To feel disappointed at DS Grandmothers refusal to help

[Ticklemonster2]

We are yet again potentially stuck for emergency child are tomorrow due to my ds possibly having conjunctivitis.
My MIL is the only living grandparent and is constantly telling us she wants to help with our son. However, there have been a few times now when we have been stuck for child care and she has refused to help. As a result both my dh and myself have had to take unplanned leave from work.
For example, today my dh rang her at lunch time to ask if she could look after ds tomorrow. He explained we are desperate. Dh has an interview up north tomorrow and I have no leave left to take. MIL does not work so is in theory flexible. Yet again she told my dh her social plans had to come first. She would not rebook her spa treatment in order to help us. She had a spa day last week also.
Am I unfair to feel this is a bit off?

Of course different children have different needs but to the OP childcare was needed in this situation. Whether you or I see it was an emergency or not is irrelevant, she needed and wanted the help of her MIL.

My SIL was given £15K by my MIL to help with a deposit but me and DH are financially secure so weren't given anything from her savings, I dont expect £15K now or in the near future but if the need arose i'd hope my MIL could help whether with time or money whenever we had a family issue because while children will have different crises at different points in their lives you need to feel that your parents are supportive of you when your time of need comes.

Equally doesn't have to mean you babysit for one child on a Sat so you must babysit for your other child the following Sat. If you think that you've again take my arguement too literally but when any of your children needs you, you should try and be there for them.

If you feel that that is a wrong way to parent then it's fine to disagree, just try and leave the ridiculous intrepretations out. I've said all i'm going to say phew!

"OP has to persuade her MIL why OP's day in the office and/or her dh's interview is more important than the prearranged day in the spa."

I think someone who needs persuading of that is probably best left to their spa days and lunches.

She isn't prepared to help out unless it doesn't inconvenience her in the slightest.

So basically her offers are meaningless prattle.

At least your sister is a good sort.

"my ds possibly having conjunctivitis"
I am not sure where "possibly" fits in, but it does not sound like an emergency and "the plague".
Dowagers has a good point about unpaid leave, so the question is why the OP is not prepared to use her unpaid leave if the "possible" conjunctivitis materialises.

BTW, good on your sister OP!

OP at least my MIL was honest when we announced DD1 was on the way: "well I hope you don't expect us to babysit". and they have kept pretty much to their word (dds now 15 and almost 13 so pretty irrelevant).

And they don't have much of a relationship with our DDs as a result. OTOH they have done everything for SIL and her 2 kids - got a great relationship with them, I guess that's enough for them.

It's a difficult issue to explain to your children though, why cousins get so much more of ILs time, lovely holidays abroad and big outings here, and much more expensive pressies. (Yes, I am bitter about it - not the money or the time, but what they convey).

Your MIL sounds a PITA and totally unreliable.

"If your DS is under 5, you are entitled to take unpaid leave (up to 13 weeks over the course of the 5 years)"

That is parental leave - it does not entitle you to take a day here and a day there with no notice.

But still, why would anyone think keeping their job was something that might be of concern to supposedly helpful family members?

Middle aged peole are entitled to be self-absorbed cunts.

You're not allowed to wish they were decent human beings who would help their offspring out in a pinch - that's too much to ask!

athing - just so that you understand where I am coming from, the "spa" reference was in relation to a prearranged day that is normally paid for in advance. i am not a spa person, so do not know the general rules, but when i was invited to a spa day by a girlfriend i had to pay 120GBP and it was no-returnable a week before the day itself (good friend who beat a very nasty illness, so we had a day out to ourselves to celebrate)!

i would have to have a good reason to cancel and loose these 120GBP before i agree to babysit for someone with "potential" conjunctivitis. incidentally, OP managed to find an alternative...

"Middle aged peole are entitled to be self-absorbed cunts. "
Nice.

incidentally, i have 4 dcs and 1 baby on the way, my mum also died and mil is a bit like OP's. when one asks someone for help and get a "no" it is tough, but it is a possibility and there is no reason to feel bitter.

btw, in my time on mn i came to realize i absolutely detest the words "entitled" and "fair" they usually bring the worst out of people

A spa treatment is not a spa day.

