No visitors at the hospital

They'll be home in no time, and they he older they get the more interesting they are - even your grandchildren! Mine are now 3, 6 and 10, and I see them in the holidays and whenever I can. We do plenty of FaceTime calls as well, and we're able take an interest in their activities.

“I’m absolutely baffled that you feel so desperate to visit the baby in hospital. Don’t you think it’s fair that the new mother might like a day, a few days, even a week or so, before seeing anyone? It won’t make a scrap of difference to the baby, nor to your future relationship or role as a grandparent. Why on earth would you be so upset? They’ll take lots of photos, what difference do you expect to make? Give them as much time as they want and don’t make it all about your feelings - you’ve had your turn as a new mother, just let this go.”

Totally agree with twiglet77. OP your reaction is over the top.

It’s hard, OP, but sadly this seems to be a fashion now.
I do find it odd that not even grandparents are allowed to visit. Dh and I met all 3 Gdcs within a few hours of birth. And I’m sure dd would have been happy to see the ILs, too, only they live a 3 hour drive away, so their first visit was later.

I know I’m lucky that dd is a very chilled type, though.
At 3 weeks her 3rd baby was taken to visit the other grandparents, and was passed around for cuddles with a lot of family and friends, no problem.
Some people on MN would have forty fits, I know!

YABU. Did you honestly want your own parents and inlaws crowding around the newborn?

One thing I valued about my hospital deliveries was that visits were carefully controlled.
When I had a homebirth my room seemed to be filled with wellwishers. DH was even allowing random neighbours in until i told him to please say no. He was so proud.

I remember wishing desperately that this wife of a colleague of DH would leave me in peace with my baby.

All she wanted was to tell me about her own birth experiences.

My DMiL was the perfect visitor. She arrived with a fabulous homecooked meal for us, and champagne, had a quick cuddle and then left us alone.

It never even occurred to me to be upset because i didn't get invited to see my new grandson in hospital.
They sent photos and were home the next day and we went round then.
Please don't let this spoil things - it really, really doesn't matter. Hopefully they will send you photo's. What does matter is all the joy you will have over the coming days, months and years

I loved my home births. The house was crowded with visitors soon afterwards, my mum and her two sisters came and brought food, made endless cups of tea and played with my three year old. Two elderly neighbours visited (separately) - one had never had children, I will never forget the look of joy on their faces as they held my newly born baby. The house felt full of love for this new little soul. My husband and I had endless hours day and night to just bond.

But times and attitudes change, we have to go with it and keep our feelings to ourselves. In the long term it doesn’t make a lot of difference to our future relationship with our grandchildren and it’s important to bear in mind we (hopefully) have years ahead of us to love them.

Please just go with the 'flow'. Believe you me the flow will change time and time again"! I know it hurts but stay quiet and calm.

For goodness sake!! Anyone would think you were being banned for life! Every new Mum has her own way of introducing her new baby to everyone. Be happy for her and be pleased and grateful when invited to your first meeting.

I feel these new, with emphasis on new parents are being very silly and I wonder where this trend has come from, which baby-rearing manual is promoting this.

That said, you will meet the baby soon enough; there is little to make you' tear up and and be heartbroken' and say'my joy has gone' before the baby is even born. Perhaps they know you are over emotional and it is this which makes them want to be alone with the baby.
And do not get into a competition of being first granny.

"Heartbroken" - "My joy is gone."

Kindly - this is a huge overreaction. There will be lots of precious moments to come with this new baby. Let them do it their way. It is not a judgement on you - it is just how they want to play this.

But more importantly the way you respond to this will set the tone for your relationship with your son and this little family in the years to come. If you get upset they will back off and be treading on eggshells with you, and it will spoil things for them and for your future with them. If you smile and say you respect that and will look forward to seeing baby when it suits them, you will be getting off on the right foot and setting the tone for the future - a future where they feel secure that you will respect their wishes and not overstep the mark.

Take a deep breath - put on that smiling face - send them your love.

good advise from others.. I don't think I saw my parents for a couple of weeks and he was a first GC.. it's become very normal now to have this little family bonding experience.. just give them space and love

When I had my three in the 70’s, we were in hospital for a week. It was the norm for family to visit, not just the grandparents. All three were in the special nursery, so my visitors never saw them. Visiting time was very limited, unlike today, so it was good to have a little bit of company during the one hour visiting time in the afternoon and evening. DH was at work, so could only visit in the evenings. I wouldn’t have wanted too many visitors to the house though if I was home with a new baby one day after the birth. I would have ‘allowed’ my mum though.

I teach antenatal classes for the NCT and recently retired from midwifery. Over the past 40+ years I’ve witnessed many trends come and go. Currently it’s very fashionable’ for new parents to say eg ‘no visitors at all for 2 weeks so we can bond with the baby and find our feet’. Some parents also specify that no one apart from themselves are to cuddle the baby until eg s/he is 6 weeks old/ has had first vaccines etc. They believe this will protect the baby from catching infections (whereas evidence says a healthy baby builds the best immune system by being cuddled by different - healthy - people). When parents express such plans in antenatal classes, I gently try to suggest alternatives but many go on to carry out their plans and often wind up exhausted and confused as they try to ‘go it alone’. I’m sharing this as context which I hope it’s helpful. All these ideas are perpetuated by social media along with a (to me) rather romanticised and unrealistic description of the early days as being ‘a magical baby bubble’. I hope I don’t sound cynical because I’m not! The early days and weeks with a new baby can include many magical moments but it takes a village to raise a child and the support of experienced, tactful and supportive grandparents can increase those magical moments one hundred-fold!

