to think this is bloody ungrateful and to say so

[HexagonalQueenOfTheSummer]

A friend of mine has 3 children; she has free, on-tap childcare to enable her to work, covering an entire working week apart from a Friday afternoon. This is provided by her mum and her MIL. Apart from the Friday afternoon, her mum and her MIL make sure that their working hours are different, to provide the childcare, but they both work on a Friday afternoon.

Said friend has until now worked part time, all day Monday - Thursday but has decided to apply for full time jobs as they need more money. This would mean her youngest going in nursery for one afternoon per week (the other two are at school and could go to after school club), so a very minimal childcare cost per week in proportion to her earnings from a full time job.

Yesterday she spent the entire afternoon moaning to me about how she thinks "one or the other grans would drop the Friday afternoon at work to help her out", after all it's "only one afternoon" and "they know we need the money". I thought that she sounded very spoilt and ungrateful and in the end I said to her that she is very lucky that she gets so much free childcare and that she should appreciate it rather than moaning about the grans not being available for 3 hours. She genuinely thinks she is in the right and that it's her mum and MIL that are being unreasonable. I guess as they've always done it for her she now sees it as something she is entitled to and so gets the hump if it doesn't go her way.

Oh and to add, her mum and MIL regularly have the children overnight at weekends to enable her and her DH to go out or go away for weekends.

Def ungrateful

Yanbu but what can you do? shrug
She should pay for
Nursery

If she stopped going out/away at weekends then money wouldn't be a problem. YANBU

she sounds like a cheeky cow!
but do you have any right to tell her dunno,if she says do you think im being selfish maybe yes

Just say outright- "You want them to give up work, so you can work? Why don't you just ask your parents and parents-in-law to give you their wages fo each Friday? Wouldn't it be less faff overall? It wouldn't be any less stupid."

yes it's ungrateful but you can tell her that.

How very dare she have weekends away the bitch

She literally went on about it for about an hour and then asked whether I thought it was selfish and thoughtless of her mum and MIL...

Yanbu

Thats crazy YANBU.

My MIL provides round the clock care for my SIL's kids, SIL thinksshe doesn't have any childcare

You sound like you might be just a teensy bit jealous OP. Perhaps she thought she could have a good old moan to a friend and not be judged?

YANBU at all. Where do people like her get this sense of entitlement from? It is incredibly selfish of her to assume that the grandparents will drop their plans for her. She should have thought about this before having three children. I don't have family to provide childcare at all and wouldn't dare to presume that I was entitled to free childcare from them even if I did.

I knew that someone would assume I'm jealous

She is very ungrateful. If I had known someone so lucky when I was working and paying for childcare, I would have been insanely jealous.

I had a mother 400 miles away, a MIL close but physically not able to help out. My DH was away most weeks. I was a SAHM, a very reluctant one but the children needed one person who was there. Your friend is being VVU! The vast majority of women would give anything for that amount of help. One afternoon of nursery? That's nothing! Does she gamble, take drugs shop in Waitrose?

my Dsis is like this - she makes my auntie drive for 30 mins to pick up Dnephew from school to take him home and then drive him to his music lesson. DSis can't be bothered to drive from where she works to collect him (15 mins away) and then drive back to where she works for the music lesson (she works for a different dept but in the same blding). Makes me really mad at her especially when my uncle has recently been diagnosed with alzhemiers.

Does your friend anticipate that she will be providing free childcare when she is a granny?

YANBU, she is taking the piss - wouldn't've been able to be as restrained as you were!

YANBU but I'm very jealous!

To be honest, I don't know why grandparents give as much as they do! But there again, my mum is prob a tight arse. If I asked her to have my DS in the week while I went to work her answer would be, word for word "If I wanted to look after another child all day I'd either have another one myself or would train as a childminder and get paid for it."

As much as I envy those who do have parents who will look after their kids while they work, I also do think, unless GP's specifically request to look after them because they want to, it's unfair to have them half raising yours when they've already been there and done their child-rearing.

My mum obviously would in an emergency situation if I was really stuck but otherwise I certainly don't expect it.

Your friend is a lucky lady indeed. The gps have compromised their working patterns for their gchild. Perhaps your friend needs to be mindful of this.

Your friend sounds incredibly entitled to me. I was a single parent for years and I had to pay for child care (often £170 per week). My Mum was not in a position to look after him, but even if she was I don't think I would have asked her. After all she had me to put up with me for all those years!

Tell her to throw herself on the floor and have a to-do. Silly, spoilt cow.

Your friend is very, very lucky. And very, very selfish. Lots of mums have no free child care at all. Does this woman actually want to spend any time with her DC, because she seems to want to offload them onto the grandparents at any opportunity?

Yeah agree with all, she is being VVU. Oh and good luck finding a nursery who'll accommodate 1 afternoon a week. Meanwhile back in the real world

Ungrateful friend! YANBU!!!