How did visiting go?

[mighty-mama]

Just wondering, I know a lot of us were very apprehensive about visiting.. How did it go..

I gave birth @ 4am on Tues. I told dh to tell people I wasn't allowing visiting until 5pm. I was thinking "oh, I'll have a nap today, and be fine".. I turned off my cell phone, and didn't allow in-coming calls to my room, Well I couldn't nap, with the nurses coming in and out. My dh and DS1 came in around noon and were in an out, and I still couldn't nap.. My brother and his girlfriend came at 6:30pm that night, and I could barely keep my eyes open (if it wasn't for the 4hr nap I got before labor started the day before, I wouldn't been up for 36 hrs straight).

The next day, Wednesday, I left at 4pm, and figured lets get some visiting out of the way tonight. We called my MIL, FIL and SIL and told them we'd be home by dinner time, and although we "weren't rolling out the red carpet" they could stop by. My MIL and FIL were there about an hr, and I got so tired, I actually went into my bedroom, and this made them leave. Of course as soon as they left, my SIL and husband showed up, and then my brother and his girlfriend stopped by.. I was so freakin tired..

The next day, we went to dh's grandparent's house, as they can't drive, We stayed about 15min, as I used the excuse "I have to lay down". We had a few other friends trickle in each night for a little...

Hindsight is 20/20.. I shouldn't gotten everyone done at one time, as even though it was in small incremements, visiting always seemed to be at the wrong time.

[EricaE]

I gave birth at the hospital that I work at, so once word got around that the baby had arrived, we had a sh!t load of visitors. I think we had close to 30 people stop in to see the baby the day after he was born. It got to be very overwhelming, but I understood everyone was just excited to see him. All of my co workers were so supportive when I had my 5 prior miscarriages, and they were all rooting us on with this pregnancy. We all very close, and I feel very blessed to have them all in my life. Sean is kind of like the department's baby. While I was happy to show Sean off, I was so glad to leave the hospital and come home to some privacy and peace and quiet!

[lactivist]

We haven't really had much family come yet because everyone lives so far away. My sister was here the past few days and other than me having a nasty cold it was great. My mom and friend are coming later in the month. Other family will trickle in over the next weeks and months. We had friends stop by but it was all my choosing and great to share my baby with my dear friends. We called my next door neighbor about 20 minutes after she was born to come see her. I did have a LLL meeting here when Dahlia was six days old and it was really nice and everyone was so sweet, even did my dishes, but I was sooo beat afterwards. Overall it has been nice. Ask me again after my MIL comes to stay and I may be singing a different tune.
Wendi

[sunshine's mama]

I tried to sleep a bit after she came but wasn't really tired bc labor didn't take much out of me ( I KNOW, I'll get the story of the hospital UC up soon......promise.....) so I was wide awake...

Daddy brought my step daughter back when he and dd1 came back with real food around 8 hours after birth...they didn't stay long....SD was bored and didn't want to be there and started causing a scene in the hospital so they left shortly after.....dd1 stayed and enjoyed some love from mommy while sister slept and got to see grandma and aunt...Daddy came to pick her up and say good night...

My mom and sister came to visit when dd was 10 hours old and stayed WAY too long...I didn't want to be rude rude and say LEAVE, NOW so I just got grumpy....

One of my friends stopped by the next day with her little girl (same age as dd1) but was quick....short and sweet..

Daddy and girls stopped by again for dinner and left shortly after.

Mom and sister came back by again that night and didn't stay as long but by that time I was finally sooo tired so they left...

That's it. Nobody from his family came by to visit....baby was 2 weeks old before they made the time to do so..They live 15ish minutes away.

I wish I had more ppl to come visit....I saw ppl going in and out of doors bringing well wishes and flowers.......DD did bring me the most perfect yellow rose.....fully bloomed...took her 10 minutes to pick it out apparently....and I preserved it....

But, on the other side, I got LOADS of time alone with my little girl.....I had the same nurse both days, night nurse, that I had when DD1 was born and she remembered me and since it was slow, she visited often and we chatted about the past few years and my labor and how it was the talk of the nurses for awhile....

[~Katie~]

My family was really great about visiting. Liam was born at 4:38am and my mom was the only visitor at the hospital. She came in the afternoon and stayed for about 45 minutes, long enough to take some pictures with him and what not. My brothers came to visit about a week and a half after he was born and my nieces and nephews were able to meet him at two weeks.

My IL's were another story. I had him on saturday and they showed up on thursday, staying until sunday. They came under the promise that they wouldn't offer parenting advice, would be respectful, and would help us with anything we needed. Only my FIL kept that promise for the most part, although he complained about how I breastfed him frequently : My MIL parked her behind on my sofa and pretty much didn't leave it until they went to their hotel for the night or shopping. She protested anytime I went to nurse him, that I was keeping him from her and he really wasn't hungry. She also suggested that I should give up breastfeeding and just formula feed since we were having latch issues :

Basically the entire time they were here I only held him while nursing, otherwise she insisted on holding him. It got to the point where I had to take him out of her arms. They also suggested we go see a movie and they would watch him, like that's what I wanted to do after waiting 9 months to meet this baby and all I wanted to do was love on him. Oh, and this one takes the cake, she refered to Liam as a failure to thrive baby because he had a poor latch like her middle son. I guess he showed her by gaining 22 ounces that week. Needless to say it was a huge relief to see them go, although she still continues to be disrespectful from afar. She got a nice email from me the other day about her behavior

Wow that was long, sorry. I'm just REALLY PO'd about it because I feel like it took away from our bonding experience and made that early time a lot harder for us. I guess I learned my lesson about post-partum visiting and will wait much longer next time.

