Baby shower drama advice????
TLDR: MIL and hubby want me to have a baby shower (which I would have to plan and throw myself) after baby is born, but I don't want to plan one any more, and would rather just post my registry on social media for whatever friends/family that want to help out. What should I do?
For some background, I am 32 weeks pregnant, have been on bedrest the entire pregnancy due to complications, and have been in and out of the hospital every few days for preterm labor since 25 weeks. This is also my first child. Originally, I had planned to have a baby shower the first Saturday of March (so I would be 33 weeks) No one wanted to plan one or throw one for me, but I thought it would be fun to have one anyways, so I started planning it myself. At 26 weeks, I ended up in the hospital for a week and a half because I was bleeding, and they were trying to determine whether my membranes had ruptured, or whether I had a chronic abruption. During my stay in the hospital, I decided that I didn't want to deal with the stress of planning a baby shower since they expected me to deliver by 28 weeks, and I didn't want to deal with the stress of having a baby shower as well as the stress of a very premature baby. Since then, I have told my mother in law several times that we wont be having a baby shower any more because I no longer have the time, energy, money, or drive to plan and throw a baby shower. The first time I mentioned it, she threw a fit and said that we needed to find someone else to throw it for us. So to appease her, I asked everyone I knew if they would be willing to throw the baby shower. Everyone said no because they dont have the time or because they are on bedrest for health issues and wouldn't be able to take care of everything like they would like to. Which I totally expected and was fine with. After that, I told my MIL again that we would not be having a baby shower because I don't feel good enough to plan it any more (contractions every 2-5 minutes all day every day for the past 2 weeks) and that no one else can plan it for us. My husband asked her to throw our baby shower, and she huffed, rolled her eyes, and said "With what free time?" She then suggested that we throw a baby shower after our baby is born. But because I could have this baby any time between now and Easter, I would need to start planning now, and I don't feel well enough to worry about that. My husband suggested that he could plan it, but I feel like that would just be me planning it all anyways. But if baby is born any time in the next 2 weeks, that would be fine because then our little one would still be in the NICU during the baby shower, and we wouldn't have to worry about people possibly breathing on her and getting her sick or trying to kiss her. If she is born later than in the next two weeks, she would be home before we could have a baby shower for her (or people would only have a 1 week notice before the baby shower, which I feel is unreasonable) and then we would have to bring her to the shower because there wouldn't be anyone who would watch her at home. I know germs aren't all that bad and everything, but autoimmune diseases, heart complications, asthma, and extreme allergies run in the family, so I would like to keep her away from all of that for the first month or so of her life until we can figure out which things affect her one by one, instead of overloading her system all in one day. So my question is this: Do I let my husband plan a baby shower for after our little one is born, knowing that there is a good chance she will be freshly out of the hospital, and that I will most likely have to do all of the planning, baking, shopping, and decorating myself? Or do I offend my mother in law (who is generally such a sweet woman) by posting our registry on social media and apologize for not having a baby shower due to my health and baby's health, and let people know that we aren't expecting anything and that I am just posting the registry because people have offered to help buy things from it already?
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