Hi, I’m not a Gran, but a first time mum hoping you lovely ladies can offer some advice. I’ve chosen to post here instead of mumsnet as I’m hoping to avoid this turning into a huge anti mil thread.
I want to start by saying that love my mil dearly, she’s a good woman who obviously adores my baby, she & I have always had a good relationship.
This may be quite long so please bear with me......
I gave birth to my first child, a son 19 weeks ago. This is the first gc on both sides of the family, so as you can imagine, very much loved.
Both my own mum & mil came to visit us at the first possible opportunity, the same 1hr visiting slot when my ds was less than 10hrs old. They were both obviously very excitited, but spent the whole visit commenting things such as ‘he’s hungry’ ‘you need to change him’ ‘he probably needs to be winded’ ‘you should hold him differently’ I found this VERY overwhelming & cried when they left (I don’t blame them at all, rather my my crazy new mum hormones 
) however since then my dh has been very protective of me when it comes to both our mums being what he deems overbearing.
My dh & mil are very similar, & have butted heads several times since my ds was born. These are usually over stupid things, such as my mil removing bottles from my steriliser and rewashing them because she wanted them washing ‘the way I think they should be done’ & a really stupid argument because my mil didn’t think dh should talk about his workday (he does quite a dangerous job) in front of our sleeping 3 week old ds. They’ve also had disagreements over the fact that ds is still predominantly & when dh asked mil to bring fewer gifts.
These arguments always finished as quickly as they started, until a few weeks ago when I left my mil alone with my ds in our lounge while I tidied my kitchen. My dh walked into the room the hear my mil saying ‘you can tell nanny all the nasty thing mummy does to you. Mummy’s a naughty lady, but nanny loves you. Nanny will sort it out’. My husband was furious, and made her leave our house before I even knew what had happened. I admit that I was hurt when my dh told me what happened, I was shocked that my mil would even jokingly imply I was a bad mum. I didn’t think this was worth a family fallout, I convinced my dh to allow me to invite my mil again a few days later (he was at work). My mil apologied, & although things have been slightly tense between them since, I thought things were back on track.
Then on Friday everything went wrong. My dh had been working away, due home that day, & I had invited my mil round for coffee with me & my ds. After a cuppa & catch-up I asked mil if she would mind occupying ds while I had a shower. This not only allows her to have a little alone time with ds, but is a massive help for me too. (After my ds was born he was diagnosed with a slight health problem. He is on the mend now, but still under the care of a paediatric consultant. Partly due to this & also because he is still so young, neither me or dh are comfortable with anybody taking ds. We try to make up for this by allowing ‘alone time in our house’) DH arrived home earlier than expected, walked into the bedroom where I was getting dressed and asked where ds was. I went downstairs to find my ds, mil & pram gone. She turned up 15 minutes later, saying she needed to bond with or ds away from me so that he knew ‘she was just as important as mummy’. My husband was furious (this was made worse by the fact ds was sobbing his heart out), spoke very harshly to mil, & told her to stay away from my dh & I.
Dh has since told me that she is no longer allowed around ds until she learns to respect me as a mother & the boundaries we choose.
I’m torn, I don’t want to argue with my husband, and I’m so angry at my mil (mainly for doing something so stupid after I’d fought to get dh to forgive her in the past), but she loves my ds so much, I don’t want him to miss out on a relationship with her. I also think it was would be so sad if the relationship between my dh & mil broke down. How can I start to mend fences?
Sorry again for the length of this post, any advice would be greatly appreciated.
