Another argument with my mother about med-free birth...
anna7602
member
3 years after the fact, I just rehashed the whole "why I didn't call you to be present for my birth" argument with my mother. It comes up every few months or so.
She wasn't supportive of all of a med-free birth and was quite opinionated about it during my entire pregnancy. To this day, she still maintains "well, I had experienced child birth and you hadn't and thought I should give you my advice. It's not like you listened to me anyway."
FFS, seriously? She still doesn't see how "going to the hospital as soon as contractions started" would have been "such a big deal." She adds, "and I would have gone to meet you at the hospital."
My head is about to explode right now. Thanks for letting me vent. FWIW, I had a fantastic 18-hour med-free labor and gave birth to DD 32 minutes after arriving at the hospital, fully dilated.
Re: Another argument with my mother about med-free birth...
Some people will never get it. And that's okay, but they for sure need to let you make your own decisions. Hell, she was a parent long before you, but she doesn't have the right to tell you how to raise your child, kwim?
Next time it comes up, tell her that if she can/will be supportive of your wishes, she is more than welcome to come to the hospital for the next one.
And yea, because of a few (well ONE) of my relatives being so openly unsupportive while I was in labor (thankfully, she was in the waiting room), no one was invited to my second birth.
I'm sorry your mom is crazy enough to want to have this argument for 4 straight years.
If I was you, I would just shut it down from now on. "What's done is done. This conversation is done. How about the weather?"
Natural Birth Board FAQs
Cloth Diaper Review Sheet
My mom read this great book that told her that to a certain age of child, it's appropriate for parents to give their kids unsolicited advice, but once they reach adulthood it is no longer called for or appropriate. I'm not sure if that's exactly how it said it, but that's the gist. I really wish every grown person's parents would read this book and internalize that!
It's so frustrating to have those kinds of conversations with someone you would really love to have on the same page as you. Since she's so obviously not on the same page, I would end the discussion before it begins next time. Something like "This is no longer open for discussion. Please respect my wishes." [Change subject, if she persists, end the phone call/leave the room].
I'm sorry
Hopefully you can find a way to stop her from bringing it up again. She needs to learn that if she isn't going to be supportive, she will be shut out of the experience.
Sadly, she still really doesn't get it and insists that my not including her in DD's birth is evidence of what a crappy daughter I am, instead of realizing that she made a choice to exclude herself from the experience by telling me she wouldn't support my choices. In her book, my choices= uninformed and bull-headed, and her "job" as a mother is to share her great knowledge with me of parenting and how it's supposed to be. If I choose not to listen to her, it means I don't respect her as a mother (in her eyes).
It should not surprise you to know that we have a difficult relationship in general these days.
Why on earth are you arguing with your mother over this more than 2 years after the fact?
I was trying to find a nice way to say this, but I really can't do anything but say it plainly:
If your mom won't go to therapy, you should. You can't fix her, but you can change how you react to her.
Natural Birth Board FAQs
Cloth Diaper Review Sheet