to ask my mum to look after my DC for one day a week for free?

[slowginny]

I'm about to go back to work full time and have arranged childcare for my DD so mum has her one day a week, my dad has her another and she goes into nursery for the other three days a week. I'm a single mum without maintenance from my DD's dad so the money's a bit thin on the ground. My new job doesn't pay especially well but it will be good for me get back to work (although in my heart I'd rather stay at home with DD!).

Just three weeks before I'm due to start, Mum's asked me to pay her what I would pay the nursery on the day she has her. I'm reluctant to do this, partly because I don't want to set a precedent for paying her every time she has my daughter (including the odd bit of babysitting) but also because mum's not exactly short of a bob or two and is retired.

I've spoken to my dad (parents are divorced) to see if he'd like paying and his response was unequivocally no! Indeed he thought it a pleasure to be able to see his only granddaughter on a regular basis.

Am I being a cow for not wanting to pay her? This is the only grandchild they have and she is a wonderful little girl and very little trouble to have around. I kind of think she should be biting my hand off!

My DM looked after my brothers children on a temporary basis which was offered willingly but when this became permanent she continued because she couldn't really get out of it easily. It took a long time for her to pluck up courage to stop.
She loves babysitting all the GC and looking after after them for odd days on an adhoc/emergency basis but permanently - no.

I just wonder how many of the GP looking after the children of the many posters on here are in the same situation - doing it because they feel they have to and quietly resenting it - whilst their adult children are busy typing away on MN things such as "My DM just love to have my children and would be offended if we used a nursery."

I think some posters convince theirselves that their parents don't mind because it makes them feel less guilty and gets them out of a tricky childcare situation.

FWIW my MIL wouldn't do it either but she's a fab grandparent too.

have only skimmed, but if this is response you have 2 choices

use a nursery, and at least you get some child tax credit back (assuming you are single parent and on £21K)

shes being mean but hey, thats life . and screw her , I would def pay nursery instead

You live and learn, eh Gin?

Personally I moved countries to be near my parents because they needed me in old age. Where did that bring me? Spent a fortune on moving costs, uprooting the kids, letting the house we own only for it to be vandalized and cost a fortune in repairs, spent a fortune on setting up a new home near my folks, only to have one problem after the other, and my dad rubbishing me for not having £30 k buffer in my bank account for "emergencies", and not making enough money near them to live comfortably. Did I ask him for money? No. Did he offer any? Yes, in return for us not going for holidays to see the inlaws, as they needed us to do housework for them the entire summer. ....

We moved back to London this September. We had enough.

Do not feel that you have to live near your mother so she can be a "grandma" when it suits her, if the end result is that you earn less. You need to make your decision based on your head, not your heart. If it now turns out that she after all wont be close to your children, unless you pay her, then I suggest you think again.

ATIYL, the OP says that this is the only grandchild, so it's not a question of the grandma having all her time taken up with the Op's dd, so that there is nothing left for the other grandchildren.

I think it's important to remember that the OP's mum volunteered to do this - she hasn't been put on the spot or had it demanded by the OP. On the strength of what the mum said she wanted to do, the OP has arranged housing and work - and now the mum wants to back out.

Also, I don't agree that she wouldn't be able to take holidays. Childminders who work full time, manage to take holidays, so there is no reason why the grandma couldn't - it just means a bit of organisation on the part of the OP to get back up care, just as she would for a CM.

I think that asking for full time care or for more than one child is a big ask (although if my dc genuinely needed help, I would provide it, even at the expense of my free time), but I really don't see how one working day (so not even the whole day, really) per week, for one child is a 'massive' ask.

YANBU Where does your mother think you will get this money from. To claim any of it back you would need a childcare register number for WTC. Give a small donation for her time and if after that she doesn't want to look after dd then you'll have to make other arrangements. But she seriously can't expect you to pay her the full going rate.

Ask he if she had a recent CRB check!!!

Well, she's the only grandchild now - perhaP's she doesn't want to create an expectation that she will do a day's unpaid childcare for each of her children.

I'd be interested to know exactly what was offered.

Saying you will help someone look after their child does not mean committing yourself to being an unpaid childminder while they work.

As self-employed people, childminders are often quite constrained in what holidays they can take, and certainly need to give plenty of notice to clients.

The upside of that rigidity is the fact that they earn their living that way.

Often people who mind their grandchildren are only "allowed" to take holidays when their "employer" (who pays them nothing for their time, despite profiting from it) takes theirs.

