How to "nicely" have the social media talk

whse13kittens · March 2014

Hi ladies....I've been back to lurking for the past couple of weeks since life got crazy but I'm still here. You all manage to make me laugh on bad days...thanks for that

My question of the day: how have you, or do you plan to have, the "social media talk" with your friends/family? I don't want a lot of pictures of LO all over Facebook, and I ESPECIALLY don't want a lot of them right after he is born (aka before I've had a chance to post them....yes, selfish FTM over here). It's DH's family who is post happy, but he says he doesn't mind so if I feel this way, I need to talk to them.

Any help is appreciated...

gutsysneakers · March 2014

We've already told our families and friends that we don't want any pics of LO on the internet. Period. We'll put out one picture after baby is born and then those who are a part of our life will obviously receive pictures via iCloud, email, etc. We didn't really have a discussion about it - it was "we are the parents, this is our baby, please respect our wishes". They get it though.

Since it is your DH's family that is post-crazy, I'd have him on the conversation so they know its not just you - its also him that feels this way. Hopefully, they'll respect your wishes. Good luck!

ArmyMedic7588 · March 2014

DH and I talked about this last night, we need to have that talk with his parents (mainly his mom) too. We also have to tell them that we'd like at least an hour or 2 to ourselves with our little girl after she's born. We live with his parents right now so we wouldn't really get that quiet "us" time with her when we get home as much as we want to.

I'm only nervous because we've asked his mom already to do some things (like keep baby's gender a secret) and she's apparently been telling people that colors like "green and purple are ok cause they match baby's room". She apparently thinks that because green can be for a boy and purple for a girl that means people won't figure it out. Uh news flash Ma, we would NOT use purple for a boy! But green can def be for a girl... ugh! She doesn't get it. We literally after having a conversation about this last night had to flat out say "do NOT say purple, AT ALL!"

DH is an only child so I understand they are super excited (as well as my family of course, I'm the oldest and this will be my parents first grandchild too), but I don't want the pictures up right away which means people will start flocking into the hospital. I'm afraid of random strangers, that MIL will think is completely fine, to just keep filing in. I'm definitely setting visitor hours!

Good luck OP! I know how you feel!

Ladiebug710 · March 2014

I'm a big believer in don't tell anyone until you are ready to tell everyone. If something is important to keep private, just don't tell anyone. You can ask them not to post pictures, or you can call them after you have delivered and have posted pictures yourself.

whse13kittens · March 2014

Thanks ladies. I'll have to re-hash the conversation with DH first, I guess. He doesn't think it is a big deal, and I'm sure his family will be the same way, especially because we both post a lot of pictures of ourselves and my stepsons (ages 16 and 12) on Facebook.

However, since LO isn't old enough to choose for himself what he shares and does not, I don't want 8bazillion photos posted -- not by anyone, myself or my husband/stepsons included. The older boys each have a Facebook account and the ability to say "please don't tag me in that" or "please take that down"...LO does not yet.

It's certainly going to be an interesting conversation. My family is much more private (they post less things than I do 98% of the time) so I worry less about them, though they will be getting the generic "please don't do this" talk from me as well.

Mrsgattis11 · March 2014

I don't want any pictures on little one posted until after baby is home from the hospital. Mine is because I have a sister who at this moment is extremely mad at me. Her kids were taken by the CPS and at the time I was living in a tiny one bedroom apartment and there wasn't any room for me to take them and CPS told me that I couldn't because they needed a room at least. I just don't want her to know when I am at the hospital and come and cause a scene and knowing her she would. I have been talking to the ones who would and explain it to them and everyone has been really understanding helps that DH backs me 100% and has been willing to talk to his family about it.

christieep · March 2014

We dealt with the same thing. I did the selfish mom thing too. We knew that DH's family would be the problem and I had him say something. I had one sister I thought might also be an issue so I just sent her a text to wait until we posted anything. Everyone respected our wishes surprisingly. We will have have to talk about whether or not we need to do it again.

We also were able to somehow in FB settings make it so people couldn't write on our wall.

whse13kittens · March 2014

@Babybarlow2014‌ I'm copying and pasting word for word for my husband to use

eghulse · March 2014

My family is the one I have to worry about, and they didn't take kindly to the request last time. Depending on how things go this time, I'm expecting a little more time in the hospital to ourselves because one of the parents will have DS, but we'll see. If he comes during the day I know the grandparents will want to come down, which means I better post pics as soon as I'm coherent enough to do so.

ns1 · March 2014

Good luck. Let me know if anything works. With MIL last time talking was no help. DD's pics were up in a matter of moments. I've just given in

ho11yday · March 2014

My mother in law treated SIL2 and I to a pedi/mani and a nice dinner as my baby shower. During that time, I politely said that DH and I would really appreciate if they let us announce when we had our baby as some of my family will not hear from us until afterward.

