The age of social media has fundamentally changed our world.
The way we interact with corporations, the way we spread gossip, even the way we celebrate.
Our culture, however, hasn’t quite caught up to the Internet Revolution.
So, what happens when a family member just insists on not keeping news to herself via social media?
That was the issue facing Redditor and Original Poster (OP) Any_Mistake_8075 when she came to the “Am I the A**hole” (AITA) subReddit for judgment.
She asked:
“AITA for telling MIL that I won’t tell her when I give birth to my son?”
A happy beginning.
“Hello, I (30f) and my fiance (29m) have been together for 10 years, and have been trying to conceive for over 6 years.”
“We are finally pregnant and could not be more happier, however I’ve noticed that my MIL is a little finger friendly and posts alot on her social media pages.”
“The first happened when we actually made the pregnancy announcement to our family and close friends, we announced pretty early because we were so excited, and I found out my MIL had made a post about being a nan again and how excited she is -“
“Me and my fiance hadn’t even been able to make the announcement ourselves yet as we wanted to wait till our 12 week scan before posting anything.”
“I didn’t say much because she was probably just very excited, and I focused on working on being as healthy as I can for the baby.”
“The second happened at our gender reveal, we had been planning for weeks, and found out the gender of our baby, it was such a pleasant day and a lot of crying.”
“Lots of pictures were taken, and it was just close friends and family.”
“The day came to a sudden stop when I had a notification that I had been tagged in a post from MIL letting everyone know the gender of our baby.”
“I have to admit this angered me, I was hoping that me and my fiance could make that announcement ourselves first, but it wasn’t even the end of the day and I was receiving congrats message from random people.”
“I expressed my concern to my fiance, and he said he’d talk to her.”
“We’re now 30 weeks into the pregnancy and decided to get a 4D scan to see our precious baby, and sent the photos to close family before we put any posts up, and she again made the post before me or my fiance could.”
“We’ve now had to sit her down and tell her that she has stole these moments from us by making these announcements first, this is our first baby and its those moments we can never have returned too us.”
“I have made a warning that if this continues where announcements are being made before we have made them, then I will not tell her when her grandchild arrives, and that she can find out through social media.”
“She’s now become very upset and said that we are overreacting.”
OP was left to wonder,
“AITA?”
Having explained the situation, OP turned to Reddit for judgment.
Redditors weighed in by declaring:
-
- NTA – Not The A**hole
- YTA – You’re The A**hole
- NAH – No A**holes Here
- ESH – Everyone Sucks Here
Redditors decided: NTA
Boundaries.
“NTA, she will absolutely make posts all over social media the minute you give birth if you give her half a chance.”
“She has shown that she will continue this behavior even after you have set clear boundaries about it. She’s in the ‘find out’ stage of her little endeavor.”
“She prefers ‘likes’ to her loved ones’ wishes. And nobody likes that.” ~ WhosMimi
“Your fiancé sounds pretty limp around her.”
“HE needs to push back against her and set boundaries, firmly.”
“I would be very clear with him that you don’t want her to know until after your baby arrives, and after YOU get to announce the arrival. I would get the birth center or hospital on board -“
“She is forbidden from visiting you in labor or after, just in case he weakens and tells her.” ~ Greenelse
“A boundary without a consequence is only a suggestion.” ~ abishop711
“Time to grow up and grow a spine love.”
“Set hard boundaries now or prepare to have this woman be a pain in your a*s for years to come.”
“Restrict her access to everything and tightly control what she sees.”
“This is how you treat people like your shovy, pushy MIL.”
“If you cave in an inch they will always grab a mile.”
“This woman has quite clearly shown you who she is yet you seem to be reluctant to see it. Believe what people show you about themselves.”
“Decide what you want to do and get your spouse on board, HE needs to talk with her, it’s his mother.”
“I’m a retired nurse and I learn to handle pushy a-holes a long, long time ago. Stop taking crap from people and being a doormat. “No” is and always has been a complete sentence.” ~ [deleted]
The OP came back with some updates and clarity.
“Firstly, I have family that live abroad, that I would have loved to have made these kinds of announcements too before MIL made the announcements public herself.”
“The second time she made the announcement at the gender reveal party we expressed she shouldn’t of done that and that any pregnancy-related announcements we would like to make ourselves in our own time and on our own terms.”
“SO did express to MIL as well multiple times about our feelings on the matter.”
“I should also mention that when we shared photos from scans we asked everyone not to share until we had managed to share them ourselves.”
“She justified sharing these as ‘I didn’t tag you so it doesn’t count’ kind of attitude towards us being upset about the announcement being made before us again.”
“I would also like to express that I did think there was a line with MILs oversharing.”
“She has other grandchildren from her eldest daughter, and she never made these announcements before her daughter did.”
The Reddit community spoke up.
“NTA”
“My mom was the same when we announced her my gf pregnancy at a dinner…”
‘”Oooh! I can’t wait to tell the rest of the family!'”
“Despite me telling her not to do so, I was basically forced to call every one during dinner to announce it myself.”
“I did so by telling them first ‘sorry to call you during mealtime, but otherwise Mom would have spoil it despite being told not to.'”
“Mom was furious I made her look like a villain…”
“But it taught her a lesson about respecting boundaries.”
“Same with your MIL: she doesn’t respect your boundaries, she needs to do so. Something, it takes more drastic measures…” ~ brisemartel
“Why do these women lose their gd minds when their daughter/DIL get pregnant.”
“This time around we made plans to tell my husband’s grandma in person….”
“MIL went in the DAY BEFORE and told his grandma even though we had already told her we would be going in the next day to tell her in person.”
“Her excuse was she didn’t want grandma to hear it elsewhere…. she is 80 and never leaves the house. Who was going to tell her 🙄” ~ Cookie_Brookie
“I think drastic measures are necessary. I’m 28 weeks right now and would be LIVID if my mom or MIL did any of this.”
“You handled it better than I would have lol” ~ greenostrich93
Not everyone was on OP’s side.
“YTA. Over-posting bc of excitement doesn’t warrant refusing to tell someone when her grandchild is born.”
“This is not a real problem.” ~ katiedoesntsharefood
“Soft YTA, depending.”
“It doesn’t sound like either of you told her how much her postings bothered you after the first, second, or third time she did it -“
“Only that your fiance said ‘he would’ after the third. Did he?”
“Was it reiterated after you shared the scan that you didn’t want it shared by other people?”
“Because if not, it sounds like MIL did what MIL’s always done, and this time you absolutely lost your sh*t over it.”
“Because if she’s done this three times before and all you’ve ever done is quietly seethe about it without actually using your words, she won’t know that it bothers you, and she won’t know to stop.”
“Basically, it sounds like you walked up to her out of the blue and said, ‘hey, that thing you always do? I F*CKING HATE IT, AND YOU SUCK, AND I WON’T TELL YOU WHEN YOUR GRANDCHILD IS BORN, YOU A**HOLE!”‘ ~ stew_pit1
“Yta.”
“One if your examples was a gender reveal party.”
“Unless you said at the start that you wanted all people to post after, it’s perfectly fine to post.”
“That’s what people do. She didn’t take anything from you she posted as she learned the sex of the baby at the party you hosted.” ~ Organic_Pangolin_691
Good news is a delight to share.
Particularly when social media gives us a nice big megaphone to do it with.
Unfortunately, not all news is ours to share.