RUBU about grandparents?

[Caroelle]

I read this page occasionally and I have been noticing more threads about what is reasonable/ unreasonable behaviour in relation to grandparents.. I am in my mid50s but had my children late, youngest is just 18. I am a social worker and worked throughout their childhood, this was p/t until youngest was 13. My job is stressful and I’m currently working about 50 hours a week, which is exhausting. My children have been n/c with my parents as they are very damaged and damaging people. I am very much looking to be a grandparent at some point. I am also looking forward to retiring and doing the things that my job, and being a parent, has stopped me from doing. For me and DH that is our time. Our bodies are ageing, I know that we get tired more quickly than we did 10 years ago. What comes across on this page quite regularly is that some people seem to assume that grandparents will/ should do anything for their grandchildren, usually to help out the parents. If gps don’t do this, they are considered selfish and inflexible. They seem to have to account for their time, if they aren’t doing something the poster approves of then they are seen as being un-co-operative/ unhelpful. If you are getting free childcare, baby sitters, pick ups from school etc just be grateful. If your children have a loving relationship with other adults, value this. Be grateful for your parents, they have lives and dreams and things that they want to do. They have already brought up one family, hopefully they choose to help and support you but it is not their responsibility to do everything you may think they should do, no matter how much they love you and your children. No doubt that I will get shot down about this. C’est la vie!

Just read the thread again Pink, there are a number of people who have talked about how grandparents should want to help out by providing childcare and babysitting (including you I think), some have backtracked and qualified this with an 'if they can' in subsequent posts.

Your use of the word 'normal' implies that you think that people who don't hold the same values as you are abnormal.

Someone earlier in the thread (I can't be bothered going back through it), said that her (presumably her) parents don't look after their grandkids but they aren't busy, they sit around doing nothing (I'm paraphrasing).

It's ashame that people are twisting what I say to mean that I expect full time childcare, which is never what I've said.

I think some of those responses were to other posters! They weren't all responding to you and you alone!

But I do now see that you do mean the words 'obligation and expectation' as you wrote them.

So we will just have to continue to disagree!

I'm surprised that so many on MN have parents and extended family nearby who can provide any sort of assistance. Everyone I know in real life are flung all over the world, had kids in their 30s and later (there's a thread running in Active where people assert that 24 is 'adolescent'), had to move for work, have parents who are too ill to assist and/or dead now.

It's a double standard on here. You're told to move wherever you can for work and/or affordable housing, but your parents are supposed to look after your kids and give you money until you're 100.

What does irritate me both here and on other forums is parents who are getting a considerable amount of free childcare from grandparents, and are then bitching and moaning because GPs don't do everything precisely the way they would choose. Especially when paid childcare is so bloody expensive!

I have done regular childcare for a dd, and now do quite a few one offs/emergencies, often for 48 hours plus, and since I'm late 60s and Gdcs are still very little, much as I love them it is often extremely tiring. Luckily my dd is very appreciative and does not give me minute instructions which have to be followed precisely, or else. I dare say she is aware that it's my way or no way, but as it happens our 'ways' differ very little.

I do wonder why the OP is worried about something that isn't even a factor for her yet?

We do get help from my DM, when she's in the country (she's in Africa for work 3 months of the year at 78!). I ask her less now as she's always shattered afterwards, my adopted DDs (8 and 5) are a handful and it's not fair to expect too much help. My MIL is 77 and doesn't live near us so we only have her stay with us 3 times a year for about 5 days each time. (She'd drive me crazy if she stayed longer!)

I'm an older mum, I'm 48 now, so realistically I'll be in my 60s or 70s when my DDs are having children.

It's about being considerate and not taking each other for granted. Judging by the posts on this thread, the GPs on here want to be involved in their DGCs lives, they just don't want to be taken advantage of. That's fair enough; they've raised their family, so why should they go through it all a second time around?

Conversely they need to accept that their children have a life and their own children and not expect to be "looked after" like "a close family" in their old age if they have been unprepared to reciprocate at times.
What about the 'looking after' their children for the first 18 + years of their lives? Doesn't that count? I despair about children who think their parents should keep on giving money, childcare etc etc, yet balk at looking after their parents when they need help. I'm with you OP.

But Pink, ‘should’ you have to do it? Because that is your argument in relation to gps. My OP was never about free childcare, it was about parents understanding that gps should be able to make their own choices. They don’t automatically owe their children more and more, as it is clear that some people on Mumsnet expect, because they still have a right to do the things that they want to do. It’s about parents respecting that choice and not bitching on Mumsnet that the gps are being unreasonable when they won’t always do what parents want.

