We have seen a couples therapist for years because we just find it to be a really awesome supplement to our relationship and she did explain to him that its just simply outside his scope of understanding as we were raised very differently, and also that he needs to respect that these are my parents and he ultimately doesn't really get to make choices above mine in this specific case.

During this most recent stint, DH did cross a line and we are going tonight to talk about it as im honestly pretty upset with him because he shared something with my parents that was not really something i wanted them to be told at this point because i am well aware that they are not actually listening or hearing anything and its a certain topic that their dismission of is very painful and it took me almost 10 years to share with DH. So im a bit upset with him right now, as i think he lost it a little bit and slipped back to his old habbit slightly and i do think that was the flaw in this system this time around. They cannot be engaged and he engaged too much.

I do think he needs to move onto the same page completely again and honestly I do think he realizes that this time he made a huge mistake and made things a bit worse than they needed to be. 

I do agree with you though, I do think we maybe we need to consider laying out the ground rules with everyone before hand, not just my parents, and let them know that we plan to keep things very private and please don't just be showing up. We have agreed only 2 people will be told i am in labor, 1 friend who can stop and check on the dog and DH's brother who will have no issue both respecting our wishes and keeping the secret. I do think though that no matter what happens they will attempt to make this about them. I have not seen my father in a year and I suspect i will likely be forced to let him see the baby in some capacity and i do not believe he will hold his tongue with me even if i am laying in a hospital bed with a newborn on my chest. I am fully prepared and expecting that we will have to have him escorted out by security. 

TheHauntedHauswife

kwife15 If mine doesnt have things to use against me, she creates things. But yes she has also been very much out of my personal life for a few years now. She thinks and will say that ''she knows me better than anyone'' but i have been feeding her a false persona for as along as i can possibly remember. She actually doesnt know me at all. I am curious how she has reacted with you being pregnant.

kbequette08

My mom is a very controlling, overbearing opinionated person. I love her to death but she literally likes stuff her way. Nearly every decision we made at the beginning of my pregnancy she openly showed her opinion of it. She has a way of trying to manipulate you into feeling guilty for not choosing the route she would take. It became such a stressful time for me that my husband literally told her never to bring up anything to me that would cause me stress. So far she hasn't and its been more cordial of a relationship with her. Unfortunately my husband is still at odds with her over ruining a surprise baby shower he had planned with our church group. He doesn't trust her anymore and it does hurt knowing that he is not on good terms with her. They are at least civil to one another and I am hoping my mom understands that every decision we make it what we think is best for us and our child. I pray she will learn to respect that. But if she takes anything too far I'm not sure what we'll do cause everyone sides with her and is always afraid to stand up to her.

TheHauntedHauswife

kbequette08 I took have an 'everyone sides with her' situation to some degree. My mother is a huge cry wolf person, she will go to everyone we know and dramatically tell them what I did to her. Even if, again, she completely fabricated it. I have taken the high road and opted to let all family members choose their own routes aside from 1 aunt and 1 cousin who i have filled in on my feelings. But everyone else only knows her side and has not bothered to ask me about mine, which will be my answer if any of them ever dare confront me. The problem is that a lot of what my mom and dad did, were isolated to only me. So its very hard for people to see them as anything but the relationship they have with them because they did not live in our house nor have they truly seen that side. They have nothing to base the accuracy of my mothers cries on, because no one is telling them the other side, which is unfortunate but running after everyone is just a childish game im not interested in engaging with. The thing is, there is nothing they really have over me, im willing to lose anything to protect my daughter and that's how i perceive this. They can turn the whole family against me on lies, and I will be over here enjoying my newborn (when she gets here) with only the people who cared enough to actually support us.

Disneygeek77

If you have to escort him out of the hospital, then so be it.  I see nothing wrong with that and I am very sorry you are in this situation to begin with.  That is terrible. My dad was the type where he got whatever he wanted by yelling, lots of yelling.  I learned at an early age to just let him do whatever he wanted because God forbid I would get yelled at.  On top of that, my mom never stood up for herself, so learning that skill has been very difficult for me as I didn't do this until I was an adult and a parent.  However, now he knows he can yell all he wants to, I won't back down.  I just shrug it off and hang up or leave.  