[danaalex]

we didn't really have that many "visitors". my mom came over to help with the kids on wed ( second day of school and all) and she stayed until friday but i didn't come home until friday so that was ok by me. they did come by the hospital on wed night ( mom, DH and all three kids), but they didn't stay very long. otherwise, no visitors IN the hospital. that was really really nice. i haven't had that many days alone with a new baby since my first was born. i really liked only having myself and one newborn to deal with. i considered it VERY relaxing!!

once we were home we had people bring us dinner every night for almost 2 weeks, but they never stayed more than 10 min. max and i think only 2 people asked to hold/ offered to hold the babe.

our biggest issue was when my dad's wife showed up to "HELP" us. she came when the babe was about 8 days old. WE didn't want her to come, SHE wanted to come, so we let her. BIG HUGE GIANT mistake. it was awful!! down right awful. and only part of it was her being there to help. the first day she was here she ruined a rug LOL by throwing it in the washing machine. then she completely rearranged my basement where the kids play, all of their toys and the furniture down there. it was insane! NONE of us knew where anything was.

Dh and i thought she was either drinking or smoking in our guest room bathroom, which is in the basement, next to where my kids play. the whole basement stunk of something covering another scent. when my dad showed up on sunday i told him i thought she was smoking in the basement and he told me that she had quit. well, after he showed up, she moved into our office to smoke which has no vent and no ventilation. SOOOO, the room stunk to high heaven. we are NOT ok with smoking around our kids, especially in our house, with a newborn, and not in the room next to where they play and where their friends play, and where i have fabric and we keep all of our important papers.

needless to say we weren't pleased. she never really apologized for it either. it got real uncomfortable on tuesday after we confronted my dad and his wife about the smoking. my dad doesn't smoke and never has. and his wife doesn't smoke IN their house, but for some reason she thought it was ok to do in MY House with 4 small kids, one being a newborn. so, it just got bad and weird and ackward and they ended up leaving 4 days early.

then after she left i found a shirt of DD#1 that had paint on it. apparently my dad's wife got paint on it and then used bleach to try and get it out. and when she made a mess of the shirt, she folded it up and put it under a bunch of papers on the dining room table. she totally hid it! i had to laugh because it reminded me of something a child would do. hide something instead of acting like a grown up and taking responsibility for what they had done.

in the end it was a learning experience. basically i learned that there is no good in her, that she is a compulsive liar, and is so immature it's not even funny. and i learned that she will NEVER be welcome in my house again. i cannot have someone like that IN my house, i don't even want her near my kids by that would kill my dad and i love him too much to do that to him.

otherwise, we've been visitor free so, no other drama or issues LOL

[beemama]

We had lots of issues around visitors for our first & really ticked everyone off when we told them we would really be enforcing the "nesting in" period that we asked for last time. It turned out that I was feeling much better this time around and not feeling as reclusive, but everyone in dh's family was still POed so really only our friends came by. That was really nice!!
But my parents, yeeeeessh... they wanted to be here right after the birth but I asked them to wait at least a month. They live 1000 miles away. They're set to arrive at 29 days, which is a babymoon exactly, right? I know I will have to defend boundaries. They are really old school... dad has major issues w/breastfeeding, they are perplexed by the family bed, baby wearing... they had kids & bought whatever gadgets were needed so we'd entertain ourselves. I love them very much but they drive me crazy. And they really aren't very good w/little kids & expect them to act like adults. So, I'm really stressed about it... and dh goes back to work 3 days into their visit.
I feel bad for saying this stuff about my family but we are just so completely different in our parenting styles and they are so harshly critical of me, ugh.

[jazzybaby9]

It went alright, I'd say. I was still being stitched up with my legs in the air when people burst in the door. I was fine with it at the time though since I was so exhausted . After awhile of the baby being passed around and constant visiting with EVERYONE I became overwhelmed and just wanted to cry...It was 2 full days of constant visitors at the hospital and all I wanted was sleep and to be with the baby and dp. I'm a week PP and there are STILL people coming around to see the baby. Hormones don't help the matter.

[stacyg]

Things went pretty good here. My parents and MIL came on Sunday (he was born on Saturday). They all ended up going back home that day. A 3 hour drive to and from! But I'm glad they did. DH had the week off and it was nice to just have all that time. We had someone visit on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday...but it was only for a short bit and they all brought supper by! My mom came last week and my MIL is coming today to stay for the week because DH has to go out of town. Overall I would say this has been the best PP period out of the three!