My (F24) sister (F28) wants to come visit after I had a baby, but we are arguing about if she is allowed to directly care for the baby or not.

TLDR: My sister wants to come help and watch new baby. I told my mother in what I thought was a private conversation that I don't trust my sister watching my new baby and my sister could help in other ways. My mother told my sister all of this and now I'm expected to apologize.

My sister and I have had a rocky relationship for a few years now, due to past events I have a hard time trusting her. She recently dropped out of grad school and is having a mental breakdown. She then moved back in with my mother (she's lived with her on and off for the last 6 years.) She's seen a new psychiatrist and is trying new meds and is trying to find a new purpose in life. So this happens a week before I give birth, and this kind of changes our plans since my sister didn't plan on coming to the birth or visiting soon since she was busy in grad school. My mom was suppose to come and take care of our dogs while we were in the hospital but now my sister wants to come.

This is where is gets complicated since we have three dogs and between them they have four. So after a lot of back and forth and talks with my husband I say they can come and watch all the dogs and we'll just have eight dogs in our house. Husband is not super pleased about this and ended up going back once or twice a day. Everything goes well, they are at the hospital most of the days and super excited to be a part of the birth. So we come home and the plan through most of my pregnancy is that my mom is going to come help me after my husband goes back to work. Two days before she's supposed to come I call my mom and ask what time she'll be coming, I get put on speakerphone with her and my sister and she tells me she can probably only come for a week since my sister needs her there. I'm hurt because the plan had always been two weeks and I really had counted on her being there. She says well I can come for a week and then sister can come for a week.

Now I'm put in the position of being on speakerphone and having to say well I wanted you to come for two weeks and not sister. It's super awkward. So then later my mom calls and tells me my sister is offended because I don't want her to come visit and I should tell her that I want her to come. Also basically I get guilted into it because "she's going through such a hard time right now and needs to know that people care." So that's fine I text her and tell her she should come visit, but because of all the dogs and baby it'll have to be after my mom comes home so the dogs don't have to come. So we plan on that and shes excited.

A few days before my mom leaves I confide in her that I probably won't have my sister help out as much with the baby like my mom did and I'll have my sister help in other ways. Also I need to point out that my mom thinks there's too many "rules" with baby and that I'm kind of harsh if I correct or tell her to do something differently. Since my sister is hurt easily I point out that maybe nows not a good time to come since if I correct her or something she could get offended and it could turn into a huge thing. My mother takes offense to all this and tells me she just wants our relationship to be better and that she thinks it's the perfect opportunity to help our relationship. She asks if I don't trust my sister with baby and I admit I don't. We kind of fight about it more and I leave the room and we don't bring it up again.

So then fast forward to the day before my sister is going to come visit and my mom tells her everything I said and that I don't trust her with baby. My sister calls me then and tells me this and asks why I said that and if she'll be able to help with baby. I'm pretty much shocked into silence for most of the conversation and am so angry with my mom for telling her what I thought was a private conversation. I struggle through this whole phone call because I don't want to outright say to my sister that yes I don't trust her. So I'm either silent or admit that I'm very angry with my mom for saying this. My sister tells me she is very hurt and doesn't want to come if she can't help with feeding her and stuff. Halfway through the conversation I have a feeling my mom is also on the phone since they do this a lot and I ask if mom is in the room and if I'm on speakerphone. My sister admits that yes I am, I then directly speak to my mother and ask why she would tell my sister this and did she really think it would help our relationship? She admits now she might've messed up, but she really thought it would help us to get everything out in the open and not have a fight while my sister was here since we have different expectations of how she can help out.

Also several times during the conversation my sister says that this is about her and can the conversation please go back to her because her feelings are hurt. I eventually figure out how to say that as a new mom, my husband and I are just figuring out parenting and so yes it's hard for me to trust other people right now. She says this makes sense but then goes on to ask about specific things she could do with baby and will I let her feed the baby and so on.

Anyways it ends with me just saying I'm not sure about anything and can I get back to her. She is obviously angry and I know she expects me to apologize. I don't and we hang up. So I don't know what to do. I don't feel like I'm in the wrong and I'm very angry about being sort of ambushed by them and having my mom tell her all of this. I also feel the need to point out that I was telling my husband all of this and he also doesn't trust her (maybe more than me) and that I can just make him the bad guy and tell them it's him that doesn't want her to help.

Thankyou so much if you read this far, I know it's long.

So anyways I don't know how to move forward from all this. I really do want my sister to visit and hang out, but not necessarily helping with direct baby things. But, I don't think I'm in the wrong and should necessarily have to apologize even though I think I will have to for us to move past this.

Submitted November 09, 2019 at 11:20AM by ssdgm870 https://ift.tt/2runq8e