Woman Not Allowing Mother-in-law to Meet Newborn After 16-hour Drive Backed

The internet has backed a woman who refused to let her mother-in-law meet her baby after driving for 16 hours just for the occasion.

In a post shared on Reddit last Thursday, under the username u/Unable-Honey2204, she explained that she had a baby three weeks ago, and only recently she allowed family and friends to start meeting the infant.

She wrote: "My mom and sister (and her newborn) visited 4 days ago for the first time and my [mother-in-law] was due to arrive the next day; to stay with us for a week. My [mother-in-law] lives 16 hours driving distance from us (in Canada so she had to get a passport).

"She called us the day she was supposed to arrive and said she had to stop off and sleep and that she wouldn't make it on the original ETA. No big deal. She shows up the next day at 10 a.m."

The issue, according to the poster, was that when her mother-in-law showed up at her front door, she wasn't alone, she had brought her two 12-year-old grandaughters with her, because they insisted on meeting their baby cousin, too.

"Not only was this never discussed (she didn't even hint toward it) but one of the nieces in question is someone we no longer allow around our other children due to severe bullying and my [mother-in-law] is fully aware of it.

"In fact, we are [completely] no contact with this girl's mother as well because she defended her daughter after she punched our 5-year-old son in the face last year at a family BBQ because he wouldn't give her the squirt gun (that was hers but that's beside the point)," she added.

According to the Newport Institute, family estrangement is quite common in America, in fact, over 27 percent of American adults have cut off contact with a family member, and about 1 in 10 reported they'd cut off contact with either a parent or a child.

When the poster saw the girl, she did not allow her in the home to meet her baby cousin, nor did she allow her mother-in-law. She only let her "nice" niece in, asking her if she wanted to stay over, but her mom refused because she would have had to travel back home by herself.

"My husband was 100% on my side. He was actually livid," she said, adding "We are being called every name in the book by several family members. The [sister-in-law] that we are no contact with is soiling our name by saying we have wasted [mother-in-law]'s time and are wrongly punishing her child (says we need to 'get over it').

"My [brother-in-law] says we are ignorant because [mother-in-law] purchased hers and her 2 granddaughters' passports, so wasted money and wasted time. The other [sister-in-law] (nice niece's momma) is on our side- as [mother-in-law] lied to her and said she told us the girls were coming when she didn't."

Florence Ann Romano, personal growth strategist, and author of Build Your Village: A Guide to Finding Joy and Community in Every Stage of Life, told Newsweek that it's odd to bring guests to someone's home without giving them a heads up, and it's also rude.

She said: "You don't just show up with extra people and expect them to be accommodated—in this case for one week. The grandmother should have asked permission and this could have been avoided. However, since she did not, now they have a very tangled web of emotions.

"The niece, who is a bully, is understandably unpredictable. Having that energy in the home of new parents and a new baby is not desirable. If the grandmother wanted to spend more time visiting, she could have gotten a hotel and stayed longer.

"But the parents were right to say that they weren't comfortable with them staying in the house. Your home, your rules. Your baby, your rules. Maybe the grandmother needs to take the advice the family has been doling out and 'just get over it.'

"Time might heal it, but the grandmother set the tone of this visit the second she didn't alert the parents to whom she was bringing. This is on her. Consequences can be hard to swallow."

The post quickly went viral on the platform, and it has so far received over 5,600 upvotes and 1,300 comments. One user, Vandreeson, commented: "[Not The A******]. You set a boundary and she broke it. All the extra information is irrelevant. If she lived around the corner it would be the same thing. She wasted her time and money. You don't want that kid around your kids, simple as that. You can't just tell someone to get over something, and then it's all better."

And imothro said: "[Not The A******] at all. Who shows up with uninvited guests in the first place, much less two children that aren't yours? And who shows up with people you are explicitly no contact with? This was intended to stomp your boundaries while you were most vulnerable.

"Consider permanent no contact with this woman and everybody criticizing you.

"ALL of the parents of those girls are absolutely insane. Who sends their child on a 16-hour cross-country road trip without calling the people whose home they are going to in order to discuss the plan first? They are neglectful and rude af."

Newsweek reached out to u/Unable-Honey2204 for comment via Reddit chat. We could not verify the details of the case.

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