Family Matters
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Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Married and Moving Away from Parents
My husband and I will be married for two years in October and we are expecting our first child in July this year. We could not be happier!! My MIL lives an hour away from us and has just bought a new house and moved into it. We are buying her old house and we are planning on moving in September. We will be about 20 mins from my MIL, 1 hour from my parents, and 1 hour from my FIL. My mom is taking it very hard and keeps trying to make me feel guilty. (Whether she is doing it intentionally I do not know). She keeps making comments of that I will be close to my husbands family now and wont be close to her, she wont ever get to see the baby, she is just sad not mad,etc. We currently live in my parents other house, so I have also heard the comments of your dad has done so much to fix up that house and now you are just going to leave. Those comments hurt and they hurt to be quite honest. She has got to understand this is what we want. How do you deal with clingy parents that aren't open to any change at all? I dont want to be mean or hurtful to her but its not fair how she is making me feel about moving. I really wish she would just say Im happy for you, I want you to be happy, etc. I dont know if it is all the horomones from being pregnant but this really does upset me. 
Any advice would be so much appreciated!!!
Any advice would be so much appreciated!!!
Re: Married and Moving Away from Parents
I don't think it's pregnancy hormones, your Mom is being ridiculous. I can only fathom how upsetting it might be when a child grows up, starts a family, moves away, etc. But GEEZ - you're only an hour away!
I would talk to her. Acknowledge her feelings but make it clear that it's upsetting and hurtful to hear her say these things. You have enough going on in your life (moving, baby on the way) and the last thing you need is additional stress. If you're willing to commit to X amount of visits per month, or skyping/phone calls X times per week, tell her. Basically try to assuage her fears but put your foot down at the same time.
Good luck with all the great things coming your way!
Ignore your mother's pathos, boohooing and "oh I'm so empty nest syndrome" histronics.
SURE you are moving away -- you and your H are your own family unit now.
If you're having a hard time with her guilt trip stuff, see a counselor --- find out how to detach and tune her out when she starts this stuff. When she sees she is getting no rise from you, she'll cut it out.
Is your mother stuck at home? Has medical issues? Can't drive? Under Doctor orders to not travel?
You are an hour away. I've driven father for shopping.
These are classic tactics to control and muniplilate to get what a person wants. Ignore her.
At the end of the day it's about what's best for your family. Follow that and she will bend.
my inlaws are like this. h and i were seriously considering a cross country job offer for me and my mil's only comment- i'll never see my grandchildren!
ps- we don't evenm have children. haha.
my fil firmly said that they would never travel to see us and if we wanted to do that to the family than go ahead. they haven;'t left the town they grew up in in 45 years and have never spent a night outside of their house.
we travel the world so a plane ride or car ride is an adventure. i get to accpet people where they are at, but o boy!
my parents live to travel and would go anywhere. my H and i finally concluded it wasn't worth it. sigh. i guess i'm stuck in nj for a while!
Your mom needs to relax. You're going to be an hour away. Not 4 hours. It's not a big deal. My mom lives an hour away and has still seen my kid at least once a week every week since he was born.
Just tell her you're doing what's best for your family and you want her to be an involved grandparent but that she's going to have to readjust her idea of exactly how this is going to go.
I'd tell her ONE time "Mom, it's ONLY an hour. It's not that far at all. The kind of relationship and how often you see DS really is up to you. If you want to use the hour as an excuse to not come and see him, that is YOUR choice. I'm not going to discuss this anymore with you."
And then don't. She starts up on it again? Leave, change the topic, hang up. Whatever you need to do. Don'[t give her to omuch power here.
~Benjamin Franklin
DS dx with celiac disease 5/28/10
20 minutes away vs. 60 minutes away is virtually no difference. Honestly, though, it's pretty common for future grandparents to be concerned about this type of thing, especially if the baby will be their first grandchild.
My H and I live 10 minutes from my parents and about 45 minutes from his. We see the families about the same amount. Visits with my family tend to be more frequent but shorter. DH's family is bigger, and does more stuff together. We see them less frequently, but tend to spend the day with them when we do see them.
We have a similar setup for grandparent babysitting. If we need someone for an hour or two, it's easy for my parents to pop over. If we need someone to watch the kids for a weekend, we generally go to my ILs, who are retired. Giving up a weekend to babysit doesn't bite into their free time as much.
Basically, we make it work out and make it fair.