It was the NCT classes that resulted in my son and his wife having a strict set of rules for when the baby arrived which I found very extreme ( and I’m someone that didn’t want people picking up my baby, kissing her etc). What was good about it though was it gave them a group of friends that became a good support group; they’re still friends years later. When they had their second child everything was far more relaxed.

Mwdebbie respectfully that is a lot of nonsense. People unknowingly carry viruses that are potentially lethal to newborn babies. It's recommended yes, that healthy people may visit. Turn away anyone with so much as a sniffle and visitors should be for short periods at reasonable intervals to avoid overstimulation for the baby with brief holding sessions and no kissing or touching the mouth. That's after a thorough hand wash. Add that to the knowledge that it takes a baby 2 months or so to form a properly functioning immune system and they can do so just as well with just parental input, having 2 weeks before visits is rather a reasonable request.

When I had my first baby in 1974 we were kept in hospital for a week, and only the father was allowed to visit. Once I got home it was still several days before our parents were able to get away together to visit us. With the second one I was out in 24 hours and my mother in law was staying with us to "help". Total nightmare as she spent most of the time having funny turns and it was a relief when she went home. By this time we had moved 300 miles away so both sets of grandparents saw very little of the new baby.

I know someone who’s a paediatrician in a hospital and they said there are a lot of respiratory viruses going around at the moment that are affecting babies so I feel that babies do need to be protected from them and not exposed to them at the moment.

I know nobody is really interested in my view on "where these fads come from" but some of us wanted the perfect no-vists no-people respite all those years ago.

I had my parents visit when asked not to "just yet" for our first born but baby 2 was a perfect postpartum period. Born at home and then just the four of us. We had moved abroad and our friends there respected our wishes.
This was the most beautiful, precious and magical time.
It didn't really happen again for babies 3, 4 and 5 as older children wanted to go to swimming or dancing or whatever.

Please allow them to have it "their" way. Send a food delivery from (say) "Cook foods" or "Waitrose" or whoever and when you do visit, take them dinner!

There was no social media 50 years ago.

Just saying.

NotSpaghetti

I know nobody is really interested in my view on "where these fads come from" but some of us wanted the perfect no-vists no-people respite all those years ago.

I had my parents visit when asked not to "just yet" for our first born but baby 2 was a perfect postpartum period. Born at home and then just the four of us. We had moved abroad and our friends there respected our wishes.
This was the most beautiful, precious and magical time.
It didn't really happen again for babies 3, 4 and 5 as older children wanted to go to swimming or dancing or whatever.

Please allow them to have it "their" way. Send a food delivery from (say) "Cook foods" or "Waitrose" or whoever and when you do visit, take them dinner!

There was no social media 50 years ago.

Just saying.

I agree.

Mum had a small child at home when I had my first. We did it all alone, though less than a mile from both mums. Wonderful.

That continued with all our children. Four over 20 years. At the last our mums were quite old and very happy to leave us to it.

Mwdebbie

I teach antenatal classes for the NCT and recently retired from midwifery. Over the past 40+ years I’ve witnessed many trends come and go. Currently it’s very fashionable’ for new parents to say eg ‘no visitors at all for 2 weeks so we can bond with the baby and find our feet’. Some parents also specify that no one apart from themselves are to cuddle the baby until eg s/he is 6 weeks old/ has had first vaccines etc. They believe this will protect the baby from catching infections (whereas evidence says a healthy baby builds the best immune system by being cuddled by different - healthy - people). When parents express such plans in antenatal classes, I gently try to suggest alternatives but many go on to carry out their plans and often wind up exhausted and confused as they try to ‘go it alone’. I’m sharing this as context which I hope it’s helpful. All these ideas are perpetuated by social media along with a (to me) rather romanticised and unrealistic description of the early days as being ‘a magical baby bubble’. I hope I don’t sound cynical because I’m not! The early days and weeks with a new baby can include many magical moments but it takes a village to raise a child and the support of experienced, tactful and supportive grandparents can increase those magical moments one hundred-fold!

Sure but surely you recognize the difference between no visitors and cuddlers for six weeks as compared to no visitors in the hospital. Which at this point is generally a single day - the first day - while mom and baby are fresh from delivery and wanting to do skin to skin them and just begin to learn to breastfeed ? A single day in the hospital is not going to leave the new parents frustrated and burnt out trying to go it alone, it will simply give them a moment to breathe.

NotSpaghetti

I know nobody is really interested in my view on "where these fads come from" but some of us wanted the perfect no-vists no-people respite all those years ago.

