Active discussions

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

No family support, anyone else? Help me find solutions.

190 replies

tangerinemagic · 30/06/2025 13:32

Feeling alone and exhausted. We have 2 kids, 2 years apart: youngest is 9 months (crawling, fussy), eldest nearly 3 (terrible twos).

Both parents useless, dead or alive. One has passed, but wasn’t any help when alive. My mum is alive but may as well not be, only met my eldest once 2 years ago, has never met youngest, won’t visit, and her house isn’t safe for kids. She’s an alcohol and mental health problems, possibly the most draining self centred person you could imagine and all caused by my late father who abused her emotionally and rumoured, physically but no idea if that’s her wild imagination or the truth. Don’t care at this point, she has failed me as a mother since the day I was born and I’ve been left with troubled siblings which only adds to my stress. Yes I have by now distanced myself/cut them off for my own sanity…

In-laws (mid-70s) are helpful with other grandkids (now 6+ and up to uni age) but say how much harder it is now at their age and find it hard to help as much as they did with the other grandkids (19, 16, 8, 6). They live 2 hours away but will happily drive 2 hours to BIL’s to do school pick-ups, give dinner, and drive home just because BIL/SIL are working late and “don’t trust anyone else.” But visiting us in London? “Too much traffic.” It is straight motorways to BIL but their only solution when we say we’re struggling is “come to us.”

When we do, we get fed and it’s nice to have a change of scenery, kids like the big garden and not worrying about food is nice, but help is minimal: no mornings, no overnights, no weekends without us. We’re still hands-on, plus have to pack for 5 (including the dog), deal with travel car sickness, overtired kids, and disrupted routines. Yesterday we left at 6.30pm, home by 8.30pm, no one slept in the car, toddler vomited, everyone overtired. We walked back into a messy house because we’d been too busy packing to tidy before we left. Honestly, not worth it.

We get more help seeing local friends with kids, where toddlers play and people happily hold the baby. DH agrees but won’t push back when PIL suggest visiting them. Just says we only do it every couple of months, it’s manageable, the drive here is horrid hence why we don’t enjoy it and they’re old. We’ve discussed moving out of london and we will but in a few years time. What if we moved closer for the help and their age doesn’t stop being a factor?

Meanwhile, others I know have grandparents flying in from abroad to take grandkids at 6am so parents can lay in, having them for the weekend while grandparents go to weddings, 5 days at Glastonbury, and holidays of their own. Dream scenario. We have to pay for every minute of help to have any kind of life….. I’ve not found anyone who can do double bedtime successfully yet. Given the age of the DCs they just want mum and dad or grandparents would be ideal but here we are.

DH turns 40 later this year. PIL say they won’t have both DCs as a full weekend including bedtime and mornings is ‘too much’ in case they might be unwell or not sleeping for example and even still would only help if we drive up rather come here.

For context, 2 years ago for a child-free wedding we rebooked flights to leave from near PIL, dropped off DC1, (2+ hours), packed for him and Us, their nearest airport we could leave from was 90 min away and all in return for 2 night stay. They ignored our messages when it was going badly sleep-wise. Non stop worry. We’d have been better off paying a professional to stay at ours.

I’d love to ring “mum” for help but don’t have one, never have done. I made my peace but this weekend everyone seems to be off without DCs and we feel exhausted from visiting PIL.

Any advice? We don’t want an au pair as the house isn’t enourmous being in London and someone would drive me mad living here, but I’m starting to think we need to hire someone so we can stop begging family for scraps of help and finally get a break.

what have others done in this scenario? No siblings my side as I established but DH has an older sister who is almost an empty nested, eldest off to uni in September. So left with her 16 year old. Could be an option but we’ve never asked.

OP posts:
nixon1976 · 30/06/2025 17:32

I'd say it's quite rare to have family who'll have the kids as often as you say you'd like. It's lovely, but not overly common. When my family couldn't help we used babysitters (friends, nursery workers, anyone recommended really). We had a few we trusted enough to leave our kids with overnight. It's easily done if you reach out but obviously overnight sitters are expensive

CaraMoose · 30/06/2025 17:31

We are expecting our first and also have no support, with some family passed away, not being close with some family and others living overseas. We don’t think we would put such expectations on the friends we have to assist with childcare. We are expecting we will have our little plus one with us for future times away and date nights and we are ok with that - we will just make it work. We did have a serious discussion about the lack of support before we decided to try for a baby.

