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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

To tell friend she’s in the wrong about her DD (sorry it’s long)

48 replies

ashvivienne · 18/09/2018 10:58

DD1 has a friend that lives about 4 hours away and has done for about 18 months she’s living there with her parents after they moved from our area. Our DDs have remained friends and are a similar age.
DDs friend drove up this weekend for a birthday party of another friends parent and has taken time off work to stay all week. The three girls have spent a lot of time together since Saturday - my DD drove girls back to ours early Sunday morning as she is pregnant so wasn’t drinking and they stayed with us on Sunday night as well.
DDs friend still has a grandparent here and obviously hasn’t had the time to jump up to see her yet. DDs friend has been in mine this morning upset because everyone has had a go at her for not going up and now grandparent is unwell (they don’t keep well as it is) and she needs to go up for when the doctor comes etc, the girls mum has also text me to tell the girl to go up to grandparents. DDs friend is very upset over the fact this has become her responsibility as she lived with the grandparent for a long stretch of time and was the one putting them into hospital and essentially caring for them but was berated by family members who didn’t visit about how much the grandparent looked after her and she now doesn’t speak to a few family members after a massive row.
I’ve written a text to the friends Mum (we are also friends) essentially saying I don’t think the responsibility should lie solely with her DD or that everyone should be getting angry that she’s had a busy weekend and not had the chance to go up yet and that she’s been very upset by a family member today over the situation.
OH doesn’t think I should get involved but the girls asked if she can stay with my DD at our house for the rest of the week due to the family member making her so upset something I think the parent should know especially. AIBU

OP posts:
Hillarious · 18/09/2018 12:17

The friend obviously knows the grandparent well, having lived there. I'm surprised she's not already been to visit. If you're reluctant to visit, it's always better to get these visits out of the way early, otherwise they hang over you and become something bigger than they really ought to be.

Sugarpiehoneyeye · 18/09/2018 12:17

Really OP, she isn't a child, I don't think that you should be cushioning your daughters friend, but encouraging her to visit her grandparent, who is in need.She lived with this family member, the least she could do, is visit. I am not surprised her mother is distraught.
Also, your daughter is pregnant, and doesn't need someone else's stress.

Hissy · 18/09/2018 12:18

She came down this weekend (Friday nigh/Saturday) to see her friends, right? and somewhere over the weekend her GM has fallen ill? and her family are kicking off at her for (a) not anticipating this, and (b) not being there?

Is that right?

Sounds like her family are a whole herd of white sheep and she is the black sheep. Of course she is right to say 'What If i HADN'T been here?' It's completely relevant.

What can you do? Sweet FA tbh, the 'girls' are women, and have to sort their own lives out and are more than able to stand up for themselves.

IF you want to do something, you can let the DD friend that you don't think she's in the wrong at all and that her family are out of order for having a go at her, BUT, the fact remains that she IS down, her GP DOES need some help and she can do it.

PorkFlute · 18/09/2018 12:18

She’s being nagged to visit by her family. If you can’t take that at 20 then how are you going to bring up a child, hold down a job? Don’t infantilise the ‘girl’ - she is a 20/21 yr old woman. It doesn’t sound like she’s expected to be a full time carer. Just help her man out because she’s unwell and she’s nearby. Surely not too much to expect?
Imagine how you’d feel if your friend texted you saying I don’t think you should have said that/expected that of your dd? Would you appreciate it? I doubt many would.

bigKiteFlying · 18/09/2018 12:21

It’s a common thing IME that one family member ends up doing most of the elderly relative work yet often also gets berated by other family members for not doing more.

I think it's uncommon it' happen to GC in their 20s.

the girls mum has also text me to tell the girl to go up to grandparents.

I think I'd text back how inappropriate it is to include non-family in this matter but as she has you think she is being massively unfair to her DD who's been very busy this weekend and why isn’t she stepping up more as it's her parents.

