My mom wants to live-in with me and my husband for several weeks to help after I give birth. Advice?
I’m due with my first in December. My mom lives 6 hours away, but she wants to come live-in with us right after the baby is born to help out. She said she could come help for as long as I want, and it seems like she‘s thinking weeks to a month. My husband will take the first month off with PTO, then go back to work, then once I’m ready to go back to work, he will take his 3 months of paternity leave so we don’t have to start childcare as soon.
As much as I know how important having a village is and how I should not take it for granted, it’s hard for me to know what I’ll need and for how long when I’m postpartum. There’s a big part of me that wants to figure out our rhythm as parents and bond with our new baby. However, I know that postpartum healing can be difficult and exhausting. Most of our friends and all of our family live 5+ hours away. My mom is a great mom, but she has already been going overboard on buying things for baby and acting like I don’t know what I need to buy, which makes me feel underestimated. I worry that she‘ll be telling me how I should parent and how to be a mother during a time when I get to decide how to do those things, along with my husband. Having family constantly dropping in to help is much different compared to a family member staying for weeks at a time with no break. I just wonder if it would be better if she stays immediately after birth, or if it would be more helpful when my husband goes back to work and I’m by myself with baby, which would be after we’ve had time to settle in. I think the length of time will be much easier to determine once we’re in it. I’m wondering if anyone has any insight or wisdom if they’ve been through something similar. Thank you <3