PurpleThistle7 · 30/06/2025 17:30

My husband and I are immigrants so have never had anyone else. He travelled a lot for work when the kids were younger so it was often just me. Our daughter is 12 and we have had 2 overnights without them since they were born and have no intention of any more for the next several years.

What helped? Finding a tiny village and sharing lifts a lot. It honestly wasn’t super practical until everyone was in primary school just with car seats and such but it’s much easier now my children are 12/9. So my son goes with a friend to football and we take them another time etc.

Ummm… honestly not sure what else was helpful. Letting go of things that weren’t necessary? We both work full time so sometimes dinners are… creative. And we watch telly a bit too much some nights. And I get a takeaway now and again when I’m just too tired.

If you have the money to outsource things do it! We never had that kind of money but if you can get a regular babysitter or cleaner or meal delivery it might help a lot.

Seventree · 30/06/2025 17:27

My situation is different as my mum is generally lovely, she just works too many hours to be much practical help and refuses overnights (she will babysit for a few hours now and then though).

Honestly, in terms of weekends away or anything overnight, we've just accepted it. Occasionally one of us will do something with friends and we get breaks that way. Occasionally we book annual leave when they are at nursery and have a date day.

Sometimes I look at friends with more help and feel jealous, but comparison is the thief of joy. Moaning about it won't magically make childcare appear and I'm not willing to leave them with an unknown babysitter so 🤷‍♀️

Mwnci123 · 30/06/2025 17:25

We don't have practical help from grandparents either (sick/ old/ dead). When the kids were small we took days off together sometimes while they were in nursery, or worked from home and had lunch together/ speedy shag on our lunch breaks. We spent a lot of leisure time with friends with similar aged children, as it's just so much easier- outdoors ideally.

Ours are in primary school now and I no longer feel such an urge for a break- it's all so, so much easier. I occasionally think it would be nice to have a weekend away with my husband, but the logistics would be hard and we're ok really. I used to feel like I'd happily stay in a motorway Travelodge on my own for a fortnight. You will be ok too, honestly.

Pinty · 30/06/2025 17:25

I had no help from family when my children were small, a lot of people don't. My family and my in laws didn't live nearby and it never occurred to me to ask for any help. I loved them but they had very different views about child rearing so I didn't want any help from them anyway.
My support network was my friends, we helped each other when we could and when we couldn't we just got on with it.

Original poster
tangerinemagic · 30/06/2025 17:24

MrsRandy · 30/06/2025 16:55

Honestly, the first thing you need to do is change your mindset or you will never be able to let go. I didn’t read your whole OP because I think the honest reality is you don’t have support and knew the situation before having children. Jealousy and comparison will just fester and you’ll be stuck in a negativity cycle.

Your feelings are valid. But try and remember how extremely lucky you are to have 2 beautiful kids. Some people would love to be you. Maybe they have experienced loss or infertility, this is why comparison isn’t worth it as you will always have it better or worse than others

Next would be to move forward and accept you’ll have less time away from the kids.

My DH has a night a week with his mates or to himself, same as me.

Make use of the fact you have each other - you both don’t need to be in together every evening

Make use of free nursery hours if your kids don’t go yet, try and find a reliable baby sitter for the odd date nights

yes well said and agree, I have definitely accepted it and made my peace because we are lucky in other ways, we live in a desirable location, nice house and good jobs. We can afford the help which is why I’m keen to understand solutions. We do have Nursey for DC1 four days a week, not eligible for free hours just yet. DC2 will be joining from later this year. Honestly the nursery bill will be £4k+ per month so knowing where to spend the extra childcare help is a valid question.

OP posts:
YellowCamperVan · 30/06/2025 17:19

I think in this day and age where people tend to move away to set up a life, it's more common to have no local support than to have it. Best thing to do is to accept it and take pride in it. You chose to have these kids, so it's your responsibility to care for and provide for them.

We live 1-2hr away from all family and have never had or expected any help from anybody, it's tough at times (mostly when everyone is really unwell) but in general I do feel a sense of pride knowing that we're doing it ourselves. I have seen the odd friend with super involved family and it can be helpful in some ways but awful in others. When people pitch in they often expect an equal say or there are strings attached, seen lots of conflict when people are offering childcare and then their expectations in return aren't met. It feels more peaceful and more simple in some ways knowing that it's on us, no unmet expectations or resentment.