I expect all that will happen is you don't get texts like this in future.

ashvivienne · 18/09/2018 12:22

Actually kieren she arrived on Saturday evening and went straight to the party obviously spent Sunday hungover so don’t think it would have been fair for her to visit on that day and yesterday she had plans in both the morning and the afternoon which included an appointment of her own. So she hasn’t actually had the time to visit as of yet.
I’m of the opinion the older cousin should be dealing with this as she lives 15 minutes away and is a constant here. I have text the mother to say I won’t be getting involved I do however think that perhaps older cousin should be helping as her DD isn’t always here and struggles to cope in these situations as she already knows. I’ve also let her know that things said to her this morning have left her very upset and think it needs to reigned it particularly when nobody mentioned the grandparent was unwell until this morning and it seemed like her DD should have already known based on the conversations had.

OP posts:
titchy · 18/09/2018 12:25

You should text back words to the effect of not my circus.....

However the girl should have gone to visit her grandmother and accompany her to appointment.

What's with all the 'put her in hospital business'? That's for her doctor to decide. The lack of nearby relatives may well factor in that decision, but afaik relatives can't just decide Great Aunt Maude needs to be in a hospital, and hospital just rocks up and takes her there.

kierenthecommunity · 18/09/2018 12:31

The thing is you’re getting one side of the story and the family have another and the truth is probably somewhere in the middle. Is the cousin abdicating responsibility full stop, even when DD’s friend isn’t in the area? If so then that cousin needs to have a word with themselves. But if they’re looking in on DGM full time they may just have hoped they’d get some time off now the other granddaughter is visiting.

The bit being able to visit due to needing a day off to recover from hangover isn’t exactly pricking my sympathy either, she could have gone for a couple of hours.

What day is DGM’s appointment anyway?

kierenthecommunity · 18/09/2018 12:32

*Not being able

CoolCarrie · 18/09/2018 12:34

Surely the young woman wants to see her grandparent when she is in the area? I certainly would. Could you daughter go with her, or the other friend? She should phone her cousin herself to meet up. She does seem thoughtless to not spare an hour or so to visit her ill grandparent, but maybe she feels she has done enough over the years.

MipMipMip · 18/09/2018 12:35

I like MrsPuff's reply. It does always seem to end up on one woman person's shoulders and yes, they will be told by those less involved of all they are doing wrong. It's a long way from fair and if it's another generation down it's even worse.

titchy yes it will be the doctor's decision if the gran is to go into hospital. But if you've never been there with someone reluctant to go in, espescially someone who is old enough to have previously made the decisions themselves, you may not realise how much work it can take. Just packing can take hours as they can't decide what needs to go with them, the disagreeing and decididing that they're ok really, the fretting over xyz...It can be exhausting.

I admit I'm projecting here but it sounds relevant.

FruitofAutumn · 18/09/2018 12:40

The rest of the family are 4 hours away, your DDs friend is nearby, grandma falls nill.of course it make sense for her to be the one to call in.That's how families work.
And how can you say she is becoming ng a carer when she lives 200 miles away?

Your role is to pass the message on, not put your twopen'th in to a situation which has absolutely nothing to do with you

bigKiteFlying · 18/09/2018 12:43

Is the cousin abdicating responsibility full stop, even when DD’s friend isn’t in the area? If so then that cousin needs to have a word with themselves. But if they’re looking in on DGM full time they may just have hoped they’d get some time off now the other granddaughter is visiting.

^^ this is probably worth considering. May even be that cousin's been asking for help and been told not to worry other GC is in area so they'll get a break.

One of my Uncle was always offering other people's time with no consulting them and FIL used to do it with DH. People always seem to get upset with the offered people if tehy can't help not the one making arrangements with no consultation IME.

MulticolourMophead · 18/09/2018 12:46

Totally agree with MipMipMip. It can be do hard to persuade someone to go to hospital when they don't want to, even when it's urgent.

I also think the DGM's children need to start planning what and how future care is undertaken, and not dump it on the DGC.

Been there, done that. My parents had my grandad live with us, and mum's siblings were very quick to wash their hands of helping. They even tried to dodge helping by saying that me and DBro should be doing it all, when we were only teens. It took a row, and me loudly saying it should be kids before grandkids, before they got off their arses. And they were nearby.

BanananananaDaiquiri · 18/09/2018 12:46

A 20yo can speak up for themselves with their own family.

