Entitled attitude: grandparents must provide childcare

Some bizarre comments here.

I have to say that I don't agree with you from my own experience, OP, though I'm prepared to admit that this might be a regional thing and also depend on whether it is common for young adults in a particular area to move away from their families for work.

I don't know a single family around us who rely on grandparents to provide regular childcare, except one who live in a multi-generational household where they care for the grandparents. Lots of grandparents do the odd weekend or evening, or help out with weekend activities, but that seems the limit. However, we do live in London, it's quite expensive around here, parents seem to be older, smaller families seem the norm (common to have one child, more than 2 unusual) and people tend to have moved for work and don't live that close to family. So not much entitlement around here. Instead, lots of panicked parents on the school/nursery WhatsApp groups picking other parents' brains on nurseries/nannies/babysitters and how to plug childcare gaps, or begging occasional favours due to running late or traffic problems.

Maybe it's different in different areas. My aunt provides 1-2 days a week childcare for her daughter, which I think isn't unusual where they live.

Also in response to “why do people have children if they can’t look after them or pay for childcare?”

Errr because not everyone is super rational, responsible, always makes financially motivated decisions or is capable of knowing exactly how their circumstances or the amount of support given by the government might change for the better or worse in the future. Especially when it comes to emotionally motivated decisions like having children.

You might as well ask, why do people have kids at all with the looming threat of climate change? Or, why do people get credit cards? Or, why do people eat cake and red meat ever when they know rationally that a kale and lentil diet is better for them? Or, why do people get married ever when the divorce rate is so high? Or, why does anyone buy a car when a bike and the train are cheaper, healthier and better for the environment?

Or even, why do people have kids, when one day those kids will have kids if their own and ask them to help with childcare? May as well just not bother.

How many of your life decisions are honestly motivated by a rational cold cost benefit analysis? And if yours are, do you think that’s the usual way, or do you recognise that the majority of human behaviour is more erratic, emotional and differently motivated than that?

Considering that we have to work until we are 66 and lots of us worked from age 16, and have worked while we had our own children, I'm surprised more women don't refuse to do unpaid childcare. This is the first time in my life that I have fewer responsibilities and some money to try to do things that I enjoy, in a few years more I'll probably be unable to get around so much. When is there likely to be any time for me? (BTW with 2 adult kids with disabilities I still have some responsibilities, but I can at least enjoy more time to myself)
Childcare was expensive when mine were young as well, and it wasn't easy, nothing has changed in that regard.

I have provided childcare for my dgs and will continue to do so in the school holidays. Did I enjoy it? No, it's a hard slog and I can think of a hundred other things I would prefer to do but I love my dd and will do what I can to help her. I have felt taken advantage of at times but I suspect that dd thinks that I enjoy having dgs where in reality seeing him for a couple of hours with dd at the weekend, as I do now he is in pre school full time, is more than enough for me.

Agreed op. I know of people who take the piss out of their parents on childcare. Some don't even bloody work and have a lot of family money so don't need free care, they just prefer it to spending their money. Grandmother is run ragged, doesn't know how to say no. It's a shame.

This is a joke, right? Just checking.

I agree 100% - my parents and my DH parents help with occasional childcare and usually as they request it when they want to spend time with our DD we then take advantage of it to have the opportunity of a date night.

My DD has been in nursery part time since she was 1 and I went back to work (also PT).

Recently though our situation has changed a little so rather than it being every month or so my mum is helping for a day every few weeks. I have no expectation and we would have muddled through but it was freely offered and gratefully received. Generationally things are different my grandparents lived the next road over and looked after us every day after school, my gran was a sahm but my parents are both working age and work full time. We also dont live that local daily childcare help is even possible so it never even factored into our childcare considerations (did see a bizarre post the other day where someone was basing their ttc journey on grandparents location and providing childcare).

TTC #2 is going to be based on when my daughter has her funded hours at nursery, I appreciate not everyone has the luxury of that and everyone's journey is their own but thats our current thought process.

To a degree I think this is a problem with such huge generational inequality. Many grandparents own 4 bed property and have good pensions whilst their children are poorer and don’t own or own a small flat.

Until we see generational equality there will be this pressure.

It’s totally fair if grandparents are unable to help with childcare. I think friction occurs when one adult child sees them giving up their free time to provide childcare, whilst the grandparents are unwilling to provide any help for their other children.

My niece and her daughter are very close to my Mum. My 2 now adult children are not so close (to their my Mum or my recently deceased Dad). My Mum was always minding my niece during school holidays (she worked for over 40 years in a school), but never looked after my children as she was ‘too tired from looking after Flossie’ (my niece).

That was a kick in the teeth, but hey ho. I worked from home, did night & evening work with my DH on dad-shift. But it has left a noticeable gap in the relationship my parents do with my niece versus my kids. And no matter how many years have passed, and now how often I bring my now elderly Mum here or help her, there’s a tangible quiet between my kids & their Nan.

