AIBU not wanting to use annual leave for stepdaughter’s childcare cover?

It’s not your problem to solve, OP. I wouldn’t dream of asking my parents to take annual leave to cover my childcare gap. It’s the parent’s problem to solve, not the grandparents’.

I would too.

Even nurseries that cover school holidays close over bank holidays quite frequently. Our closes 5 bank holidays a year, a previous one we used closed all bank holidays so 8/9 and was undoably difficult

1 day in 4 years she's asked you for when stuck. 1 day in 4 years? That's not entitled that's asking for help when stuck.

Have you never had a family member or friend help you out with childcare? Not once? Only ever used paid-for babysitters? Because a day off is valuable to most people whether it’s AL or rota or the weekend.

It would be cheeky to expect all the days to be covered by someone else without making full effort to cover them herself. It would be also cheeky to not happily accept no as the answer (but we don’t know whether that is the case here).

Otherwise, this is a single parent with no help from a co-parent, with a 4 year old at a nursery setting that doesn’t cover the school holidays (that seems a foolish choice on the face of it but we don’t know the circumstances). I’m guessing her own AL is probably stretched quite thin. She isn’t owed help from anyone but as a one-off if she’s really struggling I don’t think she’s out of order to ask.

You sound a rather mean-spirited person.

Just offer 1 day. I’m offering 1 day a school hol to look after my nephew from September. Would my brother do it for me? Maybe not, but I was a single parent with no local help, and he has little help as he’s a later in life baby, so I want to help. Will 1 day be that bad?

Your step daughter can pay for a one off extra day at nursery fior her daughter. Most nurseries are fine about this if it's an emergency. If you feel bad you can contribute to the extra nursery fees.

Nope, nothing was mentioned of that at all, can only go by what OP has said and she said the cheeky fucker SD can use her own or swap.

It is horribly unkind of the CF SD to try to purloin other people's hard earned days off. She should not even have asked and it was beyond entitled of her to do so.

Loving someone doesn't mean you should let them be unkind and a cheeky fucker to you.

So the CF SD can just do the right and loving thing and treat her stepmother and father with kindnenss and decency and use her own annual leave days on the days when she can't get someone else to look after her own child.

Being a good parent and loving them sometimes means not being a doormat and the OP sounds like she gets that.

Sounds like the OP won't be giving up her hard earned days off, and I am glad of that.

We don’t know if it’s cheeky fuckery or if it’s just busy at work. There are some periods of the year where if I took leave it would just push my work to evening to meet statutory deadlines. So I’d be working snatches of daytime and 8pm to 2am for a week and be an absolute wreck.

OP isn’t obliged to do anything but she says she loves SD like her own child, so it’s possible she may want to help out of kindness.

Taking someone's annual leave day for your own devices when you literally have your own or could do a swap is cheeky fuckery on steroids 😅

This is why I said I would expect SD to pull her finger out and cover most of the days herself, but helping her out with say 1 day out of 4 (or whatever it is) doesn’t seem that wild to me. Lots of GPs take AL to help out with childcare during the school holidays. This isn’t any different.

None of the OP or her husband's annual leave should be purloined by the SD.

SD has her own annual leave days, she can use them when someone cannot look after her child.

Taking someone's annual leave day for your own devices when you literally have your own or could do a swap is cheeky fuckery on steroids 😅

Sounds like OP won't be giving up her own annual leave just so her cheeky fucker SD can hang on to her annual leave, thankfully.

How many days AL do you get if you think your DH’s 28 (which is typical) is so very poor?

How many days cover does SD need? I think in your position if I had plenty of AL I’d be willing to use up say 1 or 2 days to help out, but only if the others were pulling their finger out too (ie SD taking some unpaid leave, DH taking some AL). It’s a bit much for SD to think all the days should be covered by someone else.

25 days + ‘Christmas’ (presumably Christmas Day, Boxing Day and NYD = 28

Nope, OP said her cheeky fucker SD has annual leave she can take, she can swap a day or she can have a sick day.

The CF SD just doesn't want to, so obviously the answer is no - and good for OP for seeing that.

As you definitely can’t do 2 of the days, if it was me I would do the 3rd. It’s only one day, to help a close family member out who hasn’t got any leave left. I know people are saying that she could take parental leave, but that has to be taken as a whole week, and as it is unpaid a part time single parent may well not be able to afford that. Other people saying that she could take emergency leave, well usually that is for very short notice emergencies, as she would have had a fair bit of notice that her mum wouldn’t be available for child care, a lot of companies wouldn’t accept that as a reason

The Catholic church should scour these threads, we're always finding new saints and martyrs 😂

Yep, OP is a normal person, not a doormat, saint or martyr and her SD is taking the absolute piss.

Even having the bloody nerve to ask if your step parent would use up a single day of THEIR precious annual leave so you don't have to use up your own - for your own kid 😆😂Hey please miss out on your day at work so I don't have to!

It's actually funny in the level of cheeky fuckery involved.

OP should tell the SD, politely, to shove off. I can't even believe she's asking the question in this thread, to be honest.

😂exactly! @BarbiesDreamHome no need to be s martyr but I guess given your user name your job is….how can I put this….low pressure? So you obviously don’t value your time off as much as others.

Ok well if you're happy doing that then that's great. Op isn't happy though.

Yes, especially if I had childfree days. I do have childfree days and so yes I know what i would do. You keep asking follow up questions like you think I don't understand. I don't think I've added any new information.

Especially if you had childfree days? It's not compulsory to have children around you every day you know! It's perfectly fine to use your days off doing things for yourself.

I've already replied to someone else. It's the post 2 above yours x

You'd take AL from work so a friend didn't have to?

If my friend was a single mum and her mum was poorly as per the OPs dsd? Yes. Of course I would. Especially if I had child free days off every week.