Family and childcare?

I live 4 hours from my parents and 3 hours from my in-laws and they still help. My son is on holiday with MiL and FiL as we speak. I am very lucky (it does help that we only have one).

If DS has any children I'll pay it forward.

I live in small-town SW so a lot of families around here have 3 or 4 generations in the same area and most of the school mums I've met have siblings with kids so they trade off.

There is an assumption that family live near you and are fit and able to help (and also that they are not still working themselves!)

I live in commuter belt. Most people have moved here because they have jobs in London or the Home counties. And most people do not come from this area originally so, obviously, have no family on hand to help.

Our only family is my PiL, who live in the Midlands, 4 hours away, and whilst they have always been amazing and took the kids for a week every summer and 3-4 day visits at other times of the year, they couldn’t support the day to day childcare issues we had. I’m not untypical for my parent peer group.

How old are your children? And are your parents close and able to help if they wanted?

My parents had zero help so I think that does frame things for them. However they were considerably richer! They are young retirees & will help maybe 4/5 times a year when we ask but not the kind of regular help either during work or for fun that some people have. I don’t resent it and I’m grateful for what they do for us, but I’d hope to be more helpful to my own kids if they want it/need it and we are young enough.

We had no family within 150 miles. My dc are 17 and 14. We paid for every second of childcare we needed. DM moved to within a mile 5 years ago and almost immediately got a cancer diagnosis, then Covid & long Covid and then needed a hip replacement, so needed care just as my teens were gaining independence !

Morally somewhere things have changed, and it is now deemed acceptable to tell people their children aren't welcome or wanted by family members. This was just unheard of when I was growing up in the 80's. Now people don't bat an eyelid at saying stuff like this, and if you get offended then your the problem.

I can see how it can go either way. For me I think on the one hand I'll want to help if I can because I know how hard it is being a mum but I don't think I'd ever want to do scheduled childcare. After being very restricted with my own children I'll want to take advantage of the freedom later.

I've wondered if people that have always had loads of grandparent help are less likely to have that "I've done my time" feeling. Then again you get lots of posts from people claiming that they were "practically raised" by their grandparents and don't get why their parents don't offer the same to their kids.

Pretty much every family i know has grandparents babysit for them

Yea minimal help as my parents were well into their 70s when my kids were born and lived abroad half the year and my in laws were just not interested. We used paid sitters and if my parents were around they’d look after them as the kids would have been put to bed already, but we just worked around it. It would have been lovely if my kids had more of a relationship with their grandparents but my DF died when they were 3 and 5, and my mother was in her 80s by then and just didn’t have the energy.
But my parents lived in another country to their parents and beyond that it wasn’t the done thing to look after your grandkids (or even your own to a large extent)!

Yeah I had no help either! So much for it takes a village. I was thinking the other day that my son is 10 and my dad has never even taken him for a day out, a stark difference to my grandparents who always wanted us and were taking us out. My mum did when she was alive but died in her 50s so unfortunately she didn’t get many years of being a grandparent. I think I left my son with my nan a few times when he was an appropriate age as felt bad that she’s a lot older so it’s pretty much just been me and my son all his life

I had a lot of help with DS1 from my parents as I was young and still lived at home. By the time I had DS2 and DD I was living 250 miles away. I had no-one local to babysit, and very occasionally i’d have my parents babysit when staying over. But generally for years I didn’t go out much as ex DP worked overseas majority of the time. All adults now, and it does feel odd to have that free time again. If i’m local, i’ll help out with baby-sitting, but likely i’ll be working full time until 67 at least so it wouldn’t be regular but i’d be happy to babysit for nights out and couple holidays. I know how important it is to get a break.

My DB benefitted massively with his 2 DD’s from my parents babysitting at least one night per week, but they are also adults now and he’s had another child with second wife. This time my dad has passed and my mum not able to babysit, and her parents are overseas (sadly recently both passed) and so they have no-one to babysit. They are very much looking for my relocation much nearer to them as i’m offered to help out so they can get away some weekends.

