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WWYD
My MIL and I normally get along great. She has always stayed out of our business and kept her opinions to herself. Fast forward to finding out I was pregnant and she has turned into the MIL of my nightmares.
She is constantly calling me "mama" and I have kindly reminded her that I all ready have three kids and she never called me that before so please don't start now.
She is setting up her own nursery at her
house. LO will not be spending the night there anytime soon, sorry.
She told my husband that any day she has off work I best let her watch the baby. Um, maybe sometimes but she works at a school so she has all summer off and wants baby all summer too. She has never offered this with my other three. And I don't want LO to get into a routine with a sitter to have it completely disrupted. I understand she will want time with LO but.....
She called around checking on babysitters/daycare centers to get pricing, hours, etc. Um, you aren't paying the bill and you aren't the one who is going to be dealing with these people so back off. So she took it upon herself to call her sister to see if she would watch Lo. Which is an option we have talked about but still wanted to sit down and talk to DH aunt ourselves.
Wow, sorry that was longer than I planned. And yes I have told DH that he needs to talk to his mom and he laughed at first but is now also annoyed after the calling of babysitters. But he doesn't want to hurt his mom's feelings. If he doesn't soon I think I am going off on her.
Re: WWYD
This would pisss me off even more in your situation because you have other kids. If she doesnt treat them as grandkids, I would be irritated because your other kids arent going to understand the obvious favoritism and will have hurt feelings. While I can understand that she is excited from what I'm presuming will be her first grandchild, its pretty crappy if she can't see that her actions will cause issues with the other kids.
I would also just be annoyed that she's being so pushy. I would definitely have DH talk to her. FWIW I can totally see my FIL acting this way when I get pregnant, its one of the main reasons I can't wait to move and definitely dont want to have kids while we live here. He is annoying enough when its just us.
If DH talking to her doesnt help, I would explain to her as nicely as possible the effect her behavior will have on your other kiddos to I guess guilt her into backing off.
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Lucy Elizabeth 10.27.12
We need to form a BSC Grandma-to-be club. Your MIL can be president, mine VP.
Ok, all kidding aside, your H needs to talk to her. I had the talk with my mom this weekend and it actually wasn't that traumatic. (My mom isn't the one who is driving us crazy with baby stuff but it was a good start.) I basically told her that we know they are excited, we want them to enjoy this time and have fun with it but that we need to be able to enjoy it too. I reminded her of how excited she was when she was expecting me and how upset she would be if someone tried to take that from her. I reminded her of all of the special moments, the firsts, etc and that those are our moments to celebrate as a family.
We are talking to MIL next weekend and we are expecting some tears but if we don't have this little "coming to Jesus" now, we will be miserable for years to come. R isn't happy about having to have this talk but he knows it's for the best and if he doesn't tell her, I will.
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Yeah, it definitely helps if he is a willing participant. I had the argument that MIL was a shiitty mother (which is something he has said several times) and that if we were going to provide a better life for our child we needed to do this. He agreed to it for that reason.
Even if your H is not as involved as you would like, I would talk to her sooner rather than waiting until it builds up and you go off. Your reasons for wanting her to back off are completely valid and the earlier all expectations are level-set, the earlier everyone can get to the fun part of celebrating baby. I think he should be a part of the conversation but if he absolutely won't and doesn't mind you talking to her, I'd say go for it.