My sister of course never helps my Mum; evening & weekend care falls to me (because I work from home, I must therefore be able to drop everything whenever there’s the smallest issue 🙄), and her office job is oh so important, despite having had free childcare for nearly 15 years. But that’s a whole other bucket of worms beyond the scope of this discussion!

Wow….just wow. A perfect example of the entitlement referred to in the OP! Some people are utterly deluded about years past and seem to think older people have all enjoyed some sort of financial eutopia. Some things they had easier, some harder. It’s very ignorant to make such blanket judgements about an entire generation and as for acting like they all owe you…wow, so embarrassing. And I’m in my thirties btw before some twat comes along calling me a ‘boomer’. Grow up!

Firstly this post is making a generalisation about parents attitude or lack of attitude based, presumably, on a few trending mumsnet threads - although OP do clarify if this is based on any other sources.

Also lots of parents don’t get, want or expect any help from grandparents - can’t think many parents in my immediate circle that arn’t paying through the nose for childcare.

And the whole ‘why have children if you can’t afford x,y,z’ is pretty short sighted… people circumstances change, cost are going up. None of us have a window into the future and frankly we do little in this country to actually make life easier for working parents.

My mother spent years avoiding her grand kids and is now just as successfully avoiding great grand kids!! There is no way any of us would have left children with her. Dogs yes, children no. She hates kids!

GPs have always provided childcare for the younger generation in my family and I will do the same for DD if she chooses to have grandchildren. It’s just what we do in our family

All well and good to say that now (a bit like how people are much better parents when their kids are hypothetical) but what happens when you’re having to work full time in spite of ailing health or even just normal ageing?

On a more general level:
No one is obliged to provide childcare for anyone else’s children, whether you think they should want to or not. The world is very different now, it’s not just parents who are having to work to keep a roof over their heads.

The bottom line is, they’re your kids, if a grandparent is able to and wants to help look after them, fine, but don’t assume and don’t take it for granted (and don’t get over dramatic when they do something differently from how you want it done, if they’re doing you a favour).

Funniest post I've read here in a while.

Back to the op - anyone who thinks that grandparents have any obligation to provide childcare have not met my mother (or any of my family actually). We all get on really well, are close and supportive but we all live independently.

The price of our first house purchase together was made on the basis one of us would cut hours if we had any DC and what we'd be able to afford to pay. I'd previously saved up a large deposit and DH also worked evenings to add extra to add extra.

It was our choice to have DC, we didn't consult our parents nor did we expect them to child mind daily. Just as well as MIL later said that as she'd had four DC herself, she'd have to be fair and say she couldn't look after any of them in case she ended up with all seven. My DM limited help to odd babysitting duties, showed no interest in anything more and I didn't expect her to. DH worked in the week and for a while had a few hours a week in the evenings, I worked at weekends and when DC went to school at local school

Totally disagree, Ds's grandad is the one that does most of our Childcare.

‘It takes a village’ - a willing village though, surely? And even among those, what form this takes will vary according to the villagers you ask.

life may be harder nowadays, but ultimately your kids are your responsibility, and that’s something to consider before you have them.

Thats not how I personally perceive things - most grandparents I know are really keen to look after their grandchildren and spend time regularly with them, yet most of the parents I know would prefer the kids in more dependable and structured paid childcare given the choice. Most of my friends do or have done a hybrid arrangement where they have a child in nursery most days then a day with grandparents as a compromise.

I suppose each family has a different dynamic - what one family might call having granddaughter round for tea twice a week, another might call an outrageously entitled free childcare service. It hugely depends on the individuals involved - some families are just closer knit and naturally want to help each other out, others have a more transactional approach to life, others simply don’t have the time or resources to be looking after their grandkids as they have busy lives.

People just do what works for them and their families.

My family or my husband's family never helped out at all. If it was an emergency they did ( once or twice) but mostly it was get on with it.
I did envy those who had childcare on tap.
It seemed ideal , but there is always a trade off with any arrangement.
At least we became self sufficient
It was different times though.

You're not serious surely?

You’re right @Hope54321. Grandparents shouldn’t feel pressured into doing childcare.

But equally if grandparents don’t want to help out, they should just say a firm, “ahh we love the grandkids but committing to childcare doesn’t work for us, sorry.”

They are also adults, and if not doing any childcare is what they want, they should just say that surely… problem solved

Life is undoubtedly now tougher for younger generations than it has been in recent history. Many families are in really tough situations where they need two incomes to have a reasonable quality of life and yet childcare is cripplingly expensive. Like it or not, many people that are grandparents now did have an easier time of things at a similar age and have benefited hugely from the relatively low house prices and generous pension schemes that are no longer an option for parents today.
Are you saying that you want to go back to the good old days where a man's salary was sufficient to buy a house and the woman remained at home, chained to the kitchen?

So sorry, I didnt mean to shout 😟

What are you talking about?

I was 42 when I became a grandmother, 10 years ago.
I didn't create the situation of two parents needing to work. I was giving back to the system by working.

I never expected my children's grandparents to care for my children.

THERE ARE SOME BATSHIT RESPONSES ON THIS THREAD.