I'm going to start this post out by saying : I have a wonderful MIL. I really do. She's very generous, sweet, caring, and generally easy to get along with. But, I feel like she's making things into a competition with my mom regarding the LO, and I wind up in uncomfortable situations because of it.

Here's some examples (you can skip this part if you don't want to ready the whole post):
when I was in labor, it was very obvious my husband was not going to be able to coach me or be much support because he was a nervous wreck. So, we both agreed my mom should stay too. His mom told him she'd "be pissed" if my mom got to stay in there and she didn't. What?! That pretty much set me off. It's my body, and I'm the one giving birth. Having your mother in there is totally different than having your MIL in there IMO. But I ended up asking her to stay anyways because he needed her to support him (he was an absolute mess). Not what I had envisioned but whatever. After the baby was born, she got a little offended because my mom was here helping out with housework and cooking for the first few days and I didn't ask her to come over and do anything. Granted, I never asked my mom to either, she just did. My husband works 2nd shift, and so does my dad, so one night I took LO over to my moms house so we could chat and hang out for a few because I was feeling lonely. No biggy. Well for Mothers Day, my mom thought it might be nice to have 1 large cookout with my parents and his at my parents house so that we wouldn't have to rush off from one get together to head to the other. She got a little huffy about it and said "Well Mya's never been to MY house". (Their house is too small to have all of us there or I would have suggested that) And my husband then told me she had been complaining about that for some time at that point. Oh, and I should probably mention my husband is an only child and him and his mom are very close.

Now. I have been trying very hard to make sure she feels included, and not leave her out. She comes by pretty much whenever she feels like it, and I asked her to babysit for a bit for our anniversary this Monday. But, I return to work after next week, and I work 12 hour shifts. 10 am to 10 pm. Babysitting will alternate between our parents by day, or week, whatever they decide. I really want my mom to babysit my first 2 days back at work. I'm just more comfortable with that and I won't feel bad if I call her a thousand times to check on LO. She offered to take those days off, so that she can be available to help get my husband adjusted to his new sleep schedule and let him nap if he needs to before work, and so that when my husband goes to work, she can bring LO to me for an evening feed and much needed snuggle (I'm going to be a mess). And I know I'm really going to want that, and it's important to me. His mom wouldn't be able to do that (we'll just leave it at that) I know it's going to hurt her feelings that my mom gets "to babysit first", but I'm tired of worrying about what's going to hurt who's feelings. What about this mommas feelings?! I don't want her to make it about whos the "favorite". I just want going back to work those first few days to be made as easy as possible on me. I don't want to deal with drama. How do I even go about telling her that I want my mom to babysit first? Ugh. My husband does try to smooth things over, but he worries about his mom's feelings as well. I just want to handle it the best way possible.

Sorry for the novel....