Did grandparents who had no help become less willing to help?

I think you’ve hit the nail on the head there. You see it as a “job”. But not everyone sees it that way.

‘club’ is a very disparaging word. Are you in the ‘expecting help for my life choices club’? 🙄

My parents had no help and they would help me any time any place, unfortunately they live half the world away but we see them often considering.

My in-laws had plenty of help but they did nothing for me, they refused to look after them the one time my husband asked. They were very fit and well and lived half hour away.

I like to think I'll be like my own parents.

That's probably just it. If their parents palmed them off on the grandparents for the entire summer, maybe they didn't enjoy being parents...so won't want to do a lot of care for their grandkids!!
I know someone who sent her kids to her parents for the summer but she doesn't do the same for her grandchildren!

My parents and in laws state they had no help, but actually both DH and I stayed at our respective grandparent’s houses every Saturday night. We would love to have this amount of ‘no help’. We struggle to go out together (maybe twice a year) as neither side are particularly interested. Children are now young teens.

We are used to it now but it still occasionally stings.

I’m convinced it skips a generation and children who were loved and cared for by grandparents grow up to be ones who recreate that relationship themselves.

Dh and I grew up in the 80s/90s being very well cared for by our grandparents. I was with my grandparents 8-6 5 or 6 days a week until I started school. I stayed some weekends too. Then they did all the school runs and had me til 6 ish every night and all sick days and school holidays until I was 12. Dh also spent a lot of time with his as well. Those were really happy days for both of us. My grandparents were like parents to me. They took me on holidays and days out and we had sleepovers.

My mum and MIL (both our dads died before we had dc) have never provided any regular childcare. Never watched ours during school holidays. Never had a sleepover or taken them on a day out or on holiday. My youngest (8) has never been to MIL’s house. Neither of them have ever been to my mum’s. Eldest is a teen. At most, they have watched them at ours for a few hours or overnight, but I can count those times on probably one hand. The only interaction they have is granny coming for lunch or meeting granny at a NT for a dog walk and cake every few months. She doesn’t really do anything one to one with them.

I, however, cannot wait for grandchildren one day. I will absolutely be there providing childcare and taking them on holidays and running around helping during summers. I think dh would say the same. We have both been really present engaged parents (our parents were quite emotionally and physically quite absent, and not dissimilar as grandparents) and I expect it will continue when we are grandparents. Our parents weren’t very happy as parents for lots of reasons and were probably keen to avoid facing those emotions for another round.

My parents palmed us off on whichever other adults they could find at any given moment. My DGM gave up work to look after us and my Aunt had us very regularly and sometimes for extended periods of times. Do my DP help with my kids? Absolutely not, they barely even acknowledge their existence.

My mom had help she chose not to help me she kicked me out at 18 let my sister stay longer so I assume if she had children my mom would have helped her but me? Nope her sisters had to talk to her more than once about treating me less than strangers she has no relationship with her own grandchildren

My dad helped as much as he could

I was a young parent, and have raised a very challenging child to adulthood. I absolutely will not be raising or playing a part in raising his future children. I truly don’t know how I survived the 18 years I did, I’m not repeating any part of it.

I also have a teenage daughter. I can’t imagine being hands on childcare for her either, but I suspect my husband will become granddaddy daycare willingly so I’ll get swept up in it when the time comes.

My parents were extremely helpful with child 1 - but they raised only one extremely compliant easy child (me, I genuinely didn’t put a foot wrong as a kid, I was extremely anxious so just did exactly what was expected of me at all times), so I think they just had a lot of spoons. With child 2, we had no help but she had a lovely relationship with her grandparents. Again, they are as burned out as me and nobody was up for round 2.

I had no help as I lived 300 miles away...my older siblings did. My parents retired at 58 and did a lot of childcare.
I won't have gc but in my late 60s wouldn't relish childcare. Dh has gc but doesn't look after them.

Aren’t younger grandparents more likely to still be working?

My mum does the odd favour here or there, less than once a month. She'd always help out if I asked and she was available but there's no regular childcare commitment and I don't expect it either.

I expect to be the same when/if I have grandchildren, I don't want to be tied down to a regular arrangement but I'll do days out or babysitting for them to a date night now and again.

From what i see, theres no universal pattern but:

• grandparents (women especially) will often be less willing to commit to regular childcare if they worked full time to retirement age themselves
• younger grandparents tend to be more willing to take sole charge of young grandkids

By the time I get to retire at 67/68, I will have been working for 50+ years and will be knackered. I don't want to be swapping one job for another. My mum, on the other hand gave up work upon having children, only worked about 10 years in her life, and had literally decades of not working nor providing any kind of care before she helped me out 1 day a week with childcare so I could get back to work. The situations aren't really comparable. Whilst I hope I will be close to future grandchildren, and spend time with them weekends and holidays etc, the capacity I'm going to have to help out day to day will be far less than my Mum had.

My parents didn’t receive any help and nor did I. However all relationships between DGC and DGP’s have been very good.

Actually, I’m not sure about a whole week, I wouldn’t want to give up that much of the precious holiday time but a day or two would be utter bliss!

My parents had very little help with childcare (their parents lived abroad) and it made them determined to help however they can, partly because they recall how hard it was. Culture may be relevant too though - my family are Indian so it is normal for grandparents to be very involved in helping with childcare.

YABU.

Each family is different.

I had no help, neither did my own parents.

I don't have GC yet but my health is indifferent and my DC, all in their 30s, live too far away (several hours drive) for me to be of practical child care help if they do ever have children. I would expect them to consider this before they made the decision to become parents.

My parents claim they had no help and they didn’t have much but we definitely used to spend a week away at our grandparents every summer. I’d bloody kill for a week or even a day, off from my very intense child!

I find the opposite- those who had the least help themselves are the ones who offer most to their children. And those who had a ton of help don’t seem to realise how important it was and don’t think to offer their kids the same.

My own parents had zero help and are determined to be hands on grandparents because of it. I have a DS age 2 and they've been amazing.

My parents had no help and are absolutely amazing grandparents, really keen to help and very supportive.

My parents had no interest in helping me. I will help my children and their children, with what they need or ask, to the best of my ability.

I think with most women having children at an older age, grandparents are older too and flipping tired! I had my kids young and my parents were still late 40s/early 50s and they did a lot with my children. I think it's much harder in your 60s or 70s to look after young children, it's bloody knackering! I'm 55 and no grandchildren yet but hoping I won't be too old by the time I do have some!