It's just getting your legs waxed or having your eyebrows threaded.

You have to be very serious about your beauty regime to refuse to help your son out when he has a job interview to worry about and his wife has no leave to take.

Is it really that weird to treat a job interview as a big deal?

The OP can feel disappointed if she wants. Why is it unreasonable to think your husband's mother might help him out when he asks?

I'd feel sorry for DH if his mother repeatedly let him down when he asked for her help.

People are allowed to say no, but the people they are constantly saying no to will draw their own conclusions from that.

This woman's priorities are up to her. Her son's feelings about them are up to him.

"A spa treatment is not a spa day."

Fair enough, when i read "spa" a possibility of an expensive cancellation jumped at me. Still I wonder if it was really so "desperate" since OP did not clarify if she offered to pay the cancellation fee or if there was an option for her to take an unpaid leave. He sister has helped out, so clearly mil was not the last resort.

Sorry - my mistake AThinginyourLife - it's called Time Off for Dependents

The OP wasn't speaking to her MIL.

It was her DH who rang his mother to ask her to help him out on the day he had an interview.

The fact that some people are more generous than to leave a family member stuck on what is likely to be a very fraught and stressful day only serves to make this mother's refusal to help her son look even more selfish.

A young woman with a child and a job is making sacrifices so that this woman can attend her spa appointment. Way to go, ma!

I will never give so little of a shit about my children

Or indeed my siblings, parents, friends, cousins.

Shit, I'd cancel a spa appointment for an acquaintance in these circumstances.

Some people don't know how to be kind.

They tend not to be very happy people.

"A young woman with a child and a job is making sacrifices so that this woman can attend her spa appointment."

You forgot the words "entitled" and "fair" athing

It was only possible conjunctivitis, no clue whether or not the OP attempted to see if she could bring the child into childcare while on eye drops or even if she attempted to get the eye drops.

I'm absolutely shocked at this being classed as "an emergency." A car accident, a trip to A&E, an serious injury... THOSE are emergencies. This is a run of the mill possible case of conjunctivitis, for heaven's sake! I would never bother MIL with something like that - you simply make do, take the unpaid leave, or see if you can adjust your work hours, whatever. But it is absolutely not an emergency.

The OP did not state she would lose her job if she called in to work. She said she had no leave left, which generally means taking unpaid leave. So that, as a parent, is what you do.

And as another poster stated, she managed to make other arrangements, so obviously the MIL was not her only option, so why is she getting so upset over it? I strongly suspect it has something to do with her other comment about MIL babysitting for other grandchildren... some jealousy and some annoyance that MIL didn't just drop everything for her.

She can be disappointed if she wants... but MIL was NOT BU.

Nobody has classed it as "an emergency", Triggles, so you can get over your "shock".

The phrase used was "emergency childcare", which normally means a sudden need for childcare that can't be covered by whatever arrangement is usually in place, i.e. the situation described

Phrases I have used to describe the problem are "pickle" and "predicament".

But then, I don't need the people I love to be in a life or death situation to put myself out to help them.

"And as another poster stated, she managed to make other arrangements, so obviously the MIL was not her only option, so why is she getting so upset over it?"

I would guess that the OP thinks the arrangement made is a lot more problematic for her sister than it would have been for her MIL.

The fact that the OP has people who love her enough to out themselves out to that extent to help her doesn't absolve a selfish woman of her refusal to help her son out on a very important day for him because she basically couldn't be arsed.

Unless you do job interviews every day, this was not a run of the mill situation.

Taking unpaid leave to look after sick children has a massively deleterious effect on people's careers.

So on an already stressful day for the family, a child can't go to nursery and neither parent can step in without potentially serious consequences.

You could help, but you'd rather have a pedicure.

That makes you kind of a dick.

You could also either deal with the situation yourself (as said numerous times, it doesn't sound as if she either procured eye drops for the child OR checked with her childcare anyway about their policy) either by checking into the situation further or by taking the unpaid day (like tons of other parents), but she'd rather whinge and complain about how unfair it is that her MIL won't drop her plans for her.

