In thinking it's fine for DS5 to stay with Grandparents

[user1498912461]

DS5 has spent the weekend with his grandparents(dh's parents)2 nights away in a hotel (not far away). He's had a marvellous time. My mum holds the rather old fashioned view that grandchildren should not spend the night away from their parents and I always get grief when he does. She moans about how they are seeing more of my son but has never offered to do this myself. There is then much guilt tripping about how I haven't seen DS for 2 days. It's the first time he's stayed away for a whole year. She made comments such as the other grandparents can do it because they have a car and are younger. I have still had my young baby to look after all weekend. I pointed out to her that it's quite common for grandparents to have their grandchildren overnight.

I wonder if your mum is just jealous of the other grandparents tbh.

Nothing wrong with it my dc are 1 and almost 2 and they stay overnight with mil regularly. They've stayed with her for the weekend too.

Your ds had a nice time and that is the most important thing

Omg. My inlaws have my 5 year old ALL the time overnight and have done since he was about two. Infact he often goes for a sleepover at my mums too!

Unfortunately with one of us working in the NHS and the other in supermarket retail we do get some overlap in our shifts!

Does she have form for being passive aggressive? If so maybe she wants to be asked to have DS for the night?

Tbh I'm with your mum. I don't think kids should stay the night, even with grandparents, until they could be trusted to take care of themselves.

Its a lovely way for GC to build a bond with GP. You know your child and if they can cope with 2 days without you. My girls loved sleepovers at GP at younger than 5 and were spoilt rotten. Don't let her make you doubt yourself

Yeah there's definitely some jealousy going on! Lol

Gosh, this view must be very old fashioned as my rather Hyacinth Bucket gran often had me over and she wouldn't have if it wasn't "proper" enough.

It sounds to me that they don't want the work of having your DS to stay, but are jealous of him growing closer to the GPs who are willing to have him.

They can naff off, staying in a hotel or in someone's spare room is a great treat at that age.

My son and dil trusted us enough to have dgs overnight at 10 weeks and we have him now once every month and he's 18 months.

They get a break, we love it and he loves it.

He hasn't stayed with her mum as they are older and havnt expressed and desire to.

Your mum does sound a tad jealous and she could offer if she wanted to.

Ignore her

I'm an auntie, and have had my niece stay weekends, and weeks in the hols with me, and have done since she was born. She's now 6, and also spends time staying over her grandparents too.

I have a new baby niece (6 months), and have had her to stay for a couple of weekends too.

I personally think that staying with grandparents (and aunts!) helps kids socialise and be more confident, and less clingy! Just, MO

DS has stayed nights with my DP since he was about nine months. They look after him when DH and I are in work so he has a very close relationship with them and loves going to theirs.

YANBU, and your mum sounds annoying.

Good Grief. Use every bit of childcare offered was my motto. The more people want to love and spend time with the children the better, no matter what the age.
It all comes round too quickly when they start to want to go out with their mates instead.

She's being silly. It's such a treat, like a mini-break for kids, to go to their grandparents. Add in a hotel and it might as well be Disneyland.

mine slept at both sets of GPs from being really quite small, maybe 18 months old.

I think your mum doesn't want your child overnight but doesn't want the in laws to have him either as he may see them more favourably.

She has two choices.

I suspect she doesn't want the effort of having him to stay, but is jealous in-laws have had him. Not all grandparents have their kids to stay, my MIL always said she wouldn't do it as if you do it for one you have to do it for all of them. My Mum always used to say DD could go and stay there when she'd had some work done on the house (has hardly had any of it done to this day), got the spare room tidy, got over a bug and never did. DD is 15 and has consequently never stayed with grandparents. Luckily, DD loved stayed with her Aunt and Uncle and they had a DD two years older so we could return the favour.

You could mention that you're not going to get into a argument about your son going away at his age, but point out to her if she'd like to have him to stay any time, she's more than welcome. As long as she can look after him and maybe walk to the park or shops to get him out. He could go armed with a toys and a bit of time spent looking at books, watching tv with him is easy.

I don't see an hung wrong with it. My father has stay overnight with our son (2) while we were away for a couple of nights. He has also stayed with my MIL while I have been sick. It's a bit if an inconvenience for us because MIL is not lax with discipline and to stupid to understand the consept of circadian rhythms but given that I was ill we were willing to put up with the fortnight of difficulty that followed.

I think at 5 years old that is more than reasonable, I could understand her saying something if it was every weekend since birth or something but clearly it's not. My ds is 3 and although he's only spent 1 night away from us when we went to an adult only wedding, I'm hoping as he gets older that will change a bit!

OP's DS is happy, PILs are happy, OP is happy. What's not to like? For the right child a night or two away with GPs can be a wonderful adventure. And a hotel, too! Your mother's view is not old-fashioned (I was left with GPs for ten days when same age, very many years ago) just overbearing and limiting.

YANBU at all. My parents have had my children overnight - they had my little boy from around 15 months occasionally. It helped that due to childcare logistics, when I went back to work, I and the children would all stay there together. Then when they started staying there alone they were already familiar with it iyswim. My mum now has my two children from Sunday night to Tuesday night to help us out - wouldn't work for everyone but does for us. My kids have never spent the night alone at my in-laws - they've never offered and we've never asked. Which is also fine. Each to their own. If they started moaning about my parents having the kids but not offering to do so themselves I'd be a bit annoyed! But they don't do that.

Just don't mention it to her next time. She doesn't need to know.

We frequently have our 3 DGC's to stay overnight.Sometimes 2 together,sometimes all 3.
We have done since they were tiny.
Their other GP's do the same.
DD nor DS never take the mick so a win win situation all round.

What exactly does she think your job is, if not to teach your kids to be flexible and independent? How are they supposed to deal with sleepovers at friends houses if they've never had a night without you?

Sheeesh!

DS who was five at the time spent a week with grandparents last summer whilst we were 1000s of miles away. This year it was two!