To be ever so slightly jealous of people that get free, willing, childcare from family?

[Swankyswishing]

I probably am being unreasonable but hey-ho.

So many people that I know have family that help them out with childcare. A friend of mine works 3 days a week and the childcare for her children is shared between her mother and her mother in law. My sister works full time and her MIL looks after both of her children for her, totally free of charge and free of resentment. Another friend is a midwife, working shifts, and her mum happily stays at hers for several days to provide childcare if her husband is working shifts too and they're finding the childcare hard to manage.

My mum is one of those people that will very rarely do anything to help, and if she does it is met with resentment. She looked after my niece whilst my sister was in labour with my younger niece and my mum moaned about it the whole time. Last week my 2 year old was ill one day and I really didn't want to drag him out onto the school run and I asked my mum to pick up my middle child from school (eldest is at secondary school so obviously makes their own way there and back), and she did do it but very very reluctantly and resentfully, and wouldn't really speak to me when she dropped DD home. BTW my mum doesn't work, doesn't have any friends or do any social things, lives 5 minutes away from me and the school yet apparently this was too much trouble. My inlaws would help more if they could but they both work full time.

I know it was my decision to have children, and I don't expect anyone else to look after them for DH and I, but I see so many people have so much help and sometimes get upset. I don't work at the moment as there would be no point; all of my wages would get taken up on childcare, there would be no point in working as I have never had a career as such to maintain.

DH's plane home I meant.

Wordfactory, I don't tie my mum down in the slightest, if she wants to go on holiday, she goes (and does!) I think the key is having back-up childcare, mine use after-school club and childminders in addition to family, so there is not one person relying on one other person. So, if anyone can't do that week, its fine and there's no long-term committment, the understanding is that it is a favour and part of being in the family, not a burden.

Me neither. As DD does a day at nursery then if my mother wants to go away we put her in nursery an extra day or the two mothers cover each other.

Both mothers offered their services and insisted. My mother has offered to do the nursery day as well but I drew the line at taking up two days of every week. Am going on maternity leave soon and both of them are quite concerned that they won't see DD.

I wish that I had appreciated how difficult it is to raise children without family support. Especially once you go beyond one or 2 DC. Yes, I would not have gone beyond 2 had I realised! We've never had much friend support, either. DC's CMs/preschool/nursery workers have been our almost sole babysitters, and not often, either.

My jaw scrapes off the floor sometimes, when I hear about the regular support other people get. A world away, and all that. We have some friends who kept asking us out for a meal & we just had to shrug off the invite since we had NO childcare at the time (something they couldn't conceive of, either).

No, you are not being unreasonable. I am a SAHM. Most of my friends work and they all, without exception, have family who help out. I have no family close by (know my parents would help if they could). To me, that is what made the final decision over being able to work after DS went to school and not work. Lots of my friends have their parents/in-laws on tap for sick days, inset days, holidays etc. It is just not feasible for us and we just decided it was not worth the stress of me working and having to juggle everything.

The other one that gets me is the "When did you leave your LO alone overnight for the first time?" threads. Coz people are all replying with things like "2 months with Granny" or "18 months with Aunty" and I'm thinking...

7.11 years, when she went to Brownie camp
8.5 years, when he had a sleepover
10yo and still never had a night away...
etc!

We have no family nearby who can help us, thankfully we manage without but mostly because I am a SAHM. I'm sure it'd be more of a struggle if I was working, we'd still cope I'm sure but it would be much harder.

When I look at friends who are in the lucky position of having healthy, happy, retired parents who want to be involved with the GC and help out I always hope they realise its worth its weight in gold. I had fabulous GC when I was young and we never needed babysitters because we could always go to our grandparents for an evening, night or weekend. If I was ill at school it was always grandad that came to take me home, parents never having to take time off for our illnesses. It was a benefit all round, it meant my parents could work with no worries about childcare, we had great relationships with our grandparents, as did my parents. I don't think my GC begrudged it at all, I think they wanted to be as involved as they could be and they just lived for their children and grandchildren, right to the end.

I really wish I had that sort of back up support for our family. Our families are wonderful, just not geographically well placed! But yes, I get a little of some friends sometimes.

I don't think you are being unreasonable to feel jealous, as long as you realise that your Mum's unwillingness to help you is not the fault of your sister or your friend etc and, and that's the real issue here.

It's not that they have people who will gladly help, it's that you have someone who won't, or who only helps begrudgingly. Your sister must at least have some experience of the same when it comes to your mum and no doubt appreciates her helpful MiL all the more because of it.

It would be unreasonable for you to take out your feelings of jealousy on your sister or your friend, but it's not unreasonable to have them and keep them to yourself.

This thread has been really useful for me. I always assumed I was the unusual one in that my parents live 2.5 hrs away from us, but mum visits twice a year. My dc's are now 8 and 6 and in all that time she's never offered to look after them for even half an hour so that my husband and I can get a break. My in laws who are far less active and physically able however, would have them at the drop of a hat! They too live an hour away though so we don't get to take advantage of that very often.
I think even were my mum to live within ten minutes that there would still be that slightly pained expression were I to ask her to pick up / look after a child at any point. That's just the way some people are I think.
And to be honest, it's very sad. I had a proper relationship with my grandma, based on the fact that she looked after me every Satruday as a child when my parents were working. My kids take no notice of my mum and it's obvious that she / they don't really know how to interact iwth one another because they never spend any time together without me there too. It's a shame.
I'm another one who will, unless my kids emigrate, be beating down teh door to help with babysitting / childcare help when they have their own children!