I had my parents visit when asked not to "just yet" for our first born but baby 2 was a perfect postpartum period. Born at home and then just the four of us. We had moved abroad and our friends there respected our wishes.
This was the most beautiful, precious and magical time.
It didn't really happen again for babies 3, 4 and 5 as older children wanted to go to swimming or dancing or whatever.

Please allow them to have it "their" way. Send a food delivery from (say) "Cook foods" or "Waitrose" or whoever and when you do visit, take them dinner!

There was no social media 50 years ago.

Just saying.

This! I was perfect happy to largely go it alone ! For all five of mine and that was decades ago. Especially that first week or two when I was so exhausted and recovering , nursing seemingly around the clock .

I totally understand where they are coming from but alot of these people HAVE to put boundaries in place because of the way family members act. The stories you read on JustNOMIL are horrible. Grandparents coming over and hogging the baby, not giving back back when crying, overstaying their welcome, giving advice when not asked, not being helpful (eating or having tea but
not washing up). I get it. When I had my baby, all I wanted was to just come home and relax. Instead MIL, FIL, BIL and 2 X SILs were in the driveway by the time we pulled in. They stayed for 10 hours. I barely got to hold my baby. I was tired, struggling with learning to breastfeed (MIL thought she knew best and wanted me to get my boob out Infront of everyone so she could show me), and wanted to be alone. I was forced to stay in the lounge room. I was bleeding and in pain. After they stayed, the sink was piled high was dishes, it was horrible. They then proceeded to call every single day wanting to come over and bombarded us with texts for pictures and updates. It was overwhelming.

My coworker who was due 3 months after me, her MIL came over straight away too and lied about being sick. Baby was hospitalised with Covid.

Asking for space is not the end of the world. Give them space to adjust and settle in first. They will appreciate it. Drop off some meals without asking to meet baby but let them know you are there if they need any help.

The hate towards mothers who choose this way is astounding. You had your chance, you wanted visitors? Great for you. Not everyone feels the same way. My first experience was robbed and I'll never forget it.

Postnatal wards are notoriously hellish and much worse than when I gave birth in the 1990s.

In the 1990s yes there were women being wheeled up and settled in the bay during the night and the noise of all our babies and the metal bin lid clanging shut and the sound of midwives talking or caring for patients. It was exhausting but now …

Wards and bays designed for 8 mothers and babies also housing partners sometimes 24/7, some of whom are utterly selfish. Widespread flouting of visiting hours so some beds surrounded by noisy visitors for hours with staff to scared of aggression or too busy, or too lazy to ask them to leave. Patients and visitors making loud calls on speaker through the night, watching football, playing noisy games and watching content without earphones or the sound muted night and day; men and visitors using the toilets and showers intended for patients instead of leaving the ward to do so as per the signs so women struggle to find windows to go to the loo or shower when their baby is settled and face filthy facilities when they do. They are often heated to hellish temperatures with no opening windows.

The friends of my daughter who have had babies in the last 5 years all left the hospital wrecked as much by the lack of sleep and stress as by the physical toll of their delivery. People are now usually discharged within 24 hours unless there are complications so they are still in the first throes of lochia, after pains, stitches, first shit post baby, heel pricks for baby and checks. It’s a bit of a whirlwind.

My mum was in a nursing home for a week with limited visiting and us in a night nursery so emerged rested and feeling more like herself. She had a hairdresser come round to give her a shampoo and set 😂
I think nurseries disappeared long before I gave birth but behaviour on wards was much better and they were less chaotic than now and it was still exhausting.

With most men getting paternity leave these days, I think apart from a short visit or two if welcomed by the parents soon after the a baby arrives, it’s nice to give the new parents that time to bond with the new baby, - whilst urging them to give you a shout if they are up for visitors or dinner bringing or making. If I was a dad facing going back to work full time so soon after a new baby I don’t think I’d want to spend too much of that two weeks hosting visitors. As the mother of girls I’d anticipate helping out more when SIL goes back to work but that would be me helping around the house and cooking so my daughter can eat and focus on her baby, not me sat on the sofa gazing at the baby while she shuffles around making me tea or “getting on with the housework” . Obviously I’ll be dying to cuddle the baby as you are, but it will happen. Initially though. The most important thing is the baby’s health and needs and the new family. I think we have to adjust to what they need at just an extraordinary time. For some that might mean mum moving in for a month to help, for others it might mean a bit of space until their baby latches, mum is in less pain and less weepy and all have found their feet again.

It won’t affect anybody else’s bond with the baby unless they are determined it will be so.

As an aside, in case you are not aware, it has been recommended that people do not kiss young babies hands or face for a number of years now. This is because small babies can have very serious and occasionally fatal complications if they contract the common herpes cold sore virus. Contrary to popular opinion the antibody protection derived from the birth process and from the mother is limited. So if your son and daughter-in-law tell you this please don’t assume this is just another example of them being precious and ruining everything, it is routine advice and evidence based best practice.

The hate toward mothers ....... good grief!!! What hate and it's the OP whose accused of over reacting.

4 pages of replies to OP’s request for “words of wisdom”.

I have 5 which sum IMHO it up
It’s not all about you.