My retired MIL has struggled to come to visit us because she was being used in this way by her daughter. I'm sure her relationship with her own son was not the only one affected by being tied up in this way.

Grandparents can be of enormous help without exploiting them so you can keep more of your wages at their expense.

The offer of help could have been genuine without ever being meant as a promise to work for her daughter for free.

As for moving to be near her parents - sorry, but the OP us an adult, she makes her own choices about where she lives.

If she wants to be near her parents to avail of the (enormous) benefits of having family nearby, that is up to her. It doesn't entitle her to free childcare.

The very idea of leaving a man recovering from cancer in sole charge of a toddler one day a week is appalling.

Parents deserve better than that.

I am shocked that peoples parents (DCs grandparents) would ask for payment, my MIL (she was retired) used to look after DS2 for a day a week and my niece 3 days a week and we would pay her petrol and obviously anything she did with them we would pay her for but I really didn't think its something parents would ever request. My mum also has both boys regularly before and after school and would never ask for money and would probably be offended if I offered.

My MIL would only ever accept money for petrol/expenses if she was babysitting for us to go to work. If it was for a social thing she would treat it as just babysitting and would refuse petrol money.

I have to pay for nursery as my mum works mornings and MIL has passed away recently and I have no problem with this but I am sure that MIL would still be helping us out and that my mum would love to help out in this way.

I would think most grandparents would love the opportunity to do this if they were retired or didn't need to work at all.

Why is it more shocking that people might want to be paid for a day's work than that children expect to profit from their parents' labour and give them nothing?

I do feel that I'm doing her a favour in giving her unrestricted access to my DD for one day a week to give them a chance to build a precious relationship.

How very gracious of you. If any hint of this attitude has been shared with your mother I'm not at all surprised that she's less keen on the childcare arrangement than she was originally.

What a ridiculously precious statement to make.

OP, I also relocated to live nearer my parents (who are divorced - we're nearer my mum) which was mainly my DH's idea (his parents are dead) and there is not so much interesting work here as there was when I lived in the SE. However, houses are much more affordable!

I mentioned this thread to my mum today and she said she wouldn't dream of asking for payment. "I'm the one who should be paying you" she said. We have quite a flexible arrangement, as I just do bits of work from home and she doesn't have DS for the whole day. She tends to keep Thursdays free in case I need her for a few hours. If she wants to go on holiday, that's not a problem (as I presume could a childminder if arranged in advance).

If your mum is concerned about the responsibility involved in a long-term arrangement (and yes, young children are hard work!), then perhaps you need to renegotiate and not ask her to look after your DD on a regular basis. Perhaps she would prefer to just play with your DD on a more casual basis. However, I don't see how you paying her is going to change the commitment issue, and I think it's unreasonable of her to ask you to pay when you are much worse off than she is and to give such short notice.

I was very close to my maternal grandparents who lived about two hours' drive away. I would have loved to have seen more of them. It was also hard on my mum being quite far away from them when they were elderly and ill, and I hope that I'll be able to look after my parents in their old age. My dad's parents lived five hours' flight away so we didn't get to see them very often. I just think it's sad when rather than families being close and helping each other out as might be the norm in other cultures, we've come to grandparents wanting to be paid to spend time with their grandchildren.

My mum goes round to my elderly gran's house a few time a week, does jobs, runs her places. Perhaps she should ask my gran to pay her the same wages as a carer?

Looking after your elderly mother or your grandchildren once a week isn't work just because someone else would have to do it for money. If it's not a pleasure, and you don't want to do it, don't do it. But charging to start looking after family members once a week. That's horrible.

it will be interesting to see what happens in 20/30 years time when the parents who are getting free childcare from grandparents now, become grandparents themselves. With pensionable age rising I assume a number of these people will still be working. Will they offer to give up their jobs to provide free childcare for their grandchildren, or will they pay their children an allowance towards their childcare costs, so their children wil be getting the same benefit as they are now receiving iyswim

I guess this comes down to whether you think of looking after your own grandchildren as 'work'. In my family, it wouldn't be and I'd be hurt if my parents saw my children in that way.

Ops mother is a fault here for promising something that she doesnt want to do!
If someone OFFERS to have ur child for free of course ur going to take it as nursery fees are so ridiculously high with or without the %70 tax cred help.
Dont be such vipers to the op people she was told she was getting the help she so greatly needed now she doesnt have it.
People 'care' for the parents in old age for free this is more or less the same thing except its not everyday its for ONE day.