We haven't had a night together alone since I gave birth lol. And it's fine. We chose to stop at one because two would have sent us under I think without any support. Did you get a lot of support with the first and then choose to add a second and it disappeared? Or was there a reason you went for two without support?

Original poster
tangerinemagic · 30/06/2025 17:18

Radra · 30/06/2025 16:31

Your social circle sounds unusual.

Mine - no one really has super regular childcare help from grandparents but everyone apart from us can call on grandparents for a wedding or a week over the summer, a child free long weekend once or twice a year at minimum.

A couple in our circle had a fairly remote childfree wedding and of the 24 couples invited, we were the only ones who didn't have grandparents willing and able to look after their children.

Similarly our removals company were just totally thrown by us having our two small children with us - they just kept saying "but why didn't you leave them with grandparents?' because they didn't offer..

Show quote history

What did you childcare wise do for the remote wedding?

OP posts:
SilviaSnuffleBum · 30/06/2025 17:18

You just have to suck it up and crack on. I'm a lone parent with twins, both of whom have additional needs. Absolutely fuck all help; nada.
You just get used to it when it's all you know.

doodleygirl · 30/06/2025 17:16

The reason your in-laws don’t come and see you is because they don’t want tolook after a baby and a toddler at their age, and I don’t blame them.

Im 61 and in the last 12 months both of my girls have had a baby, I’m planning on offering regular childcare because I can and I want to. However, if they decide to have more babies in the future that may change as I get older and potentially won’t have the energy, I hope they wouldnt resent that.

Your BIL has older children, your in-laws felt capable of having them at that time. Instead of being so resentful why not speak to your in-laws and ask what they can do. Although if your attitude comes across in real life as it does on this forum I can understand why they don’t help.

Redlocks30 · 30/06/2025 17:15

made me question whether the support we do get is worth the hassle.

That makes it seem very transactional! See them because you want to, not because of what you can get out of them,

Original poster
tangerinemagic · 30/06/2025 17:14

HorseAreBetterThanHumans · 30/06/2025 16:15

We had no help from parents, particularly as it became clear DC had additional needs and less easy to look after. This also meant that a lot of other childcare didn't work - summer playschemes didn't work as I would need to pick up after an hour, or not be able to leave DC at all.

All the poster saying to suck it up may not be wrong but you asked for solutions. What we did that worked was
Have a couple of trusted nursery workers babysit a couple of times a year.
Have DC friends over a lot, so I was less embarassed about asking for help when I needed it (playdate after school type help).
Tag team parenting - so you at least get some alone / free time. Very little time together as parents but it does help a bit.
Made friends with parents in a similar boat, created a network where we helped each other out.

I never returne to a proper job, I am self employed and work at home. This was not my original plan but it has been much better for me and the family.

DC is now 17 and my parents missed out on spending time with a wonderful human but that was very much their loss.

Brilliant, thanks for the suggestions these are great. At what age were you able to manage the tag team parenting? Makes me think living in london is the way forward as it’s so much easier to create a network here of other parents and the paid for help. We have good jobs so we can afford it once I’m back at work, and people want to ‘live in’ in london if it comes to it.

OP posts:
TheCosyViewer · 30/06/2025 17:13

Due to several factors we never had family help with our kids. Any help we had, we paid for it. Babysitters for going out in the evening, the odd few hours during daytime every so often and so on. We just got on with it and brought our children to loads of places and weekends away where it would have been nice to leave them home with someone but as there wasn’t a someone, they came too.

MigGril · 30/06/2025 17:13

We didn't have any help either. I was concerned that they wouldn't be confident to be left with anyone as they got older. So enrolled them in scouts (your oldest can join squirals in a year at 4). This has been fantastic, for us getting the odd break and for the kids confidence. Neither of my kids where phase at going on school residential in primary as they had already done camping away from home. And as your two are closer in age you will get some camps where they are away together. Even my two who are 4 years apart have done this as they will do mixed section camps. For example cubs and scouts together.

When the kids where little we either had to pay babysitters or swap favours with friends, so we didn't go out often. I can also understand how hard it is with the travelling to relatives DH family are only an hour away but DD would get bad car sickness and it was never easy and despite them being young grandparents (in their early 50's when DD was born) they wouldn't come to us for some reason. My dad is 4 hours away so we have never seen them often.

Redlocks30 · 30/06/2025 17:10

What if we moved closer for the help

Would they even want you to?! I feel sorry for lots of these retired grandparents who are expected to do childcare whether they've expressed any desire to or not!

