Entitled attitude: grandparents must provide childcare

Totally agree with you. If DGP are able to support occasionally, great, but very unreasonable to expect them to make up the day to day childcare. That’s up to the parents and they shouldn’t be guilt tripping the DGP into it.

Dotjones · Yesterday 14:30

Everything a child does, even when they reach adulthood, is ultimately the responsibility of their parents and grandparents. Therefore it's right that grandparents should be expected to provide free childcare for their grandchildren; if they didn't want to do this, they shouldn't have had children of their own in the first place, that way the grandchildren could never have existed.

So the flipside of this nonsense is that parents have a right to demand that their children produce grandchildren? Really?

As a relatively recent Gran I am delighted to help, look after DGD one day a week and random other times when asked. But there is no demand from me or from the other side. This is about love and support.

What car? I can’t even afford driving lessons.

Last holiday was a weekend in Scotland in 2018.

My grandparents rarely helped out with any of us, we didn't live that near.Loved visiting though. Likewise my inlaws and my dad rarely helped out with mine .(My mum died when I was 11) just too far away. My late husband said we should only ask his parents in an emergency as they had brought up one lot of kids already.
My grandchildren don't live near either though I certainly help out when I can and regularly have them at the weekend. I'm still working out of necessity at 73, and am the only grandparent.

Definitely this.

Op do you know my sister because she is exactly the same our parents are disabled and have looked after my niece since she was born she never asked them if they could she would just dump her daughter on them never even offered any sort of payment they have saved her a lot in child care they never get a thank you she wasn’t working when she had my niece but found any excuse to leave her with my parents this has been going on for 9 years and I don’t think she will ever change even though both our parents are disabled, our mum can’t see because of cataracts in both eyes she’s waiting for the operation and our dad also has cataracts in both eyes and has been ill since last week with his epilepsy and has my sister offered any sort of help or told them not to worry about getting my niece from school and looking after her until my sister finishes work nope she has just carried on like normal. It pisses me off no end how badly she treats our parents and how she just expects them to look after her daughter she has never once said thank you to them she wouldn’t be able to work if it wasn’t for our parents but she seems to have forgotten that.

I was a single parent. I worked full time when childcare was like rocking horse shit. I wasn’t able to buy my shitty two bed terraced house until I was 37, before that it was a series of grotty rented flats. The rose tinted view that people who weren’t even born have of my life back then couldn’t be further from the reality.

Can i ask the last few posters what do you did in your 20s? Apologies if you are all still in your 20s and struggling with these childcare dilemmas. I am just curious.

For example, how many times did you go abroad or change your car?

And mum stayed at home. So they didnt need childcare help

I have no choice

And even if i did, im not staying home with a kid and most blokes certainly wont do it

This!

Life was different for previous generations. Their money went further than it does today

Wr need to work full time to pay mortgage on a crappy terraced house whereas my parents bought a five bed detached property on just one salary

Unbelievable.

Yes. You voted a succession of @#£&)+)- into parliament. Your house prices were peanuts. You earnt enough to have the luxury to stay at home looking after your kids whilst your husband went to work a job that covered all the expenses. You chose to have children that are now suffering the consequences of your voting actions.

Roll up your sleeves and help them. Cause we're all struggling.

What on earth are you on about? Parents responsibility!! NOT grandparents

What???

That is ludicrous.

Also to add I think this creates a huge inequality between women who have help and women who don't. My own parents are dead and my mil is incredibly disinterested. Because of that, I have not been able to work without severe restrictions on my time. Being a sahm has been much easier. However it's massively impacted me financially and my job prospects. Other women I know with grandparent support have had so much more opportunities in their careers. I know a woman who's mum comes over every day and looks after her child. If she has an early or late meeting or drinks after work, she can go easily. Just asks her mum to come earlier. She even does the housework while the mum is working.

I'm lucky to be in a,position where I can offer childcare, and parent care. I'm looking after my grandson and my mother-in-law this weekend. I can't help my other grandchildren as they live too far away.

I think expecting regular, free childcare from anyone who is not the other parent is a cheek to be honest. I'd hate to be retired and having to look after children full time or still be tied to the school run. However, I think grandparents who don't offer any help must be incredibly mean spirited. I think offering to pick up in an emergency or looking after a child on an inset day or when the parent has an emergency or appointment are absolutely fine and a fit, healthy, local grandparent who refuses to help on a one off basis is a pretty lousy human being.

I had four children in the 70s, and childminded and fostered. Neither of those occupations brought much money in, there was no wage element to fostering at that time. I had no help and didn't expect any. It was my choice to have those children. We lived in poverty, because we earned £2.50 per month too much to claim benefits that would also have given us free school meals and prescriptions, so I definitely could not have afforded child care. I remember running out of money, frequently, and going to a little shop up the road, because they would divide a pack of loo rolls and sell me one.
By the time my first Grandchild was born I was working full time and could not offer child care. But then my son and daughter in law were responsible people and did not expect that from me. The odd days I looked after her were by my choice and we both really enjoyed that time together, because it was not a drudge for me.
Now remind me.... what do I need to pay back??

Agreed. The very high unemployment rate was concentrated amongst young people and people over 50. The unemployment rate in these age groups was much higher. It is easy now for people leaving school to get a job, it was very hard in large parts of the country in the eighties.

Gyms and exercise classes did exist. Most people could not afford them. But plenty of middle-class mums paid for one exercise class a week. Ordinary women bought videos and did exercise classes in their living room.
The late seventies and eighties when there was an explosion in interest in exercise classes and gyms. It is when you first started getting gyms appearing that were not aimed at boxers and weightlifters.
There were gyms in five-star hotels and in wealthy places.
Most people could not afford them.

To be fair, it doesn’t matter why. The fact remains that people in those days had a much more basic standard of living.

I concede that there are people who go without and still cant save up etc.

However, when i look at my friends they spent all their cash when they had no responsibilities (and i dont blame them one bit) but they are now complaining how dear everything is!

All im getting at is that if my children wanna spend their money in their 20s, il be damned if they expect me to look after grandkids when i know full well the sacrifices we made for me to be at home for them.

But you’re proving the point. People aren’t living a life of riley buying iPhones and gym memberships, they’re going without them like you did. It isn’t ‘going without’ if they didn’t exist at the time.