'I do wonder why the OP is worried about something that isn't even a factor for her yet?'

Yeah. I had my surviving children at 34 and 37. The youngest has autism. I can't see myself ever having grandchildren at all, tbh, but hey, cross that bridge when you come to it.

I do wonder why the OP is worried about something that isn't even a factor for her yet? Cos this is a forum, specifically AIBU, and, as she said, she wondered!

It would be really quiet in here if we were all constrained to only post about things that immediately affected us!

For example:
Ooh! AIBU in asking DH to pop the kettle on as he is passing it?
YABU... my DH is nowhere near a kettle..

Jassmells, I’m not worried about it. But I’m questioning the attitudes of some people who seem to think that gps should be at their beck and call otherwise what is their purpose. I’ve fought all my life as a female for equality, my generation is not going to accept the ‘know your place’ attitude that some people exhibit towards older people.

Not going to read all the responses, but DH and I raise our children by ourselves. In 5 1/2 years MIL has looked after the children twice for us. Mine due to distance can't.

I don't hold it against them, but I wish that as GPs my ILs would be more involved. Mine would love to but can't

I think that if you offered once or twice to babysit - things like their anniversary or a wedding they're invited to and invite the family round for a Sunday roast or go on the odd day out, that would be great. You don't have to give 5 days a week childcare from birth to 5 for each child....

I'm a grandmother to 3 under 5's, and I find some of the posts on here about grandparents are so bloody offensive given that these women are getting free and loving childcare but it has to be on their terms. My DD is very considerate and never expects, but I have the children most days in various ways as she has a couple of part time jobs and it's a nightmare juggling a baby, playgroup and school pickups.
I don't mind in the week but now my youngest is working and I'm finally free of lifts/school/college commitments, I like to have the weekends to myself and DH only has a sunday off. I have to grit my teeth when my SIL often drops hints about the kids staying over so he can have a lie-in........ I didn't get one for 20 years so fail to sympathise that he's missing out .

I'm in my late 40s, and find having young children both wonderful and challenging. I get a lot more tired than I did looking after my own. It's all about keeping the scales balanced - helping out your kids but also having time and space that you've dreamed of when they were younger.

I stand by what I said, I think grandparents should help out if they can

Fortunately you don't get to tell anyone what they should or shouldn't do.

DD thinks I should have DGD every other weekend while she works. I appreciate that she was left unexpectedly single, but I am in my 50s, also work and DGD is really a bit small to stay overnight every other weekend. My health is not the best and I am going through a bad patch with it just now. It also involves 160 miles of driving and I have not been offered a penny piece towards petrol. I have had to put my foot down and say only 1 weekend a month. I love DGD, and she is very good, but she's a toddler and I am not well enough to deal with that. DD has had ample time to look for someone else to help, but has not done so. Thankfully, she is now looking for a job that won't involve weekend working.

I do want to help, and have bent over backwards in the last 6 months to help her out, but there is only so much I can do. I hate to be made to feel guilty when I say no, though. I have to look after myself, too. There would be no question of DD looking after me in my old age, that's for sure, if the question ever arose.

My DP see my DS most days for but not as childcare, I'm there as well. Sometimes I'll pop out for something or my DM and I will go shopping so DF looks after DS. And if I'm going out at night (on the 3 nights of December which make up my social life!) they babysit him, though I'll often come sleep in their house on those nights so I'll be the one looking after DS in the morning or if he woke at night.

I love that DS and DP have a really close relationship, that he has these other adults in his life that he can love and trust and rely on. But I'd never assume my parents would ever be free childcare. Not for one night and certainly not as part of an ongoing childcare arrangement while I earned money. Or at least if they did, I'd pay them the going rate to do so. Expecting help from your loved ones is one thing, expecting them to do an actual JOB for nothing is taking the piss. (That's not a judgement on people who have taken their DP up on this if it was freely offered. It may well be an offer I make to my DS if he is ever a parent but there is a difference between accepting a freely made offer and expecting it.)

There may be one or two posters on here who think that they are owed free full-time childcare from GPs, but they are usually jumped on.

What is far more common is people complaining that retired GPs want parents to do all the running to facilitate a relationship with the GCs (when the parents are already run ragged) but are unwilling to put themselves out at all in return.

FIL has seen DS less than 10 times in his life. He lives 20mins away, passes our house on his way to work every day. He was complaining today that my DM has a better relationship with DS than he does. She came up every week while I was on maternity leave to help out, babysits so I can go to medical appointments, and has offered to do one day a week of childcare now I’m back at work (DS has a nursery place so she isn’t obliged to at all, but she wants to spend the time with him). You do get out what you put in.

