Baby shower anxiety

I live in FL. Most of DH's (and some of my) family live in NY. My MIL has been tossing the idea around of throwing me a shower in NY. My mother (who I am not on the best terms with) lives in FL too, and wants to 'arrange' a shower for me down here amongst my friends.

I dont know why, and this prob sounds bizarre, but I dont want a huge production. I honestly do not want to fly to NY in the winter, rent a car, get a hotel and have a big baby shower. I did this for my bridal shower, which was fine, but then came the project of shipping EVERYTHING down here.

I am not sure if it's hormones making me feel like this, but I've given this alot of thought, and it is causing me so much stress, that I just dont want one. I had the 80 person bridal shower, and I dont want something like that again.

I have alot of family issues going on, and add that to heading to NY, paying for a hotel, rental car, flight, shipping the gifts here, etc is causing me alot of undue anxiety. I am not on good terms with my mother, and that will mean she will also want to travel to NY with me, stay with me, etc.

I dont know, I guess I am just looking for some input, as to what I should do? I told my MIL that if I came to NY for the weekend, I would really prefer to have maybe a small get together with her, DH's sisters and few others only. That would be fine, because my mother would not need to be there for that.

What to do?

ETA: And to top it off, DH is pisssy at me, because I feel like this. He is complaining how "his family cant experience the 'JOY' ". Of course this caused an argument with me telling him to tell his family to COME HERE if they want to experience the JOY of a shower...amongst other 'choice words', lol.

Message edited 9/18/2010 8:38:28 PM.

Re: Baby shower anxiety

What about suggesting a virtual baby shower with dual webcams? Have people ship you their gifts and they can watch you open them. Then suggest a "Welcome Baby" party where you will make the trip up there AFTER baby is born so they can see and meet the baby, emphasize that you aren't sure about being able to afford 2 trips up etc etc etc..........

Re: Baby shower anxiety

My IL's live out of state and for our wedding they insisted on having a shower down there. Timing worked out perfect and we were able to make the 2 day drive down there and another 2 days back. However, I'm NOT doing this again. First, we don't have the time to drive all the way out there and I don't want to spend 6 hrs flying there either. I've already hinted that my mil is more then welcome to come up here for the shower up here. I'm sure it is really stressful to deal with hotels, rental cars, and then family drama and I'd avoid the stress.


Have you tried to talk to your mil about her making the trip to FL? It seems reasonable to have her fly to you so she can experience the joy and get to spend time with you. This way you can avoid having to ship presents as well. Granted you might not be able to include all of his family, but maybe some close family members would make the trip?

Re: Baby shower anxiety

aw. I'm actually going to be having 2 Showers as well. When I got married, I moved to Colorado (where my DH is from) but my heart is still in NY (I consider it my real home). So in November when I come to visit NY my friends and family there will be throwing me a shower, and then DH's mom and HIS family (as well as some friends) will be throwing me one here as well. I think this is awesome, as what I really want is to celebrate with EVEYBODY. If that means 2 small parties rather than one big one then so be it. I'm not a center of attention girl though, so I get where you'e coming from. But I say just enjoy it and be glad that people love you and want to celebrate with you. If you're REALLY uncomfotable with it though, then be honest. No reason to go through so much trouble going to NY if your heart really isn't in it.

As for gifts - I cannot be bringing stuff back to CO with me (as I will be flying), so my mother is asking people to either give a giftcard or have gifts sent directly to my house. So the shower really wont center around presents, just us all being together.

Re: Baby shower anxiety

a great way to deal with the present problem is to tell eveone to have there present sent to ur house. thats what a friend of mind who lives in fl did when her mil had a shower for her in ny we all sent the gift to her fl house and then we gave just outfits or cards with a picture of the gift inside it. That may workf for you...