How To Make Sure That Postpartum Visit from Grandma Goes Smoothly

By Andrea Renskoff

As a brand-new mom, you could use some help around the house for a week or two. As brandnew grandmas, your mother and mother-inlaw can’t wait for a chance to come for a visit. It seems like a match made in Heaven, but is it?

Pairing their high expectations with your postpartum exhaustion and newmom insecurities could have its perils. Some pre-planning, plus a few discussions about what you can and can’t expect, could help keep hurt feelings at bay and make this time spent with mom or mom-in-law one of joy rather than extra stress.

A Timely Arrival

If mother or mother-in-law is traveling to visit you, a key consideration is timing. You and your partner should agree on whether you want her to be there for the birth, in the first days after, or later when you’ve had a chance to catch your breath. The hospital and early days at home are overwhelming, and the last thing you need is to have a mother or mother-in-law around who feels like a guest that you have to host. If your mother or mother-in-law lives in town, you and your partner can decide whether you want her to stay with you or just visit at scheduled times.

Being honest about what the relationship truly is, rather than what you might like it to be, will help you plan. “It’s got to be a case-by-case decision,” says psychologist Diana Lynn Barnes, co-author of The Journey to Parenthood: Myths, Reality and What Really Matters. “If you’re comfortable in the relationship with your mother or mother-in-law, then get them there as soon as possible because you need the help.”

Barnes started the Center for Postpartum Health in Los Angeles CA. She stresses that these are important conversations to have with your partner ahead of time so that you are both on the same team, and if problems arise, you are united in dealing with them. And she suggests that each partner speak with their own mother rather than having any decisions delivered by a daughter-in-law or son-in-law.