Because this is our second, I actually have to involve them as they will be watching DS. Last time, I just didn't tell anyone that we were in the hospital until after baby was born and I had the opportunity to share with everyone.

christieep · March 2014

ho11yday said:

During that time, I politely said that DH and I would really appreciate if they let us announce when we had our baby as some of my family will not hear from us until afterward

I like the wording used here. We had family and friends we wanted to notify personally and not find our the news on FB which was part of the reason we asked people to hold back. I will definitely include this in our request this time.

jenniferroshto · March 2014

We are only allowing DH in the room with me and have strict rules set on order of who comes in to see her first. DS and DD will come in first. Then grandparents. None of them are post happy and after they see her I don't care. I just want them to see her first.

hatrats · March 2014

I'm glad I read some of these responses. I didn't think this would be a big deal if someone posted pictures, but I really would rather not have the general public know we are at the hospital and start coming up there. We don't even plan to tell our parents until after the baby is born so we can have some private time, and I would really rather any visitors wait until we get home to come visit. So we will probably have to tell them no facebooking until we get home.

cbrust · March 2014

This is why I'm really glad we just moved out of state! My mom is a facebook picture whore. Literally her wall is littered with mobile uploads everyday of anything and everything. My in-laws will probably be living here come May, but I know that I don't even have to ask them not to post to FB. DH is under strict orders to text my mom when we go to the hospital and assure her that he will text her with any urgent news, but not to be expecting a play-by-play. She is the type of person that would be updating her/my facebook with texts from DH. Yeah, no. We will text the entire family the general announcement shortly after, but we won't be texting pictures/uploading to facebook until we are settled in and have had time to bond with LO. I'm really glad we aren't still living in my hometown where I know that dozens of people would "pop in!" for a visit in the hospital, unannounced. No thanks!

liz18t · March 2014

We don't put any pictures of LO on the internet at all, he is 3. It has honestly caused us more strife than we ever expected. We have had to ask friends, as well as family, to take pictures down. Many people are VERY unhappy about our decision. But we made it and we enforce it and expect our friends and family to respect our decision. We believe this will only get harder as he grows up and gets more cousins, friends, etc who are on FB. But again, we just nicely ask that the photo get taken down and then let the person know that we do not want him on FB or IG or anywhere.

pistolpackinmomma · March 2014

I said absolutely no posting pics on FB until we're ready and have done so ourselves or I would be extremely pissed. Maybe they just respect me or maybe I had scared them by threatening to withhold the baby over bigger things (TDAP vax) but they complied without asking questions. I also haven't had much issue with family posting pics (my mom took some in the fall and shared after asking me) but I don't know if it's because I was so strict about it in the beginning or if it's just common courtesy. We post pics of him though and our biggest problem actual seems to be them sharing those pics on their wall (therefore allowing people we don't know on their friends it's to see) all the time.

cnbean · March 2014

I would just make sure that they understand if they do not respect your wishes on this, there will be consequences. I know you have said in the past that your DH's family isn't your biggest fan, so I would be concerned they may do it just to spite you. If you are worried about that at all I would make sure to set very clear expectations and consequences.

It might be easiest to not tell anyone until after LO is here and you can get pics up. Good Luck!

Helmink0804 · March 2014

I won't mind people posting on FB that know we're at the hospital to wish their Good Lucks. I want to be the one to post the first picture to FB, if I haven't put anything up on FB yet when people come to visit I'll just ask them to hold off until I get to post first.

TaylorHam86 · March 2014

pistolpackinmomma said:
We post pics of him though and our biggest problem actual seems to be them sharing those pics on their wall (therefore allowing people we don't know on their friends it's to see) all the time.

That's another thing I'm worried about!

MissLadyTay · March 2014

We have a pretty strict policy against posting photos of our son. I post maybe 4-5 photos a year of him on Facebook, and they are flattering and usually of us as a family. I don't post photos or statuses that could embarrass him later. Sometimes my mom wants to post a photo of him and in that case I make her text it to me first so I can make sure it's not of him naked or covered in food or something. She doesn't always have the best judgment. I know our family thinks we're nutty about it. Don't care. We'll continue the same rules with this baby.