My mum and step dad have helped me with childcare for 14yrs. I owe them my career and lifestyle I have now. I’ve never had to put my children in paid care. I’ve worked 2-3 12 hour shifts with my parents supporting for at least a few hours a shift when my DH has been working.

As a family we all do the same for each other. I cared for both my sisters children when my mum couldn’t, and now my niece and nephews children as required. Our family members do not use paid child care unless the choose to. No strings, no drama. We just all chip in.

We are beyond lucky. Hats off to you guys that don’t have that support. It must be tough.

My mum created this mindset as she said she had no help or support with work and childcare. It held her back both in her career and financially, she never wanted that for me and my sisters. I will adopt the same attitude for my children.

We’ve never had any family help. I’ve definitely never had anyone be shocked by that. I’d say that’s pretty much the norm amongst 80% of families I know. The other 20% tend to be quite unusual circumstances: one family has a very ill child, so grandparents help a lot because parents are often at hospital 1-3 hours away. Or another family, the parents are divorced and mum is mostly off partying with her boyfriend during her 50% so her parents usually have her 4 kids. 😳

But most of us normal families have always done it ourselves. That said, I cannot imagine having grandchildren and not wanting to help with them. My mum hasn’t seen my children in 6 years and MIL (both our dads died when we were teens) sees them maybe every other month for a few hours, but has never taken them out to do anything fun. Eldest is 13, so there has been no lack of opportunity to spend time with them. They are simply pathologically disinterested (my mum) to just not very engaged (and probably a bit controlled by her partner so isn’t allowed to see us much, in the case of MIL). Their choice, but I don’t get it. I’ll totally be that granny who is there and waiting for all the school holidays and sick days.

Across most countries/communities, it is normal, and has always been. If you choose to be a parent, you're choosing at least the possibility of being a grandparent, and most people want to help. Obviously it depends on your health/if you have to work FT etc, but I would hope to help mine, if they have kids when they grow up. Grandparents and grandchildren can have a very special relationship, important for both, and many grandparents are devastated if they don't get to have this.
Modern life has changed things, people living further away, women in particular being busier than in the past, and things that would been seen as shocking in other places, like not helping family/going NC with them, have recently seemed to be more common.

I think it's quite sad if relatives don't want to help. I know not everyone can, but if they could but don't want to it's a bit of a shame. My kids had such an amazing time being looked by their grandparents. I never asked the grandparents to, but they were desperate to do so. In our family it's a bit weird for relatives not to help out. That includes aunts , cousins etc

Yes I think that's what I would find.
I always paid a neighbour to babysit while we had nights out, they were at nursery during working hours.
When you are paying somebody you can tell them what's acceptable and what isn't.
When somebody is doing you a favour you have to put up with their way.
Also, regarding grandparents minding kids, at ds school some grandparents collected the kids.
I used to feel really sorry for them.
Some kids, only a parent could love

Family help can be overrated. My mum would love to help more but her "help" comes with strings attached which are honestly even more stressful than having no help. The moment someone steps in your house and takes over your children, they also get to mess with the routine, make decisions, and most of all judgments. We keep family for plenty of fun stuff/visits and prefer to pay for actual help.

My parents both passed away before DD was born and in my laws both worked full time till recently so family help just hasn’t been available and that’s fine, we’ve managed. We’ve taken a few annual leave days here and there so we could go on daytime dates while DD was at school. She’s 12 now so it suddenly feels like we have loads of alone time because she spends more time with her friends or in her room

We moved abroad, so we have little local support, my mum is amazing and does visit a few times a year giving us a night off, but day to day or emergency just isn’t possible, as imagine it isn’t for any families who have moved for work etc.

The problem I'm having with my ILs is how little time that they want to spend with us. I don't care if they don't want to do childcare, I'd never want to take advantage anyway, but they just drop off the radar completely for long periods. My DP spend more time with them despite being further away.