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People only interested now had a baby

My girlfriend gave birth a few weeks ago to our first child and we are both really struggling with how her family have now suddenly decided to get involved in her life. Her family have never been close and have never taken an interest in her life despite her trying in the past, we were in a relationship for 15 months before I met her mum because her mum is just very self absorbed and is only interested in herself.

It is her mum and sister we are having the biggest issues with, they would go for weeks or even months without replying to my gf's messages but now this baby is here they want to be around constantly but they only care about the baby. My gf had to give birth via emergency c section and not once have either of them asked how she is. When her mum came to the hospital she took one of the pillows off my gf's bed and sat on it because the chair she was on "wasn't comfy" ignoring the fact my gf had a huge operation 12 hours prior.

They also both massively outstay their welcomes, when my family visits they will stay for an hour tops but they will stay hours on end. Last time her sister visited she arrived before 10am and didn't leave until 5pm. She then only left due to subtle hints, my girlfriend asked me if I was going to start making tea so I did but then her sister said "if you was having a takeaway I would have had some" so basically inviting herself to stay.

Me and my gf are both struggling with how they showed no interest during the pregnancy but now the baby is here we can't keep them away. It also annoys us how they haven't offered to help, not saying we would have accepted it but the offer would have been nice. For example as you can imagine our house has been a bit upside down over the past few weeks so my mum made us some food, brought it to our house and took the baby out for a walk so that we could have just 30 minutes to ourselves. Little gestures like that mean a lot.

I have told my girlfriend I will speak to her mum and sister but with the way she is after the c section she has told me not to. Is there any advice as to what else I could possibly do?

Reply 1

Anonymous #2

absolutely toxic family interaction. only replying to ur gf's texts again when she gives her own mother a grandchild. kinda ridiculous. crappy mother who is only there for the baby. Although it seems finally nice to have ur gf's mother to be there, but ur gf's sister and mother wasn't even there for you guys pre-birth. do u guys really trust them ever since ur gf gave birth? try communicate with your gf and see what to do next. What if they abandon you guys again. and I doubt ur gf's mother will treat ur gf with basic human decency if she gave birth again. find a right space with friends that will be there for u guys.

Reply 2

Doomotron

Original post by Anonymous

My girlfriend gave birth a few weeks ago to our first child and we are both really struggling with how her family have now suddenly decided to get involved in her life. Her family have never been close and have never taken an interest in her life despite her trying in the past, we were in a relationship for 15 months before I met her mum because her mum is just very self absorbed and is only interested in herself.
It is her mum and sister we are having the biggest issues with, they would go for weeks or even months without replying to my gf's messages but now this baby is here they want to be around constantly but they only care about the baby. My gf had to give birth via emergency c section and not once have either of them asked how she is. When her mum came to the hospital she took one of the pillows off my gf's bed and sat on it because the chair she was on "wasn't comfy" ignoring the fact my gf had a huge operation 12 hours prior.
They also both massively outstay their welcomes, when my family visits they will stay for an hour tops but they will stay hours on end. Last time her sister visited she arrived before 10am and didn't leave until 5pm. She then only left due to subtle hints, my girlfriend asked me if I was going to start making tea so I did but then her sister said "if you was having a takeaway I would have had some" so basically inviting herself to stay.
Me and my gf are both struggling with how they showed no interest during the pregnancy but now the baby is here we can't keep them away. It also annoys us how they haven't offered to help, not saying we would have accepted it but the offer would have been nice. For example as you can imagine our house has been a bit upside down over the past few weeks so my mum made us some food, brought it to our house and took the baby out for a walk so that we could have just 30 minutes to ourselves. Little gestures like that mean a lot.
I have told my girlfriend I will speak to her mum and sister but with the way she is after the c section she has told me not to. Is there any advice as to what else I could possibly do?

I'd recommend that your girlfriend tells them directly what she thinks, and if they don't listen, you should get more stern with them.

Reply 3

Anonymous #1

Just to come back to this, me and my girlfriend were discussing this over the weekend and she told me that once our baby possibly starts nursery or at the very latest when he starts school her sister will no longer be interested. I asked how she knows this and she said that her sister has probably only seen one of her other nephews twice in the last two years and she lost all interest since he started school.

So now I am thinking do I grin and bear it for another few months until he starts nursery and see what happens or should I still say something?