Grandparents helping with childcare - do you get help? Did your parents?

[DorotheaHomeAlone]

We’re lucky to have weekly childcare help from my mum with our three dc. She’s come pretty much every week since I returned to work after mat leave with my first.

A lot of friends have said how lucky we are. I agree, Mum is great! She also offers the occasional overnight and we holiday together every couple of years. Her mum provided similar when she had children and both enjoy close relationships with their gc as a result. I hope to offer my kids similar help if they choose to have kids one day.

A lot of parents I speak to would love this sort of help but don’t have it and it’s got me wondering why that is. Were our grandparents‘ generation more inclined to help than our parents? Is it because people are less likely to live near family or because they’re starting their families later and grandparents are too old to help?

So my question is: did your grandparents offer childcare when you were small and do your parents offer now? If not, why not?

I grew up with my paternal grandmother but her help wasn't free. My mother paid her a weekly wage. She lived with my family from Monday to Saturday morning. We would drop her off at her house that she shared with my aunt and her children and we picked her up late on Sunday evening. My maternal grandparents had twelve children and I had over 50 first cousins from my mother's side (I have 72 first cousins in total!). I was lucky that they knew my name at all.

I have three children but I've always lived far away from our parents. My parents are now deceased and my in-laws live abroad. My husband and I have always taken care of our childcare for our children. I was a SAHM for nearly 20 years.

We are grandparents now and live in the same city as my son and his family. I find it difficult that he expects me to look after his children on a whim and for free. I don't have experience with this so we butt heads a great deal.

On a regular basis, no.
But I remember my grandmother coming for the weekend if Mum and Dad were off somewhere once, maybe twice a year. My Mum would do similar.
And when we were on child 2 with chickenpox within a month, Mum came up and stayed for a week so DH and I could go to work (she would gave come for round 1 if not on holiday, I think).
In laws have come for half term a couple of times, again allowing us to work.

I was never regularly looked after by grandparents because my only surviving grandparent (the rest had all died before I was born or by my 3rd birthday) lived nearly two hours away. My DM was a stay at home mum until I went to school and then she worked as a TA.

Now, DD is taken to and from school by my DM and, when she was too young for nursery, she spent the days with my DM too. I’m due DD2 and, when I return to work, she’ll go to be with my DM too.

I know I’m incredibly lucky. I trust my parents completely with my DC and they have taken DD on mini holidays when she finished for the summer earlier than I did (I’m a teacher). DH’s parents live two hours away and don’t have the same relationship with DD because they don’t see her as much. They have offered to let DD go to them for a while in the summer but I’m not comfortable with that as they don’t know her routines and I would hate DD being upset and me not being able to be with her in 10 minutes.

Both sets of grandparents live several hours away so couldnt do anything weekly. But both are great about coming here to help when I am away with work, or having dd to stay in the holidays or for us to have a night away every couple of years.

I'd have thought it was obvious, lots of grandparents have to work.
Both my mum and Mil worked when dd1 was born.
I didn't have any other close relatives who didn't go out to work.
After having ds I took a career break, the expense of childcare coupled with the stress of working and never having a break became too much. I actually think it was the correct decision as I was always there for my dc, not judging here, and we are incredibly close now they are adults.
My now ex in laws don't have a relationship with my dcs. They never put much effort into a relationship with their grandchildren and now real what they have sown. When my marriage ended they stopped offering to look after the dc and the relationship never recovered.

Not really. We live about 2 hours' drive from my parents. I'm over it now but I haven't had a night away from the children since DS1 was born (8 years ago)

I am really envious of people who get lots of help. I can't understand why my parents only come up in an emergency.

PIL are too fuddy-duddy to have ever helped us out.

