Dear Blake,
My 28-year-old daughter is having our first grandchild. My daughter and I have a good relationship, but she doesn’t want me to be around when she goes into labor.
All her life I have been the most loving and caring mother I could be to her. She has a great husband. Should I take it personally that she doesn’t want me there when she goes into labor?
I have waited a long time to be a grandmother. I feel she should be happy to have me around. I’m deeply hurt that she won’t let me be with her during this beautiful moment in her life. What do you think?
Signed, Agnes
From Dover, Delaware
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Dear Agnes,
If your daughter doesn’t want you around when her child born, it’s a personal decision that I think you should respect. Which means the basis of her decision may not be something she believes that you can emotionally handle, because there is something about you that she finds deeply disturbing. Here are some possibilities. Maybe she doesn’t want her child to see you when the newborn first exits the womb, because your daughter thinks you look so hideous, that the child may frightened enough to jump back into the womb and board it up from the inside. Or, she may not want you or the father around during the birth, because the physical appearance of the infant may be blatantly apparent that the child’s father is not who you or the man she’s with thought it was, and she needs time to get to the nursery and switch babies. It’s even possible that you daughter thinks you have a wicked sounding voice, and she doesn’t want her child to hear the sound of a witch cackling, and then freaking out after assuming that all people sound like you. And finally, she might not be pregnant at all, and she just may be doing this to garnish the attention from you, that she felt she was deprived of when she was a little girl. And if this happens, do not admit to anything, because your daughter is probably recording you, to be used later in a court of law when she sues you for child abuse, or have you arrested if the statute of limitations has not expired. I hope this helps.
Blake