YNBU - but on the other hand do you want someone who clearly doesn't want to do it looking after your kids - I had until june no nearby family and it is now brilliant to have it - but you do manage - we had a lovely flexiable childminder, a babysitter and a great network of friends - and I worked too

Yanbu. When I had my first my parents were so helpful and if I didn't task them to babysit enough they would actually get the hump about it. Days out/weekends away - we could do anything really. But each additionally child we have had had made them more moany and more resentful about looking after them, to the point now where I do anything to avoid asking them (we have 3 under 6 now)!

When I do ask now I can't stand the look on my dm face and she always says 'well I dont mind really....' but she really does! And my god, the moaning about it we have to put up with for days afterwards. And the kids have normally been pretty well behaved too! They will moan that maybe one of the kids came downstairs and asked for a drink ONCE after being put to bed (yes, I know, an excuse to stay up but still it's only once and then they go to bed and to sleep after that with no fuss!).

PIL are the same, they don't offer and we can tell pretty clearly that they don't want to either so don't bother asking!

I think someone else mentioned though that GP who don't want to be involved with their GC (not necessarily as childcare givers, I just mean interested and involved) risk having no real family support themselves as they get elderly.

I was so close to my granny that when she became too ill to look after herself at about 92 I gave up full time work to be her carer. Neither of my parents were in a position to do so, so I did. I'm so proud to say that I nursed her through her last year, day and night 4 days a week (I worked the other 3 days a week). If I hadn't had the close relationship built up when I was a child when she looked after me, and then as a source of comfort and advice as an adult, I doubt I would have given up half my income to care for her. As someone else said, you reap what you sow.

Now I am even more jealous having read the great support that many of you get from your parents and in-laws!

To who it was earlier in the thread that suggested my mum is depressed, I totally agree. I think she has been depressed all her adult life to be honest. She is very moody and difficult to get on with, as a child I never knew what kind of mood she would be in when I returned home from school each day.

No, I am envious too. My mum lives a couple of hours' drive away but would babysit at a push and a hefty amount of planning on my part. But in reality, the last time she helped was five years ago (January 2007!). And it was all a bit of a pallaver anyway so I never ask. She has my brother's children to sleep over most weekends though as bro and sil find parenting hard

No inlaws to ask so that is a non-starter.

I often feel the same. Mil minds one of her grandchildren fulltime, so sil and bil can both work, and only takes ?50 off them (her choice). It means they basically have 2 fulltime salaries with virtually no child care costs. I cannot afford to go back to work because I have 3 children, and here in Ireland we have no State help with childcare, so it would pretty much cost my whole salary if I was to go back to work :(. I dont have any family nearby and tbh even if I did my parents have bad health so I would never ask them to mind the kids for longer than a few hours, they wouldnt be able. I hope anyone who has free or nearly free family childcare really appreciates it!

YANBU. My parents and their dog are moving in with us when DD turns 1 and I go back to work FT. When I read the threads about people hating their nurseries I'm pleased but I know I'll be biting my tongue a lot and I feel a bit sorry for DH!

YANBU.I feel very envious of people who can call on family for a bit of help (I don't mean regular childcare, just being able to get a couple of hours' break occasionally to get stuff done!). It's quite hard to replicate that with paid-for childcare: we use a good babysitting agency, but because they're just evening babysitters DS can't build up a relationship with them, so they can't come in and put him to bed, so we can't go out together until he's safely in bed and asleep (he's 14 months and very clingy at the moment). I would love to have an involved grandparent (or aunt, or uncle, or good friend) around who could occasionally babysit and would be able to comfort him if he woke.

As it is, DH and I do a lot of stuff separately rather than together so that one of us can look after DS, and I feel a bit sad about that.

YANBU. I'd be £800 per month better off if I had family who would look after my kids for me! I do get the odd bit of help here and there and not reasonable of me to expect it though, but I get where you're coming from...

Tadlow Yes, thats how I feel. I'd love to just have someone for the very occasional evening so DH and I can have a night out together. Or the odd Saturday when we were househunting would have been invaluable so that we didn't need to take the babies with us to every appointment. It wouldn't need to be regular at all, even once or twice a year but someone the DDs were comfortable with.

Btw OP, well done for managing to word your OP in such a way to avoid the usual avalanche of posts saying 'YABU, you can't expect your dps/pils to look after your dcs etc'?...

I have to look at it that I choose to have DD therefore I must be responsible for either providing her care or paying for it. Any help I get from family must be seen as a huge bonus. If I didn't think this way I think I would explode.

Yanbu, but jealousy is such a destructive emotion. Try your best to feel neutral about other people's childcare, it will eat you up if you let it. And as you can see from this thread there are thousands and thousands of families in exactly the same boat.

We are extremely lucky to have both sets of grandparents living within 20-30 minutes. My parents look after dd 1 day each week whilst I'm at work. We use a childminder for 1 day a week and dh has her 1 day too. I know my mom and dad would do more but I wouldn't want to take them for granted, plus we never feel guilty asking for a babysitter if we want to go out. We really do appreciate the help we get but I also know that they love looking after dd so it's happy all round. It's funny though as my mom was always very strict with me but she's far more chilled out with her granddaughter!!

For a precious 14 months, before we moved abroad, we lived about 5 minutes away from my parents. It was bliss. I thanked my lucky stars for every precious moment of that time spent near them. People who have their parents/inlaws (hell, ANY family) nearby are incredibly lucky.

We have a decent occasional babysitter for the odd night out, but it gets very spendy. Weekends away will never happen until DS I'm mad enough to leave him on his own is old enough to be on his ownat least 16.