So depressing to read all this entitlement and tit for tat accounting of who looks after who. Grandparents and parents are only to be 'cared for in old age' IF they pay by babysitting? Really? FFS how totally fucking disfunctional.

I agree with this but unfortunately sometimes it’s inevitable. For example if you moved to be closer to GPs that helped out you cannot then be traveling every weekend to help other GPs. Or if your working full time in to afford childcare weekends are precious & as the kids grow full of activities. Other family members may have helped out & need support. We all have constraints on our time & finances so you can’t help but prioritise.

I’m a grandparent I love my GC I see them as an extension of my family. I work full time and I regularly have them overnight, since they were babies, mostly for my own pleasure and sometimes to help out. They honestly give us so much joy.

I have lovely memories of time spent with my GP’s and my parents did the same with my DC. I’ve taken half term off to spend some time with them. I wasn’t asked and won’t have them every day because they enjoy holiday club and I would be worn out, but I will enjoy taking them out and having lots of cuddles.

I wouldn’t agree to regular childcare though, it would wear me out, and we do like time to ourselves. I wouldn’t want to miss out on my GC and I feel like I have a happy medium.

I disagree that that is the attitude on here, I have seen a couple of threads where the op was getting lots of help from parents and wanting more or where the op was complaining that gps wouldn't offer regular childcare and on each thread the op got their arse handed to them.

I do occasionally feel jealous of people who have their parents pick the children up from school a few times a week but I would never expect that of my parents - we are nc anyway but even if we weren't I fully accept that it was my choice to have children so it is my responsibility to look after them.

Sorry to start this up again, been out and catching up on thread.

With regards to being 'normal'. Let's say for example I was rushed into hospital and my children were without care, I would find it very odd if my own mother, who is supposed to love and care about me, refused to look after my children for no other reason than she didn't feel like it. Having said that, my parents are still relatively young and I've never asked for much or taken advantage. Perhaps it skews people's views if they've had a different experience.

I was brought up in a way that you should always help others if you can without detriment to yourself. I find this attitude of "I'm not obliged to do anything I don't want to" odd.

I literally can't think of anyone I know in real life where grandparents don't help out a bit, unless there is a really bad relationship.

The problem with threads like this is that huge sweeping generalisations are made about everyone involved based on the experience of whoever posts a comment.

Not all parents expect childcare from grandparents
Not all grandparents resent providing childcare
Not all grandparents who provide childcare for free
Not all parents are annoyed at the standard of childcare provided by grandparents

I don't really see what the point of this thread is and Im sure its not that long since the last one.

FWIW dd is looked after by my DM and DPIL when I am working. I didnt ask them to do that- they offered/insisted. I have also offered to pay them for their time. They have declined.

I had a very close and loving relationship with my grandparents - they never provided childcare as DM was a SAHM but we did stay over most weekends, go on holiday with them and they babysat for us to allow parents to go on date nights etc
When I was expecting my first DC I told my parents and before congratulations got ‘don’t expect us to look after it!’
My DC are now 24 and 26 have never spent s night at their GP home, or had more than the odd evening where they baby sat for me
I think the distant relationship they share is of their own making and it saddens me

I don't expect any help from grandparents and I hate the thought of palming my children and my responsibilities off on anyone else. I chose to have children so I make the sacrifices. My children are 8, 7, and 3 and my in-laws have never spent any time alone with them, they don't want to which means i wouldn't want them to. My mum asks to have my kids all the time, but we have so little precious family time that we do say no thank you a lot of the time. I wouldn't ever expect my parents to have all 3 of my children at all, the older one sometimes has a sleepover (maybe 3 nights a year), but that is because he requests it, not to help us.

What about the reverse OP, let's say the son/daughter is a stay at home parent with school age children, with a decent disposable income. Their elderly parent living nearby is struggling to look after themselves.

But hey, their son / daughter has dreams and things they'd like to fulfil in life so there's no obligation to help is there?

When you retire and have gc there is no obligation to help. but if you live local to your children/gc and are in good health and choose to spend your time on a hobby or on holiday rather than spending your time with gc that will affect how close you are to your gc and affect how obliged they feel to help you out in the future.

When my mum first retired she said to me, don't expect me to be your free childcare. 10 years later she was desperate to be a grandparent and when she finally was she couldn't be more hands on and looks after them because she wants to, both my parents do, and I truly think it keeps them young.

After a bit of a break from parenting, you may change your mind. Given people wait until their 30s now to have kids there's usually 10-15 years between children moving out and getting grandchildren.