One of my daughter’s friends is expecting her first baby, and her mom will be flying cross-country to help her out for a time. I’ve heard of this arrangement lots of times.
My mom never had anyone come stay with her. When I was born, my folks lived 3000 miles from either set of parents. When my sibs were born, mom had experience, so she didn’t need help. As the oldest, I was involved to some degree with the care of my sibs, and coupling that with years of babysitting, I wasn’t worried about caring for my own daughter, so I didn’t ask either grandmother to help me.
If my daughter ever has a child, it’ll be her call whether she wants me there or not. I’m good either way.
Did you have help in the early days of motherhood? Did you give help to any of your offspring during the first weeks? If you plan on kids in the future, have you thought about whether you’ll ask someone to move in and help out for a while? Will the number of babies affect your decision? :eek::eek::eek::eek::eek:
We had three days in the hospital and then a solid week at home, just me, my husband, and the baby. And he had to go to work after the first couple of days. In a way it was hard not to have help, but in another way, we were such a hot mess than I’m glad no one saw it.
Then my parents came for a week (and took complete charge of food), then my husband’s parents came for a week (and the same). That was a big help. When the company cleared off, the baby and I had figured out the hard stuff and felt ready to get stuck in on our own.
I lived with my mom and it was a good thing because I din’ know nothin’ about birthin’ OR babies! I remember the first time she left me alone with the kid, I was petrified.
I later moved in with my grandmother, so I had training wheels for a good long time.
By the second kid, I was married and less clueless about babies, but my grandmother still came to stay with us for a while and I was happy to have her.
We were looking forward to having the time to ourselves and getting settled in without people under our feet. Our families live at the other end of the country so it wasn’t easy for them to get here anyway.
I had 2 weeks paternity leave anyway so we just took that time to get into a routine and apart from a few friends visiting it was a quiet period, a lovely time. The Ashes cricket was on the telly (2005…great series) so much time was spent sprawled on the sofa, baby daughter asleep in a basket, watching cricket… I’m not sure what we would have needed help with. I kept the house clean, cooked and washed while my wife kept herself rested and the baby fed.
I was never a young mother ;), but when my wife was, neither of our moms provided significant assistance. When my daughter recently gave birth, her husband had an extensive paternity leave.
As I understand from my wife, after our first child, she had no need for constant assistance, although it might have been nice to have someone occasionally assist her as needed. (As one might imagine - though she didn’t really need/want help, she would have liked to have been ASKED. My mom was just unpleasant, her mom was drunk.) Assistance would have been more appreciated with subsequent births, when she had young kids to care for.
IMO a wildcard is the ease/complications of the birth. My daughter had a rough pregnancy and C-section. She was very happy to have her husband at home helping out.
I’m pretty sure my wife would have considered it a considerable imposition for even a competent, well-intentioned mother to move in with her after any of her births.
The thought of the Grandmother from Hell moving in after any of our births is enough to scare a bunny out of having babies. There was help from neighbors and friends, and to neighbors and friends, but it didn’t involve any invasions.
Ed and Judy had her parents living with them when they had both babies, but it was because Judy’s father had ASL. On one hand her mother was help, on the other it was a hindrance; the territorial issues were huge. And the father was jealous of the grandkids :smack:
When my wife had her baby, her mother came to visit about a week later. The first week I spent at home and by the time I was heading back to work, she came to assist for maybe a week. It was welcome help since I couldn’t just stay up all night long to let my wife get full blocks of sleep. Her family lives in Virginia and we’re near Chicago so it was also grandma’s chance to see the baby in general and spend time with her daughter.
When I had my kids in the mid-2000s, it seemed pretty common for the new mom to have assistance, either her mom or mother-in-law.
Personally, it would have been more of a hassle to deal with my mother or mother-in-law than the help we would get, so we did not invite anyone to come help us out.
My friends and I all had our kids from 1998 to 2004, none of us had mothers or mothers-in-law come stay with us. I just don’t think it was done.
My in-laws lived about 15 minutes off in the same town and my parents about 45 minutes away in the neighboring county. I think they would have come and stayed if I asked, but there was no need. I’m sure spending that much time together, we would have ended up on each others nerves. Plus, they had jobs and/or volunteer work and stuff they were involved in. I would never expect them to take vacation or time off from that to take care of me.
They would come by and hang out with me and the baby during the day occasionally in the first few months before I went back to work. Maybe once a week, but always with calling and arranging it first. Maybe they would do dishes or other cleaning just to feel useful, but mostly they would fuss over my son and keep me company.
My son doesn’t have kids yet (he’s only 19), but I suppose in the future if his wife really wanted me to come and stay with her, I would.
My first one was born in the mid 1970’s. I hear they don’t keep jaundiced babies in the hospital any more due to insurance changes and bili-blanket technology. We were in the hospital for six days, with him under the lights and wearing his mini-sunglasses. So I was pretty much back on my feet by the time we got home.