I would keep focusing on your husband.  Keep telling him how upset it makes you when he engages with them. Don't be afraid to ask him difficult questions like " Why are you choosing my mom's feelings over mine ?  Is she the one you live with, is she the one you made vows to, is she the one you sleep next to in bed every night ?"  Asking him these things might help to put it into perspective.  Keep reminding him that there is a difference between keeping them out of your life to be mean or spiteful and protecting yourself from their abuse ?   Not all parents are the same and you truly don't have to keep someone in your life just because they are family.  

Good luck and I am so sorry you have to deal with this.  Kudos to you for having the courage to stand up for yourself and your baby.  In the end, you won't regret it.

kwife15

TheHauntedHauswife said:

kwife15 If mine doesnt have things to use against me, she creates things. But yes she has also been very much out of my personal life for a few years now. She thinks and will say that ''she knows me better than anyone'' but i have been feeding her a false persona for as along as i can possibly remember. She actually doesnt know me at all. I am curious how she has reacted with you being pregnant.

My mother is bipolar so she goes between being super interested to not writing email for weeks. She lives thousands miles away so that makes it easier in some ways. 
She tries to get closer to me through pregnancy but I know she's seen her other two year old grandson maybe twice since he was born and he lives not even two hours away. She tried emotional blackmail mentioning I wanted her to come and stay with us for months (true, years ago before things went to shit), "hope you won't prevent me from being a grandma," so I explained the situation is different and we'll be taking our own time and are private people. Took it better than I expected. I told her of course I won't be preventing her from being a grandma. Given her track record, don't think she is coming or anything so I'm just nice without actually dealing with her. So that's a very shortened incomplete gist.

TheHauntedHauswife

Disneygeek77 Yup thats exactly how it went for us. My dad screamed, my mom never stood up to him or for me, and was passive agressive at the same time her self. She let him to do a lot of harmful things to me and did nothing about it, and to this day actually says that i was just a difficult kid and that i dont truly know my dad and I have a very wrong impression about him..... yeah cause living with someone for 21 years totally fosters a wrong impression, keep telling yourself that Ma. Towards the end of me living there i did begin standing up to him, and would tell him he was wrong but it never really made him stop. 

DH is currently sitting downstairs in silence (he just got home) because he knows he really screwed up. But i mean i dont really know what to do with that. He did screw up and a simple, oh i forgive you, isnt going to cool off the pot that he just heavily stirred up with them. - He did 2 things that really kind of shook my trust, he invited my dad to my birthday this weekend after i specifically told him he could only invite my mom, NOT my dad. (its a long story but i lost my best friend 2 years ago on my birthday and its something i haven't healed from and miss him everyday -hes alive, he chose to disappear- but its something that i struggle with on my birthday so i find myself wanting to avoid my birthday. So for DH to actually undermine me and ruin my birthday plans by inviting my dad has caused me to decided to feel like i had no choice but to cancel it entirely and it wasnt fair of him to undermine me on.) On top of actually lying to me about where he was this weekend so he could go over my parents house and try to calm them down. But then ended up telling them a lot of things that was not his place to bring up. So im just pretty hurt by him right now and don't really know how to handle that. But we do have the therapist in a half hour so hopefully that helps some. A lot of those phrases you suggested will likely be put into use.

TheHauntedHauswife

@kwife15 Mine lives not even 20 minutes away. So its a bit harder to keep her away. Before i put my foot down a bit harder she actually use to show up here to yell at me. Which she now knows we wont open the door for her after last time DH had to grab her because she looked like she was going to actually punch me. She didn't but she put on some strange like death stare and like charged at me. If i didnt know better i would assume she got temporarily possessed. So since then shes not allowed over anymore.

Disneygeek77

Good, I am glad you guys have a safe place to talk it out.  I hope he understands what he did wrong and you can both be on the same page from here on out.  I know I would be very angry and hurt if my husband did the same thing.

kwife15

That's really rough. Honestly, it sounds like cutting them off completely would be a good thing to do. Doesn't have to be forever, just one day at a time. 

I'm sorry about your husband screwing up. Sigh.