My grandparents did no childcare for us but we saw them loads-the come for dinner or we'd go there or all go out for the day. Maybe that's the sort of grandparent they want to be.

HelpMeUnpickThis · 30/06/2025 17:09

I really dont want to be mean but OP @tangerinemagic you really need to get on with it.

We did - in London - NO HELP, grandparents passed away or an 11 hour flight away and
I really didnt expect anyone to help me raise MY kids. My DDs are now 11 and 8
and I am still alive.

You sound a bit entitled. Sorry.

I hope
things get better for you.

Original poster
tangerinemagic · 30/06/2025 17:06

LindorDoubleChoc · 30/06/2025 15:54

We never had any parental "help" with our 2 children as we lived too far away from all the grandparents. One set had our two kids for 3 days when they were 8 and 5. The other set had them for about 5 days in the school summer holidays for a few years when they were at primary school.

We never went on a childfree break apart from that one 3 day occasion mentioned above.

I did baby sitting swaps with other Mums, or paid friends au pairs to baby sit for evenings out.

You seem a bit obsessed OP, like you're allowing it to really piss you off whereas in reality your situation isn't in the least bit unusual.

Quite dramatic. Don’t know how you worked that one out. I’ve clearly said I made my peace with it but several examples this weekend on top of clearing up my child’s sick at 10pm last night from the car and having him not get home (without sleep) until 8.30pm and giving him toast for dinner at 9pm made me question whether the support we do get is worth the hassle. I’m not obsessed.

OP posts:
Scottishgirl85 · 30/06/2025 17:06

We just get on with it. No help. 3 kids. About 2 nights out together in the past decade. It's just life with kids, and we chose to have them! It was my 40th on Saturday - family day out and home for cake and film.

Thunderdcc · 30/06/2025 17:04

I know this isn't quite what you're asking but as a one off, we went on holiday as kids with my much older cousin acting as an au pair to give my mum a break. 20 years later my sister went to stay and look after the cousin's small children for a week. If your SIL has dc off to uni they might be up for earning some money in the holidays?

Are dc in nursery? One of the staff may be happy to do regular babysitting.

NerrSnerr · 30/06/2025 17:03

We have never had any help. We go away separately with friends to have a break.

One positive thing is that you can do everything your own way. So many people who rely on help have to compromise on things, it’s nice not to have to do that. It is nice to be independent

menopausalmare · 30/06/2025 17:01

Our parents were early/ mid 70s when ours were little and we rarely asked for childcare. Instead, we gave each other a break. One of us would take both children out so the other could stay home and tackle jobs. Alternatively, one of us looked after both so the other could go it for the day and see friends. It can be done.

IncaAztec · 30/06/2025 17:01

I understand and hear you. My parents have never had my kids, just didn't want to and now too old. You just feel like you've no support. No solutions just solidarity.

Original poster
tangerinemagic · 30/06/2025 17:00

HenDoNot · 30/06/2025 15:41

If you can reframe it in your head as you “go all that way” to visit and spend time with DH’s parents, rather than going with the expectation of them providing you with childcare, you might feel less annoyed and resentful.

Your DH is obviously ok with it and wants to spend time with his parents.

Maybe every third or fourth visit he can go alone and take the children, and then you get a weekend to yourself.

Show quote history

I do agree except they say all the time they don’t see the DCs enough, they’re growing up fast, they wish they lived closer, why don’t you come up for help x100… it’s crazy they can’t travel for 2 hours by car if it’s so important. They are retired and as I say do plenty for BIL.

OP posts:
Arthurnewyorkcity · 30/06/2025 16:59

I think its quite sad all the comments about expecting help. It's not an expectation as such but a hope. I was at my granny's every single Saturday in the holidays. It was good for me and good them. In fact studies show grandparents who are close with grandchildren live longer!
I'd have thought my parents would have wanted to do similar with my children/their grandchildren. Even more so when you have parents who say 'we can't wait to be grandparents'. I don't think wanting 1 night away a year is unreasonable op and I think you've got a very hard time on here. I find it very sad families don't seem to club together nowadays. I know the grandparent I hope to one day be, is not the ones my kids have.

If your kids don't have sen it'll get much easier as they get older and you'll see friends who can do mutual baby sits but for now the p.o who said about date nights indoors advise some fantastic ideas.