As a brand-new mother, I spent my days stumbling through the mystifying world of breast pumps, sleepless nights, and diaper-related catastrophes. It’s a rough time for any mom, but it’s especially trying when you’re an expat. Having supportive in-laws, of course, can make early parenthood much more bearable—sometimes.

Some weeks back, I was sitting in a recliner at my husband’s parents’ apartment. My two-week-old son had fallen asleep at the breast, something I would later learn is all too common in newborns. My father-in-law burst in with his characteristic aplomb, stared unabashedly at my semi-exposed breast, and exclaimed with dismay, “But he isn’t sucking!” Later that day, I accidentally walked in on my sister-in-law in the bathroom, and then, during a family dinner, my mother-in-law asked how my stitches were healing.

There are no closed doors in my in-laws’ home, much less locked ones. If you leave a letter lying around you can rest assured someone will pick it up and read it, and you can forget about trying to keep a secret.

It’s not just my in-laws who have a problem minding their own business. This is Italy, where the word privacy is not in the vocabulary. I mean that literally: There’s no Italian word for it. It has, admittedly, been nearly 700 years since the Florentine dialect evolved into modern Italian, but I think it’s telling that in all that time, no word has ever been coined to express what the “Oxford English Dictionary” calls “freedom from interference or intrusion.” When absolutely necessary, Italians use the English version, as they do with other nontranslatable terms such as sport, picnic and jeans. But this adopted word is more often used in regard to Internet policies and data collection. Personal privacy, on the other hand, seems to be a completely foreign concept.

This lack of personal space—physical or otherwise—can come as a shock to the Anglo-Saxon sensibilities of many expats. And it’s not just family members pushing personal boundaries. I’ve had an Italian roommate who didn’t find it at all awkward that she had to walk through my bedroom to get to hers, and she would routinely inquire about my social life (or lack thereof) on her way to bed. If you mention to an Italian co-worker that you’re off to a doctor’s appointment, she’ll probably ask, “What’s wrong?” And don’t be surprised if your hairdresser, butcher or corner grocer points out that you’ve gained weight. For Italians, these seeming faux pas are not considered invasions of privacy—how could they be when privacy doesn’t exist? On the contrary, these irksome intrusions are merely evidence of caring and solicitous interest.