Found on Message board
Grandmother-to-be: “My daughter, who lives in NYC, (we are in VA) is hiring a baby nurse for a week or too after the bay is born to assist her w/ in learning how to take care of the baby, someone who will be in the apartment when she needs to walk her dog, help her w/ nursing, and it is always possible that her husband could be out of town, etc.
I really need some help in understanding this because we are planning on going up there for 4-5 days or so, and I had assumed that this would be my role. I have raised three children myself and I certainly know what I’m doing”
Advice from a message board participant: If you have problems communicating with your daughter before a grandchild is born, you will continue to have them after! Just because you see your role in a cut and dried pattern, that doesn’t mean your daughter or her husband see it the same way.
Your role should be to support your daughter and your grandchild as best you can. If this means sucking it up and being in a hotel, while a nurse tells her “how to” instead of you being the one – - then do it! This is not the time for the two of you to hash out past issues — it is the time to forge a new respectful relationship. That new relationship must include allowing your daughter to make her own judgment calls regarding her child. Please remember advice is given, but it doesn’t have to be taken!
Now, I know that I have been a bit harsh. I too had a difficult relationship with my mother. She walked in to “help” with the baby (my first born) to my freshly scrubbed home saying “What can I clean?” I had been up all night getting the house ready, including scrubbing floor on my hands and knees to make it acceptable to her, and I tell you it was spotless. I had a good friend and neighbor come over to “check” and she told me I was going overboard, OCD type of overboard. Still, it wasn’t “good enough” for my mom! I had taken care of children and babies since I was 10 years old, but to her I didn’t do anything right: I stored the diapers in the wrong place, I bathed the baby in the wrong spot (in a baby tub on the kitchen table, with all my supplies instead of the kitchen sink – as she had done), I breast fed instead of bottle, I had the baby in a bassinet by my bed instead of isolated in the crib on a different floor (in Navy housing – floor plan was poorly laid out). By the second day of her visit I was so nervous, my milk stopped flowing!
All I wanted from her was to coo and coddle the baby. Make a fuss over her, be a grandma. For me, well she was a great cook. Having a few home cooked meals prepared while I napped with the baby would have been a godsend. Instead, she wanted to shop, go out to see the sights of the city and invited company (brother and sister-in-law and their two children to visit for 3 days – and nights) after all, she was in the area and not doing anything.
I wish you luck with your new grand baby and daughter, but please take it easy on her, after all she is new at this role – just as you were once.
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What about one grandma correcting another grandma publicly…..grandma 2 acting AGHAST because grandma 1 put her thumb in baby’s mouth for sucking (washed hands of course.) Grandma 1 used this method of soothing on her own 2 children and 3 previous grandchildren…Grandma 2…this is the first grandchild…but she is very vocal!!
I would like to know some other people’s thought about what happened today.
I was over at my son’s house visiting my 1 month old granddaughter. I was holding her while her mother was busy in the kitchen. The child is breast fed and does not care for fake nipples. She would not take the Pacifire and kept rooting around for a breast. After a while I lifted my shirt and allowed the baby to suck on my breast while her mother was busy to sooth the baby. This seemed to do the trick but when her mother came back into the room she came all unglued and told me I was gross. She was very upset. I can’t understand why because my mother use to do the same thing with the baby’s father when he was an infant as did my sister. He did not like rubber nipples and would only be soothed by the natural ones. Also my Sister and I had infants at the same time. My Daughter is 3 days older than her youngest boy. We use to breast feed each others babies all the time. My husband said I did nothing wrong as did my youngest son. The baby’s father, my oldest boy, understand and feels I made a mistake. I told the baby’s mother I was sorry and I would not do it ever again and she told me that my apology did not mean shit to her because I knew it would make her mad. I did not know it would make her mad and it seemed natural to me. I don’t understand why she is so upset. Please don’t judge but would like some other opinions. Thank you