Oh sorry just saw your question no I was never looked after by my GPS, two were dead by the time I was 1. My mum thinks this means that she shouldn't be obliged to offer more than the odd bit of help

Yes my grandparents had me and my sister regularly and enjoyed spending time with us. I have lovely memories of my childhood with them and a close relationship as a result. Due first baby in October, my mum despite working part time and looking after my now elderly grandpa has offered a day or two a week to help us. We aren't very high earners although we own our house and she wants to help us financially by offering childcare as well as wanting to spend time with her grandchild. DP's parents by contrast have been retired 15 years, very well off, live twenty minutes away and are already making noises about how unreasonable it is for retired parents to be asked for regular childcare. DP is still going to ask but it's unlikely they'll help us which is really disappointing for him as he had hoped his parents might actually want to be involved with our child, and want to help us. I would want to help my child in the same way my family have helped each other generationally- I consider my own mum to be very selfless and kind and I'm lucky to have her, and I would in turn want to look after her when she needs it.

No and no. My grandparents all lived far away and had all died by the time I was about eight, I only have vague memories of the grandmas and none of my granddads.

My parents live far away and are pretty old now. They have only met my children a handful of times and looked after one of them on their own for an hour. My in-laws have been more help with babysitting and some overnight stays but not regular daytime childcare, we pay nursery for that.

Nope my parents have never had my ds and he's 10. I've spent thousands on childcare but I like to be independent and love the satisfaction of knowing that everything I've done or got is from myself.

My mother's parents looked after us occasionally, grandma was very ill though so it wasn't often.
My mother lives hundreds of miles away so no help there and my dad isn't bothered, he's seen my daughter twice.
Her paternal grandparents are in another country and have never seen her.

@Waxonwaxoff0

I doubt I'll be able to do regular childcare if/when DS has children either because I will be still be working, I can't afford to retire early. But I'll babysit if he wants a evening out, same as my mum does.

It sounds like your daughter didn't appreciate what you did for her providing childcare. This seems to be common.

No. I grew up hundreds of miles away from my grandparents, and I also now live hundreds of miles away from my parents. I have hardly known anyone who could use grandparents for childcare. It’s really not normal in my world.

We have had no regular childcare help at all. My parents are happy to babysit occasionally and my dad will occasionally pick up one of the dc from school if they have an after school club and we can’t get them a lift from elsewhere.

I asked a while ago if they would be prepared to cover childcare for us to enable me to get a job outside the home (I’m currently a childminder). Due to DH shifts, this would mean we needed Help for 2 weeks On, 2 weeks off and because of the hours of the job I had seen, we wouldn’t have needed every before and after Session covering anyway. I got a resounding NO. My parents didn’t want to be tied to childcare, didn’t want to have to get up every morning to do the school run. So I didn’t apply for the job and will continue to do what I’m doing until my dc are in a position not to need supervision after school (youngest is 9).
Fast forward to now, my sibling now has a baby and she is going to be looking after him full time in September when his mum goes back after maternity.

Mum can’t understand why I’m upset and quite honestly I can’t see that our relationship will ever be the same again. (She has form for favouring my sibling over quite a lot of things). Whilst I appreciate she has every right to say no to me, to say yes to her other grandchild, which will invariably be harder work because of the age of the child and the hours involved, it really smarts that she couldn’t do the same for us.

My grandparents lived 200 miles from us so didn’t regularly look after us but we used to go there for a week in the summer and at Easter as my parents were working.

My parents live a few hundred miles from us now so don’t do regularly childcare. They’ve looked after the kids for an afternoon here and there when they’ve visited and I’m hoping when the children are older they might be able to do some overnight visits

I do know some very well off families that imo take the piss with the amount of help they demand on their parents. To me that’s just being cheap!

I find this interesting as it assumes the main reason for gp to help is financial. We could afford the extra childcare (though obviously appreciate the substantial saving) but I love knowing the kids are with someone who loves them for that day. I especially appreciated that when they were babies and I returned to work but even the older ones get very excited about seeing their Grandma and I love that. I want them to have that time with her away from me.

All my grandparents lived too far away to help regularly when I was growing up, but we would go and stay with them for a few days in the school holidays and they sometimes came to stay with us if my mum was on a work residential or similar.