TheHauntedHauswife

Disneygeek77 We WERE on the same page, but he tends to need some like.. reminders and maintenance with things. So it looks like my parents were quiet for just a little too long that he forgot completely how to react to them or something. I don't know. The birthday thing is  beyond me because he knew I didn't want to celebrate at all so i'm really confused on why he did that. But hopefully we do make some progress.

I just honestly don't know what we are going to be able to do to solve the damage he did. Not just to me but he stirred the pot with them so bad that i'm seriously expecting a huge blow up, directly at me, very soon. I've been on the borderline of making an official decision to cut them off completely for a long time now, if they cross a line just a little bit right now I will simply have no choice but to make the choice to lose my entire family, as they will all side with them if i decide that any relationship at all with them is unsafe for my daughter. 

HBamama2B

I'm sorry you're going through so much, and I have had similar issues so I understand the magnitude of the challenge. My suggestion is to take some time and calm down. There's so much going on here and you're allowing it to overwhelm you in a negative way where each stressor overlaps and creates a seemingly insurmountable pile. Seperate out the issues: 1. Parents, 2. Husband.

Table the parents by limiting your communication. The birth doesn't need to be decided now and you don't have to lay any ground rules this week.

Focus on resolving the issue with your husband through improved communication. It seems like he could be on your side but conflicted about how to support everyone. My suggestion: have a conversation with him, but limit it to one specific action that bothered you and one preferred solution. Ie: I feel you broke my trust when you went to my parents house. This hurt me and made me feel unsupported. Can you please promise me you won't contact them without discussing with me in advance or including me going forward? This is really important to me so that both they and I see us as a team. (Or something of the sort). Try not to let it snowball into a litany of offenses.

TheHauntedHauswife

I think DH and i have essentially gotten on the same page and i think where that is concerned we will be able to just move on from this as he hes very aware he made a big mistake here and hes working to correct some of what he did.

Essentially what was decided with the therapist as well was that essentially DH will be uninviting my parents to the birthday thing. Basically that was what sparked the entire thing, and there was a huge blow up over it because my mom was invited and my dad wasnt and it caused quite a bit of very unnecessary stress. I am not sure why my dad expected to be invited, especially since after he WAS invited he made it very clear he had no interest in attending and never would have came anyway. So really my mom made a big deal out of nothing, and is very unrealistic with her expectations. I dont know why its so hard to understand why he wouldn't be invited, when he hasn't attempted to speak to me in over a year and has made the comment many times that hes totally done with me. So why would he be invited??!! and after all that, and after days of her sending DH nasty texts and after DH going over there and talking to them with much more negative commentary from them... she then messaged him today as if NONE of that happened at all asking for the details for my birthday. Which DH will be responding to her that we think its best she no longer attend as the situation as caused too much unneeded stress. That she was offered an olive branch by being invited and that it took far too much for her to even accept that.

I am realizing a constant huge issue is that my parents are both on totally different pages and neither of them is standing up for themselves to the other one. My mother seems to timid to stand up to my dad and my dad just seems like hes kept out of anything my mom is doing on his behalf. Because essentially my mom was upset he wasnt originally invited, but apparently he wasnt actually upset. So its like this constant thing of she ''thinks'' shes fighting to get he family back together (very poorly..) and he is pretty set in his way that ''they'' are done with me and its too late to fix anything. So its pretty confusing having them both constantly speaking on behalf of both of them but being on totally separate pages and even when they are in the same room my dad just takes over the conversation and my mom doesn't correct him.

Additionally in lieu of my original post question, DH did so happen to start to inform them about the plans for the hospital. He said that my mom seemed to have heard what he said but that her reaction at first was something like.. ''well she wont even know we are in the waiting room'' and his response was that ''you wont even know shes in labor, we wont be telling everyone.'' and that that kind of was the end of the conversation. So thats good atleast that he already planted that seed. There will be a follow up with both families about it this in a few weeks.

Boonhilde

I'm wondering if there's a simple solution. If you told them everyone who sees the baby in the first few weeks of life has to get the tdap, would that scare them off? 

TheHauntedHauswife

Boonhilde Oh we so already tried this actually. My moms response was that ''she already knows that she needs to get that"