MissLadyTay · March 2014

One suggestion is to let your family "share" any photos you post. Or tag your parents in the birth announcement so their friends can see. I do this when I post so that my mom feels like she gets to show off her grandson.

IBackBevo · March 2014

Personally, I don't have this problem. My in-laws aren't on Facebook and I don't think my parents can even figure out how to post a picture. I guess there is some upside to them being semi-computer illiterate.

However, I would have your DH bring it up with them. I always think it is better to have anything like this come from the child/relative rather than the "in law." Especially if it might cause hurt feelings. However, he needs to make it seem like it is coming from the both of you and not just you. My 2 cents.

RedInLove · March 2014

We had the convo when we announced, we told all our family that we are not announcing the pg on FB so to please not do so. If they want to tell family and close friends that we're expecting, that was completely fine, as long as they told those people that we're not announcing on any social media. We told them when the time comes that we share the info on FB, then they can do the same after us.

So we will handle the birth the same way. We're likely not going to put out that I'm in labor, so that we don't have a bunch of people calling/texting/posting or coming to the hospital before we want to see anyone. Then we LO is here, we won't be allowing too many pictures taken beyond everyone having their pic taken while holding LO or something like that. We'll tell them that when we put an announcement on FB that she's here, then they can share the info on FB. When we put up a picture of LO on FB, then they can.

Anyone that doesn't respect our wishes will just not see LO very often, and they will be blocked from our posts and from tagging us, etc. on FB.

whse13kittens · March 2014

pistolpackinmomma said:

I said absolutely no posting pics on FB until we're ready and have done so ourselves or I would be extremely pissed. Maybe they just respect me or maybe I had scared them by threatening to withhold the baby over bigger things (TDAP vax) but they complied without asking questions. I also haven't had much issue with family posting pics (my mom took some in the fall and shared after asking me) but I don't know if it's because I was so strict about it in the beginning or if it's just common courtesy. We post pics of him though and our biggest problem actual seems to be them sharing those pics on their wall (therefore allowing people we don't know on their friends it's to see) all the time.

Ugh, I am trying not to think of this. I'm almost positive I can get them to back off and/or take down any pictures we ask them to (well, my husband asks them too...even as they roll their eyes at me, they'll do it for him) but sharing is a whole different story. I still have people I don't know walk up to me at my stepkids' functions to tell me how beautiful our wedding photos were. These are people my husband doesn't even know. Turns out my mother in law shared a bunch of our photos by saving them and reuploading them as public photos. Because she didn't tag us, we didn't see them. Not a fan of this

ThereBeDragons · March 2014

Our families have been very respectful of social media bans I think because we gave them a good reason to be (FIL did not know about the pregnancy until 26 weeks and we knew it'd be inappropriate to have him find out by way of my mom or sister posting something baby related). We intend to extend the same social media ban after baby is born for at least a day to give us the chance to share the news with everyone personally. As for photos- I'm not too strict about people posting photos of the kid so long as they let me have the first picture

RedInLove · March 2014

If I found someone posting pics in their feed that I didn't already have on FB, or doing something to go around our wishes, I'd report the photo to FB. Technically, anyone else posting a pic of LO without my consent violates the FB TOS and I can report the pic. If they didn't stop, I'd shut them out 100%, and anyone who enabled them after the fact. I don't have anyone that I think would be out of control, as long as they're not plastering my kid's picture publicly, but instead share the tasteful picture now and then, I'm fine with it. But we most definitely call dibs on the birth announcement and first photos.

awc1986 · March 2014

Thankfully I live 300 miles away from all my extended family, so pictures aren't an issue and they're more likely to PM or text me congrats. My dad is my only immediate family and he doesn't do Facebook. DH's family also aren't too bothered with FB and I'm sure they'd respect us if we said we didn't want a 3rd party announcement.

I did just AW on FB though. I've hardly said a thing about my pregnancy other than my 12 wk scan pic and a couple of PMs to friends. However, my basketball belly is so majestic today I couldn't help but post a pic. I don't think people mind. At least I'm not posting real time updates of my pregnancy every day like some people on my feed.

liz18t · March 2014

Bliz1712 I only will notice if it comes to my newsfeed and I see it. Or someone will tag me in the photo.

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