I wonder whether the women who post about how exhausting it is spending a day at home looking after babies/ young children, are the same ones who blithely expect grandma to take on the same task for no wages?

Looking after young children is demanding on your time, your attention, your energy. As a parent you choose to do it. To expect anyone else to do it on a regular basis unpaid is a cheek. To expect them to do it while you are EARNING FOR YOURSELF is taking the piss.

I wouldn't take money (unless I was absolutely skintight and doing a few days) for looking after any Gc. But, I might not be so keen to have the commitment of one day every week which might disrupt my own social plans and holiday plans etc. That is quite a big commitment unless you are always at home.

shewhowines - I agree I suspect there are many GPs who actually arent enjoying providing free childcare but who for all the reasons this thread is demonstrating darent say anything

How many times on AIBU do we see threads where people have got "trapped " into doing favours like lift shares which are taking up a tiny amount of time by comaprison and the OPs dont know how to get out of it

How much harder for a GP to stop ? Sorry just because they are a loved and precious GC doesnt mean they should be keen to act as a CM

To callmrs-the op did not once say she expected it , she said her mother had promised to do it, so that is totally different to what you are talking about.
I dont think Gps should be expected to babysit for free etc etc but the op wasnt 'expecting it' her mum 'offered' then changed her mind, which i think is awful thing for a mum to do.
Obviously op is going to be angry she already took the job, hence the reasoning behind her latest posts

I know- and I have said all along it's unreasonable of the mum to suddenly bring this up now. However taking everything the op has said altogether, it does sound as though she has created a situation which makes it difficult for the parents to state their true feelings. She has actually stated that she thinks she's doing her mother a favour, rather than vice versa- that speaks volumes

I would say to your mum you're just going to put her into the nursery if its going to cost the same. She might back down then as it means missing out on time with her GD

I'm not a Gp yet but think having child all day is quite a big ask.

DM has probably already done many years of childcare. DF probably hasn't.

What about DM just having DD for a morning or afternoon initially and use nursery the rest to see how it goes. Or just use nursery until DM changes her mind or use DF for day care and DM for evening babysitting

"I guess this comes down to whether you think of looking after your own grandchildren as 'work'. In my family, it wouldn't be and I'd be hurt if my parents saw my children in that way."

Bollocks.

Of course looking after children all day is "work".

Work doesn't mean shit or unrewarding, it just means time-consuming, requiring effort and involving commitment.

You can't really be suggesting that SAHPs don't do any work, surely? That they have a life of leisure sitting about enjoying themselves?

Or that childminders have an easy gig?

Childcare used to cover somebody else's job is work - and deciding it us a wonderful treat that other people should be honoured to do (for free, while you earn money) is manipulative, self-justifying nonsense.

And yes, some people would turn down an offer of free childcare rather than allowing a much-loved parent to spend their retirement tied up with childcare like they were when they were raising their own children.

I did just that when my mother offered for her first grandchild. When I pointed out to her what it would mean to be an unpaid childminder and how restricting it would be, she realised that it wasn't something she could offer without it having a major impact on her life.

Her life. Which is just as important as mine.

I'm aware that a few MNers think that I might be taking the piss a bit but I think it's a two way street with grandparents. It's not just about free childcare, it's also about providing an opportunity for them to get to know their grandchildren, indulge them and get some quality time in should they want to (and mine have expressed a strong desire to do this). I'll be doing the dentist and the doctor's run, looking after her when she's ill, the donkey work-I wouldn't dream of asking my folks to do any of that. I'd like their time to be fun and as easy and as trouble free for them as possible. If it doesn't work or they aren't enjoying it, I'd hope my parents would come and have a conversation with me.

I'm going to book another day at nursery like many have suggested. Thanks for your replies.

But all those pleasurable things- getting to know your grandchild, spending time with them, doing lovely things- they should be happening anyway if you value the grandparent/grandchild relationship. The wonderful thing about such a relationship is that it's the pleasures without the restrictions and responsibilities. Once it becomes a regular and important commitment, and you are relying on them to do it week in week out so you can earn- its a big responsibility. It doesn't mean it wouldn't have fun moments - but lets be honest, looking after a young child all day also involves a lot of chasing them around, having eyes in the back of your head, playing a game for the umpteenth time....

Anyway, good plan to use the nursery for an extra day. You can now visit your mum with your dd and let her continue to build a lovely relationship