That makes you kind of pathetic. >shrug<

Yes, it's not great to have to take unpaid leave from work. But it's not like she's the only one that's ever had to do it.

And SHE thinks it's more problematic for the sister than it is for the MIL?! If the sister is offering and MIL is not able to babysit, I would say something along the lines of looking a gift horse in the mouth...

Nobody said the DH shouldn't go to his job interview. But I presume the OP does go to work every day, so this IS a run of the mill situation. People deal with this sort of situation all the time. The OP is being overly dramatic because she's annoyed.

The entitlement people seem to feel sometimes is unbelievable. The OP saying her mother would "jumped at the chance" to babysit.. it's rather like she expects everyone to line up to be inconvenienced at the last minute to watch her PFB.

Not an emergency. Not anything other than a run of the mill problem that millions of parents have dealt with before without help and will continue to deal with. Hardly anything to get her knickers in a bunch over. 'Nuf said.

triggles I love the way you keep saying she could take unpaid leave,where are the employers that allow unpaid leave at the drop of a hat.At our place you have to apply 7 days in advance in writing.There's no way you can just say that you won't be in you are taking unpaid leave.

I am afraid I am constantly thankful for my IL when I read things on MN .My IL would fly to the moon and back at a moments notice if we or their GC need them,and in the past they have dropped everything to help us.Likewise we would do the same for them ,if they need us we are there ,that's what you do for the people you love ,equally though because we love them we wouldn't rake advantage of them and neither would they of us.

As they become frailer we will be there for them just as they have been for us ,our children think the world of their grandparents,we are very lucky.There is No way I would prioritise a spa over my inlaws and MIL would drop a similar activity like a shot in the OPs circumstances.

Personally I don't think the MIL should have to drop everything she had planned. If it was my mum and she said 'I can but I'll have to cancel xyz' I wouldn't let her cancel her plans, regardless of how unimportant I felt they were. My mum deserves her free time. I choose to work ft with kids, its up to me to sort when they issues come up. Imo its part of being a working parent.

Again, so glad there is nobody as mean as you in my circle.

I guess you get used to having to do everything with no help if you are an utter cunt that nobody likes.

I imagine this woman will find that regularly disappointing your son when he needs you doesn't pay dividends in terms if being a much loved Granny.

But if you dislike other people and find them and their needs massively onerous and irritating, I guess a lonely old age is a small price to lay for never having to change your plans.

athing "I guess you get used to having to do everything with no help if you are an utter cunt that nobody likes."

You are a charmer, aren't you?

"I guess a lonely old age is a small price to lay for never having to change your plans."

Really?

People would punish their parents for not dropping everything they when they want childcare?

The problem with last minute requests is that the other person is most likely to have something on. I think there is an undertone here of expecting the MiL to be sitting around waiting for "the call".

As a parent you are always on call for your children while they are still young, you never know when you may have to drop everything to pick up a sick child or take time off work. A grandparent may not wish to be on permanent standby and be expected to change their plans at the last minute because a grandchild has "possible" conjunctivitis. Yes, some grandparents will be happy to change their plans, which would be very good of them, but it is their choice whether to do it or not. Just because op's mil doesn't work it doesn't mean she is always going to be available.

"People would punish their parents for not dropping everything they when they want childcare?"

Nope, but in general, pleasant and helpful people who put themselves out for others are more beloved than those who are very rigid about sticking to their plans.

People who don't care for you very much because they have come to realise that you are only a fair-weather mother won't want to visit so much.

Sure, they'll do whatever their sense of duty tells them they must (although presumably a woman with these priorities won't have raised children to have much of a sense of duty to family) but they won't come to see you because they actually want to, because you are important to them because of the strong bond between you.

Social bonds are created and sustained through helping people out. You can't really opt out of the latter and expect the former to be strong.

A pattern of never being willing to help immediate family wouldn't be what I'd be going for if I cared about being close to them.

"You are a charmer, aren't you?"

I like to think so :o

So a family bonds depends on the willingness of someone to be on call for childcare? I don't agree. You making very big assumptions, espec in regards to the upbringing of the OPs dh.