The plethora of threads on here from women often substantially older than 20 who find it hard to speak up for themselves within their family or push back at being treated like a doormat would suggest that is often far from the case.

EK36 · 18/09/2018 13:01

Don't get involved. Keep out of it.

starfishmummy · 18/09/2018 13:08

I'd be sending a text to the girls mother to tell her please to not involve me in her family arguments and that you will not be acting as to between.

If she continues then block her

PurpleTrilby · 18/09/2018 14:37

I feel really sorry for your DD’s friend. She’s visiting for a week, essentially a holiday, but since her family are used to dumping care of the GP on her, they want to do it again, just because she’s there. She probably thought she’d pop in and visit after catching up with her friends, like young people do, because, you know – they have a life too. Or they do if they’re not burdened with caring responsibilities way before their time. Now she’s very upset because she didn’t say ‘how high?’ when older relatives ordered her to jump. Why in hell should she get her leisure time wrecked like this? Taking an elder to hospital appointments is not fun, it’s not a holiday, it’s bloody hard work. Why can’t the adult children, the generation above her, step up instead of dumping it all on her? And no, it’s not that easy to manage these things at 20, she’s very young, it’s very unfair. I was barely prepared for caring for my elderly parent in my 40s, it’s a very steep learning curve and hard work. And people like Keirenthecommunity (oh how droll, you care and it’s all about community, yeah on your terms) just love to tell others what to do, what ‘they would do’, don’t they? How kind of them to tell other people, usually women, what to do with their life and how to sacrifice it with fuck all thanks at the end. Tell your DD’s friend she has NO obligation, none, unless she wants to visit. Still, they’ve fucked up her time away already, haven’t they? Talk about FOG, fear of family disapproval, obligation to not one but two older generations and guilt if she doesn’t spend all her free time looking after the GP the minute something happens. Tell her she does have the option to tell them to fuck off and sort it themselves. That’s also an adult response.

PorkFlute · 18/09/2018 15:02

The op has massively overstepped the mark here.
If the older cousin is generally looking after gm ten it’s not too much to ask for the other gd to look in on her gm and help her out for a day while she’s visiting. She put a roof over her head for a time! I also think the young woman sounds pretty selfish tbh.

ashvivienne · 18/09/2018 19:48

Porkflute older cousin is a bit of a part time family member and caring responsibilities have pretty much always fallen on this girl from roughly 17. To the point she told her mother she was staying with us one night while the Grandparent was in hospital and slept in her clothes and winter coat under a duvet in freezing cold temperatures so that she would be there for a heating engineer to come out and fix it in the morning so that the grandparent didn’t need to worry about it when they came out of hospital or it didn’t delay her leaving.

Thought I would give a short update.
She went to GPs house and spoke to DR when she was out. Dr didn’t send GP to hospital but asked if she would stay with GP to monitor her as she knows what she’s doing and what to look out for in case the hospital is needed. Family member has shown up later and took over the situation which DDs friend is quite annoyed about as this family member is showing that she doesn’t know how to properly handle the situation and is putting pressure on GP to go to hospital etc.

OP posts:
PorkFlute · 19/09/2018 00:40

How is she taking on most caring responsibilities from 4 hrs away? Someone nearer must be doing day to day care?
And it seems she doesn't want to help her gm out but the other person doing it isn't doing it properly in her eyes? I'm really struggling to have any sympathy for her from what you've written. And I've no idea why you would risk your own friendship by basically giving her mother a dressing down about the situation. Unless you are the sort of person who enjoys latching on to drama that doesn't have anything to do with you.

stayathomer · 19/09/2018 00:52

At that age you are selfish though aren't you? And it's not like she's done nothing for her GM. Saying that I assume Theres a reason. It's nice of you to try to help but Id leave them to figure it out themselves

TheStopAndChat · 19/09/2018 01:48

Are you always such a drama llama OP? You say "I won't be getting involved..." and then can't help yourself!

It's not an unreasonable expectation for this young lady to visit her sick grandmother. That she didn't want to, or hadn't isn't really a good look. Your interference is really nothing but shit stirring. I'm sure you will, however get to keep your 'cool parent' crown.

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