Hello. It is 6am on xmas eve and I've been awake since 5! I seem to have a bit of pre-baby insomnia. I woke up thinking about how I need to get a garbage can with a lid for the baby's room - on top of the diaper genie. I know, such important details! How will I ever accomplish finding a garbage can???
More desperately, how am I going to negotiate ALL THIS (not the garbage can) with my mother? As the pregnancy goes on, every time I see her I feel completely overwhelmed by her. I think I've mentioned my recurring nightmares where she prevents me from breastfeeding by stealing the baby away while I'm sleeping? (This actually happened to her, which I didn't know until AFTER I started having the dream. She wanted to breast-feed me, and her mother strongly discouraged it.) In reality, she's totally supportive of breastfeeding, that's not the point. BUT, she keeps GIVING me stuff without asking first. I know I sound really ungrateful, but this is obviously bringing up some pretty deep mother-daughter dynamic stuff for me. For example, she had a family heirloom bassinet refinished for me (without asking if I wanted it). This was something that freaked me out b/c since the baby will be sleeping in it as a newborn, there are safety concerns and as his MOTHER it is something that I wanted to pick out myself. (I am the MOTHER here, right? Or perhaps I'm still struggling to convince myself.) Anyway, now she's brought up the bassinet and while it's okay now that I've removed the bumper that surely would have suffocated him in his sleep (I'm only sort of kidding), it's still not exactly what I would have picked out b/c I think he'll outgrow it before we are ready to put him in the crib in his own room. (we were thinking when he goes down to about one feeding per night - maybe at 3 mos or so. my God I have no idea what I'm talking about or what I'm doing.) But even if I have no idea, I have to figure this out for myself.
On a less serious note, she's bought us SO MANY (without asking) cloth diapers from ebay. yes we are planning on using cloth, but USED diapers would not have been my first choice. Perhaps that's silly and I would have changed my mind. But I would have liked her to ASK first.
Ack!
Derek says I have to talk to her about this. But how do I do it without offending her and feeling like an ungrateful wretch, or turning into a psychological 2 yr old screaming for my independence??? Of note, I've historically been the more "independent" daughter. I went away to college at 17 and my parents pretty much left me alone - maybe too much. Now this - a total turnaround.
Merry xmas eve - I'm going to try to go back to sleep now.
More desperately, how am I going to negotiate ALL THIS (not the garbage can) with my mother? As the pregnancy goes on, every time I see her I feel completely overwhelmed by her. I think I've mentioned my recurring nightmares where she prevents me from breastfeeding by stealing the baby away while I'm sleeping? (This actually happened to her, which I didn't know until AFTER I started having the dream. She wanted to breast-feed me, and her mother strongly discouraged it.) In reality, she's totally supportive of breastfeeding, that's not the point. BUT, she keeps GIVING me stuff without asking first. I know I sound really ungrateful, but this is obviously bringing up some pretty deep mother-daughter dynamic stuff for me. For example, she had a family heirloom bassinet refinished for me (without asking if I wanted it). This was something that freaked me out b/c since the baby will be sleeping in it as a newborn, there are safety concerns and as his MOTHER it is something that I wanted to pick out myself. (I am the MOTHER here, right? Or perhaps I'm still struggling to convince myself.) Anyway, now she's brought up the bassinet and while it's okay now that I've removed the bumper that surely would have suffocated him in his sleep (I'm only sort of kidding), it's still not exactly what I would have picked out b/c I think he'll outgrow it before we are ready to put him in the crib in his own room. (we were thinking when he goes down to about one feeding per night - maybe at 3 mos or so. my God I have no idea what I'm talking about or what I'm doing.) But even if I have no idea, I have to figure this out for myself.
On a less serious note, she's bought us SO MANY (without asking) cloth diapers from ebay. yes we are planning on using cloth, but USED diapers would not have been my first choice. Perhaps that's silly and I would have changed my mind. But I would have liked her to ASK first.
Ack!
Derek says I have to talk to her about this. But how do I do it without offending her and feeling like an ungrateful wretch, or turning into a psychological 2 yr old screaming for my independence??? Of note, I've historically been the more "independent" daughter. I went away to college at 17 and my parents pretty much left me alone - maybe too much. Now this - a total turnaround.
Merry xmas eve - I'm going to try to go back to sleep now.
posted by Melissa at 5:48 AM
4 Comments:
Let me just add a few instaces to put this in context. Some other things that she has gotten us without asking:
1) MORE used diapers. This is really just the second batch.
2) A Mobile. I'm pretty sure she knew that we had already picked one out months ago in Mexico. It was the first item we bought for the baby and was "special."
3) Clothes. For example, the girls clothes that she got before knowing the sex. Although this will not be an issue now, we would have had a major problem dressing a girl in the "butt ruffle" outfit. This was after we specifically said we wanted gender-neutral clothes only.
There are dozens more examples like this. We are grateful to have her support and it's nice not to save the time and money of buying a lot of this stuff. But there's a lot of stuff that as parents we want to be involved in choosing. Choosing stuff is part of being a parent, and at times it feels like we're not being allowed that opportunity.
Ack. Sometimes you make me really happy that my parents are totally neglectful. And I am not being at all sarcastic.
I think Eumaios' last paragraph puts it awfully well. It does seem like you are going to have to find a way to say this to her, Liss. In some ways it is worse than a parent who keeps barging in with advice (what my grandparents did to Dad and R) because in your case it involves all this STUFF. Maybe I just think that's worse because I am a stuff-phobic NY'er.
In any case, not getting to choose all your own stuff sucks. In my not-at-all-frugal opinion, you should continue to buy what you want and donate any of the stuff that she gives you and you don't want to charity.
It's time to get a little heartless with your mom, my sweet.
How was the rest of Christmas?
Well first of all, Merry Christmas! I hope you're feeling well. Second, being pregnant and then becoming a parent brought out a lot of nasty feelings in me about my parents because of the way they approached the whole thing. Watch out- you think she's bad now, she will go C-R-A-Z-Y once the baby is born. I think what other people say about addressing the problem is probably a good option, but just know that it could start a conflict that you may or may not be up for dealing with at the moment. I think waiting and seeing what she is like once the baby comes is a valid option too. New issues may arise at that point anyway.
I hope you are well and am excited for you and D!
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