To think this family set up is odd?

[Milkybars]

Nc for this. It's a bit random, sorry, but I'm trying to get my head around something.

Family - mum, dad and six children aged between 4-16 when this occurred. White, working class but with money, British (just for background)

Eldest child is now mid 30s so this is all fairly recent.

They live in the same area of the city as extended family, so within a few minutes walk of various cousins, grandparents, aunts and uncles.

From the age of 4 or so, the children have been sent to live with members of the extended family - so child 1 lives with Aunty A, child 2 lives with Granny B, each child living with a different family member except the youngest two. Sometimes there is a swap - so child 2 might go and live with Aunty A and child 1 goes off to Aunty C for a year or two. No particular reasons given for the swap. Children would have dinner at home at the weekends. No social services involvement of any sort. Parent's relationship volatile by my standards, but joked about by the family. Children never seem to be taken out/no family days out

There is no real reason ever given for the children living with these relatives, and nobody seems to have a problem with it, however as adults there is some dysfunction/poor grasp of boundaries/mental health issues/poor parenting. The parents of these children both worked, one parent worked school hours only, there was plenty of money, and the family home was big enough to house all the children, so space didn't come into it.

I think this situation is really odd, and a contributory factor to some of the issues within this family, but others disagree. AIBU?

It's not common or normal. I would ask one of the aunties if I wanted the truth behind it.

It’s odd and could definitely have long term impact on mental health etc if the child suffered some kind of attachment disorder due to this set up.

I wouldn’t expect the kids to have close relationships as adults to there parents as they were not really raised by the parents. The chances are they have a good relationship with the main care giver be it the aunty etc as they took on the parent role.

I have seen it frequently in my jobs that the child becomes more attached to the person who cares for them the most. For example if a grandparent has the kids a lot during the week including weekends doing day up day things such as nursery/school drop off, providing dinner, day trips out, overnight stays, setting boundaries, rules etc the child does tend to view this person more as the parent.

This is just such a weird post, it’s an unusual enough situation to be indentifying anyway, why not just say who you are in this situation?
Is the family British? Or could it be a cultural thing?

Dysfunctional in my view.
Hard to see how the children could have ended up emotionally secure adults.

Yes, some children have it worse, but generally those would be the ones suffering some kind of abuse.

I still honk one of the other adults could explain the situation - they were heavily involved in their childhood and must be very close as a result.

If you aren’t one of the children, maybe they know part of the story but just haven’t divulged it to you?

This happened to my two cousins - sent to live with other relatives and then swapped over every year.

However I didn’t know that there was abuse in the family. The DM and others were scared that the F would abuse the children. I think it was much harder to leave a partner in years gone by, or she was so abused she couldn’t bring herself to do it.

None of us cousins knew this growing up. We thought it was odd but just accepted it. And looking back there was no external signs of the abuse - it was a very well hidden secret.

funday I tend to agree. The situation has been whitewashed a bit recently with the story that the children were "only sleeping" at the other houses, but that's simply not true. It also misses the point that huge amounts of the intense bit of parenting of young children is (at least in my experience) done in the evening - dinner, bath, bed,night wakings. And for older children, sometimes it's the only time you really see them!

I did wonder about attachment issues. I don't know much about them, but some of the children have really, really struggled to bond with their own children

I would presume it's because the parents were unable or unwilling to properly raise their DCs, so rather than wait for the DCs to be neglected and SS involvement, family stepped in to take over.

Agree asking one of the Aunties, who probably would be able to explain why they felt they had to step in and take a child in.

Keep in mind, in the 80s/90s, having 6 DCs wasn't the norm either, and working benefits weren't all that generous.

It fucks you up a lot. I talk from experience. Passed around the family who would take me.
As an adult, I have MH issues (started in primary school), have relationship issues, trust issues. Could go on.
And have no relationship with parents. Dad walked out very early. Mum came back into life sporadically, and as an adult tried to control everything.

This must have been massively unsettling and damaging to the children.
I just don’t see how they would have felt loved and wanted, plus how could all these ever changing houses really feel like home? I can understand why they may be fucked up as adults and having their own children must make them realise just how bad it was that they were farmed out as kids.

Sounds very odd to me.
Especially as space and money are not an issue (or don't seem to be).

I think there would be great resistance to the idea it was farming out the children, because geographically they were still close and "family help each other out".

I also suspect it was really for the parent's convenience.

"I think this situation is really odd, and a contributory factor to some of the issues within this family, but others disagree. AIBU?"
I agree OP. YANBU. I'm surprised any child would come out of the situation with a healthy view of life unless they are just naturally VERY resilient.

Is it that some siblings found it was normal because they knew nothing else and were happy and were treated well whilst living with the various aunties and grans? I'm surprised any of the siblings would now wish to see their parents on a weekly basis.

It is a very unusual set-up.

I hate all this A, B rubbish, child 2, 3

It sounds terrible. I have known of many children who have been in family care but that has almost always been for stability. I have known of one child who was passed from person to person for a long time. There was great insistence that this was “only for sleeping - not living with” but clearly it was indicative of a much larger issue. The young person had enormous issues and is now in counselling and has no contact with one parent

Sorry that's just bizarre.

It sounds like the parents couldn’t really be bothered to be parents.

I know someone who grew up similarly. Her mother loved babies, but around 2ish they ended up spending more and more time with the grandparents. Then when they were teenagers the grandparents struggled to cope so they went to an aunts. their mother was then offended when the Aunt and Granny were on the top table at the wedding because “I’m your mother”

Posted too soon.. There is a sense, even now with the grandchildren, that children are inconvenient/a constant nuisance. There is an assumption that everyone wants to escape their children all the time (of course everyone does at times, but to them it's like the default state of being) and there is disbelief that anyone can find enjoyment in parenting small children.

Strangely enough though, they are desperate to be close to their adult children, are generous with money, and want to be very involved in their lives.

it's not normal to outsource the raising of your children to other people, especially if there are no extenuating circumstances at play
^this

A sense of stability is so important to children. I don't think what you're describing sounds acceptable at all. Not only were their parental relationships were affected, but also the relationship with siblings. I find the idea of this quite upsetting.

Sorry, I know it's a nightmare to explain, but I really wanted unbiased opinions--thank you

Sounds very sad

Lyralala and passmethecrisps- yes, I could see both those scenarios happening with this family.

The children were treated very well by the family members and very much loved by them. I think that is partly why the issue is clouded with some of them today - can you really complain when Mum and Dad are only a five minute walk away, and Granny is letting you stay up late and eat all the custard creams?

I grew up in extended family, but it was a stable situation. I was loved by the family that raised me. Less uncommon in the past than it is now because society was more rigid about its expectations for family units and not supportive for families not within that.

Being passed around various relatives over time sounds very emotionally unstable with a very high chance of long term negative consequences for mental health and relationships.

Perhaps the parents liked babies then got bored of the reality...