I now live near my mum so she has quite a bit of ad-hoc childcare over the years, and my dad has babysat sometimes. Years before I even met my now DH, my mum used to say that if I ever had a baby, she'd look after it (although she also used to say that she didn't hanker after grandchildren either).

My parents and in laws all work so couldn't provide weekly childcare even if we asked. They would babysit at weekends if we asked but, again, they are busy people with their own social lives so can't always fit us in. We've actually never left our 3yo overnight so far. We were intending to this summer for a wedding but it's now been postponed so perhaps next year.

My grandparents did odd days in school holidays so we never went to holiday childcare etc.

I live a few hours (in opposite directions) from parents and PIL.

DS is in full time nursery, but both sets willl help out of me or DH have to travel on business etc

My mum is amazing. She had my DD one day a week when she retired, and when DD started school she had DS one day a week. She does a lot of school pick ups and ad-hoc days.
She doesn’t babysit in the evenings much, as she likes to be home in bed early though. But I’m very grateful for everything she does do.

My paternal grandmother looked after me when I was toddler / preschool age and then mum had a job as a TA throughout my school years.

My parents do both the school runs for me and look after Dd until I get home between 4-6om, normally with dinner ready for me to eat. I realise I'm very very lucky.

Depending on my shifts my parents look after my dc 2-3 days a week. My mum actually gave up her part tine work to do this. I never asked or expected. Financially, she never needed to work and really wanted a to help and have a close relationship to her GC. I am so great full to them both and realise just how lucky I am. They have a beautiful relationship, and their house is just like a second home to my children

So I pay £1200 a month in nursery fees. And always wonder if people who have family doing childcare know truly how much financially they have saved them.

Yeah, we have this in our family. DB and SIL get masses of free childcare from Mum. She looked after DN3 full time before she was at school and does wraparound care for DN1&2&3 now. Mum also looks after the DNs when DB and SIL go on holiday. It must have saved them tens of thousands of pounds and then DM is always going on about how she gets such good birthday presents from the end I'm so tempted to point out that unless they have bought her a brand new car every year they are still the net winners in this situation.

We don't live close and I knew we'd not get regular childcare but I hadn't expected the level of favouritism that goes on.

MIL also lives far away but is much more generous with her time for the DC. She is much older than DM but comes to visit for a few weeks in the summer holiday and does some childcare then. DC are at the stage they just need someone in the house, they don't need any personal care, so she can do as much or as little as she wants with them and it works really well (DH and I work short days so it's just from 9am to 3pm). She has a lovely relationship with the DC.

No, no (and no, I won't be looking after my grandchildren either).

My parents lived a long way from any family members and, in those days (60's) not everyone had cars or easy transport. I remember my paternal grandad babysitting ONCE. Mum stayed home until my brother went to secondary school, then worked term time only.

I live 350 miles away from family. No one to help, so I was home until youngest started primary (I was a single parent). Then I worked term time only, until they'd all gone to Uni and I was no longer required to do the endless driving to various events, clubs, sports meets and hobbies.

I've already told my children that I won't be taking on their children either. I've got two jobs, another seven years before I can retire and I am still single so will have to work well past retirement age to keep the bills paid. I don't intend to turn into a 'granny martyr' who's always 'so tired but just got to have little Jimmy overnight to give his parents a rest and then pick Katie up to give her breakfast and take her school so her parents can get to work on time'. Sorry, no. I raised five with no help, they can cope!

I’ve just realised I didn’t answer the other part of the question.
My parents moved away from both sets of my grandparents, so had no help with childcare. We lived over an hour away, so too far away. My bro And I were put on the train to my grandparents town from the ages of about 9 and 11 during the school holidays and we would spend a few days with grandparents which I remember fondly and we were sent to live with them for 2 weeks each year for about 4 years while my parents went abroad on holiday. But no weekly childcare help.