So I am a 32f. I am a police officer and I work a rotating schedule of 4 days on 2 days off and work afternoons 2pm-10pm. That’s not including mandatory overtime that can happen due to staffing issues. Sometimes I get mandated unexpectedly to stay another 8 hours until 6am. Etc etc. I have a 6 month old. I am lucky to have my mom and MIL help out a couple days a week to help watch the baby. But I am so sick of hearing how they had it harder. They were both SAHM’s and were able to live off of one income their husband provided. I have to work full time work crazy hours take care of a majority of things in the household and care for a baby while trying to bounce back and work out because I need to be in good physical shape for my job. To top it off my husband also works in the career field and we currently share zero days off together because of our wheel rotations at the moment and for the unforeseeable future.
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You’re a superhero! They’re twatwaffles. You’re awesome!
Yeah, I think comparing is useless because we live in completely different times. My husband tells me (he is a great husband, don’t come for me) that his mom kept the house spotless, not a speck of dust and she ran a business. And I’m like, “yeah? Well, she also had parents who took care of her kids until you were in kindergarten!” I am a SAHM and a manage his business while I have a toddler and baby running underfoot. No help unless you count my sibling playing with them once in a blue moon. Grandparents were way more involved back then! Kids could play outside unsupervised back then! They got to school by themselves back then! There wasn’t literal scientific studies readily accessible on handheld devices so they drive themselves crazy with decision-fatigue back then!
But they did have to work at factories if they were uneducated. They did have to deal with heavier sexism and misogyny back then. They had even less medical care tailored to women back then. They had even less opportunities, respect, and pay when they worked back then. We still have a lot of work to do to improve things for mothers and women, but in general, mothers/women have more options and freedom than our mothers’ generation.
In the end, your mother/MIL should stfu and just help out when they can. Cook some meals, do the dishes, do a grocery run! Sad to say, my parents HAVE to help me out whereas my grandma helped my mom just because it was tradition. We live in an odd post-Cov dystopia where some of us can’t afford groceries on one income anymore, so grandparents’ help is a necessity, not a luxury for many.
My mom is a boomer too, she’s told me before how rough her postpartum times were and how she needed help from her mom because my dad was working and going to school and not able to be home much. Her mom told her no, she doesn’t like babysitting. My mom has since told me she would never want me or my brothers to struggle without any help like she did. It’s about giving the support she was denied. I’m grateful and sad she had to go through that alone. I loved my grandma but she was selfish about a lot of things.
It’s not a badge of honor for being overwhelmed while in the newborn trenches. I don’t know why so many people have to treat new parents as needing to pay their dues and struggle too.
My grandmothers went through two wars, famine, wrecked economy that obliterated their savings, raising children while their husbands were away fighting.
I don’t know what they told my parents. But I never heard them complain about their past or present. Never ever.
In short, even if your mother and MIL did have a harder time (and I am from their generation and am convinced they didn’t), such remarks don’t help. Personally, I would not try to correct them, but rather learn how to ignore and grey-rock them.