My mom came out to visit/help, but the visit was more important than the help, by then.
My mother came for three weeks when my older son was born. By the time number two son came along, hubby and I felt equipped to deal with it on our own. Having no siblings or young cousins, etc., my baby knowledge wasn’t great, so I was very grateful to my mom for making the trip for my first.
In the mid 90s, with the first baby, I had a friend with me during the day for about three days. She was a big help. That was the time of 24-hour hospital stays following delivery, and husband had a sales job and was given a whopping two days off. I had a lot of infant experience, but no experience with how wrecked and tired I was going to be. Yay for friends.
With the second baby, Mother-in-law stayed at our house with child #1. We came home from the hospital just as Princess Diana’s car crash was being reported on the networks, and from there it got really bizarre. There were definitely a lot of people around and it was a memorable week. And the third baby was born into a house full of caregivers. So yes, I’ve always had somebody assisting and I’ve been thankful for it. I would do so if I were asked.
When I had my first, we moved from Alaska to Tennessee when she was 3 weeks old. The first 3 weeks I was on my own. In TN the baby and I stayed with my mother, who despite her promises, only wanted to do fun stuff like hold the baby and bathe her. I did not feel this was the help I needed, since I was expected to do laundry, wash dishes, etc. while she cuddled my baby.
My daughter was incredibly competent with her babies, and I contributed mostly by making some meals for the first few weeks.
Well, my mother came out. I wouldn’t say she helped.
Wait, I guess she did. The thing is that with the second one, you need someone to hang out at home with the first one, in case things happen in the middle of the night. She did that. It all happened in the middle of the night, and we were all back home by 11 the next day, but…if not for her we would have had to wake up and drag a two-year-old to the hospital. (Or not go which, the way things turned out, would also have worked.)
Now I was summoned to my son and DIL’s for a similar thing, in case things happened in the middle of the night, and they did. Home birth, not planned that way, but they did all take off for the hospital and I was there for the two-year-old.
Both sets of parents came for about 2 weeks each, one after the other, when our son was born. Although I did not begrudge them the experience, it probably would have been easier on me if they hadn’t come. We were living in Maputo, Mozambique when it was still pretty underdeveloped, so we had limited access to “normal” grocery stores, restaurants, and the like. In order to host people, I had to make sure I could provide three meals a day for my guests, since they didn’t have the option of hitting a local coffee shop, ordering pizza, etc.
Fortunately I wasn’t working, so I spent my 9th month of pregnancy cooking like a fiend and freezing everything. That meant I was able to keep my guests properly fed at the same time I was learning the ropes as a new mother.
My in-laws were easy to have around, but my father-in-law was in poor health so my mother-in-law spent most of her energy making sure my FIL was okay, and didn’t really do anything to help with our son.
My parents were a bit more helpful - though she hadn’t worked as a nurse in years, my mother was an RN, which was nice.
Now that I think of “other ways to help”, we did do the opposite for my brothers’ births. Dad and I (and Ed for Jay’s birth) stayed at Abuelita’s house, as she lived in the same town where the hospital was. We stayed there the one or two nights Mom and the newborn were kept in the hospital. Short stay, but being in a known house is a lot better than being in a BnB!
My cousin cooked a month’s worth of dinners and put them in our freezer. That was pretty great.
Our government at the time was running a program, where if you left hospital after 24 hrs or something, a nurse-midwife would visit you at home every day for the next week. That was awesome, because she could tailor her advice and problem-solving to exactly our situation.
When our second was born, my parents looked after our first. My partner took 2 weeks off work both times (no paternity leave at his company).
I like my mum, and get on fine with her, but having her stay would be very stressful for us both.
Back in Madeira, after you’ve had your first baby, tradition is your mum comes to stay for a couple of weeks.
Even though I’m English, my Madeiran mum came to stay. She was wonderful.
I also had a health visitor come around, it was a godsend.
Second baby, you still get a health visitor but no mummy.
It was great, but I like my mum, I suppose if you don’t, it would be a nightmare.
( I have friends who love their mums but don’t like them.)
I have two daughters, if my wheelchair using self can do anything, I’ll be there.
If I’m asked.
My situation is a bit different, our daughter is adopted. We brought her home a day before her first birthday. Her foster mother spoke mostly Spanish, so we were t sure if language would be an issue, on top of her being with two complete strangers after living with her foster mom from when she was 5 days old. She adjusted beautifully and the language didn’t appear to be a barrier. We did not have help and I wouldn’t have wanted it, we really needed time to make her comfortable and to know she was safe. I don’t know if I ever told this story here, but when we got her, the first night we were in a hotel in Guatemala and she cried and cried for what seemed like hours. We had people, Guatemalans knock on our door a few times and very kindly ask if we needed help with the baby or if we needed anything, etc. You could just tell it was out of kindness. I said to my husband later, had we been in the states I think people would’ve been banging on our door complaining and not offer help. I cannot say enough about the hearts of the people we met the few days we were there.
