Should parents be "paid back" for sacrifices they made when raising their children?

[FurtherShowers]

My sister's MIL expects to be paid back financially and emotionally for raising her (now adult) DS. She will openly say "I sent you to a good school, I made sacrifices" etc and believes it is the job of her adult children to support her financially. This includes paying for her holidays, credit cards for discretionary spending, paying various non essential bills etc.

My sister and her DH have two children and my sister is sick of family money being spent on her MIL's luxuries. MIL has another son who is single and gives her a proportion of his wage. I think it's crazy that MIL accepts this, she is young enough and for enough to work and does work part time and has more than enough to cover all of her bills. The money she takes from her children is purely for luxuries and it's upwards of £10k a year (at least).

My sister believes all their spare money (they have less than her MIL and many more outgoings) should be spent on their children, but MIL insists mothers should be financially "looked after" by their sons. To clarify my sister and her husband, and her other son, are financially less secure than MIL.

I am angry on my sister's behalf and want to support her talking to her DH who I believe doesn't realise this isn't normal, but first of all wondered if it is normal in some families and if people see it as the right thing to do?

My adult DC have helped me through redundancies and unemployment, not with regular money, just here and there " I'll get you that" for stuff - only what they wouldn't miss, and I don't regard the help as my right!

It wouldn't enter my head to ask for a regular amount and they'd quite rightly laugh in my face if I suggested it!

Not normal. Even from my culture where kids would support their parents in old age (eg live with them, essential expenses etc), they would not ask for expenses for luxuries like this while the children and grandchildren are struggling.

There's no financial hardship at play (well at least not for her) she has a luxurious lifestyle in comparison to her children who are renting homes etc (sister's MIL owns hers outright).

How did she get into this situation from single parenthood? Was she a high earner or did she come into money? Or was it based on what her children's father paid her?

So she only raised her children as an investment, with a view to financial reward? What a very strange attitude. Also as a PP said, she only supported them for what 18, 21 years max and she expects a lifetime payback - what are they a pension scheme??

This is not normal and the MIL is very selfish.

My response would be along the lines of "your parents made sacrifices when raising you, you made sacrifices when raising your DS, and now we're making sacrifices while raising our DC. We're paying the sacrifice forward to the next generation"

Hell no! I have never heard of a weird set up like this before. Most people I know paid rent and some money towards bills when they started earning and were still living at home with their parents but that stopped when they moved out.

According to my mother, back in her day (late 50's/early 60's) the general rule was that wages were split 3 ways: 3rd to her parents, 3rd went to her personal savings, and the remaining 3rd was hers to spend as she pleased. But this completely stopped as soon as she and her siblings moved out or got married. White British family.

I would suggest having your sis write out their monthly outings vs their current income and have her sit with her MiL and show her in black and white that them supporting her financially is putting pressure on them. And that basically, that's not what she "signed up for" when she married your BIL.

Or ask for receipts for everything she spends their money on!

I know a couple of white British women who have this attitude. I think they are both embittered by their divorces still and that is the hardship they blame the children for. It’s sad.
No we chose willingly to accept children for our own pleasure and to meet our needs. They owe us absolutely nothing.

Ok so if MIL made sacrifices for her child/ren, how is her son/daughter to make sacrifices for their children if they are making sacrifices to pay MIL back? The maths doesn't work out.

MiL had children of her own choice. The children didn't choose the Mother.
The children (now adults as you say) need to unite and deliver a single message to her now -
"We will no longer be sending you any additional money to cover your luxuries. We have our own families to support now and make sacrifices for. You will have to cut your cloth to suit you new situation now. We don't have money to pay your credit card bills, your phone bills, you holidays or anything else. We are not being harsh, just realizing that the situation we've been party to was not of our choosing and no longer works for us adult children."
Just that.

Best of luck to you all. That's going to be one tough conversation to have.

No it's not normal.

But so many children expect their parents to look after their kids so they can work, don't they, we see enough bitter whinging posts about that on AIBU.

I don't think either is a fair expectation.

We had this in our marriage. MIL Greek Cypriot. We paid her gas, electric, council tax, water, tickets to Cyprus/holiday spending money, weekly food shop & household repairs. I used to joke with my dh it was like she was the first wife & I was the 2nd. Sadly, it wasn't funny, it was true & we ended up divorcing, though not solely for this.

Seymour skinner in the simpons had to pay his mother back for all he food he ate as a child😂.

Perhaps your sister should play the episode at the next family gathering.

We support my in-laws, but that is completely cultural. They made big sacrifices to help him get to medical school. DH has also talked to me about this before we talked about living together.

We pay about £200 a month which covers help in their home as they are getting older and Need support. We also pay any medical bills as there is no NHS and cover all costs of them visiting us.

What you are describing is completely different and absolutely ridiculous!

“Duty” = control mechanism.

It’s bad enough that a lot of older folk expect their adult children to live to please them, demanding financial support from a generation who need to deal with them having shat the bed for the rest of us is just comical.

As adults, my children will owe me nothing. I chose them.

Father and step mother expect my sister and I to paid them an monthly allowance, as they don’t want to work.

I put myself through uni, but my father and step mother paid all my sisters fees and they asked for the money back plus their mortgage to be paid and an allowance each month.

My Dsis has given them thousands of pounds over years to the point it has effected her financially (she earns 100k), but when she started to say no, they started sending me PayPal requests and I refused to give them anything.

I can just about afford to keep myself and due to not earning much and I don’t have a lots spare cash to support people who don’t want to work.

Haven’t RTFT but has anyone mentioned “narc” yet?

I don't agree with it in this scenario, although I think you should look after your parents if they need it.

Why wouldn't you want to look after your family? Society has got it sooo wrong with the endless greed. We've lost all perspective.

My parents both sent money home to their parents until they had children. That's over 60 years ago though and was unusual even then.

@HarryElephante have you RTFT? It's not looking after the older generation. The OPs sister and DH are not rich with tons of spare cash, they are sacrificing their families quality of life to fund MILs luxuries. She is more than capable of working so it's ridiculous that she expects them to find her when they have children of their own.

I did wonder about her being a narc, what wild that entail? She does seem to have her family wrapped around her little finger.

It is normal to look after elderly parents once they cannot maintain their independence, and to pay for everything if need be. They are your closest family,why wouldn't you?

But not in the OP's case, when mil is capable of funding an independent life

looking after your family doesn't include denying yourself and kids any luxuries so can fund those for your parent. I can see the case for helping relatives in need, but not relatives in want - luxuries should always be self funded.

If my kids ended up millionaires then I’d like them to buy me a nice house but expect it -NO

Wow, not normal in anyway! They're being rinses for something they had no say in, they didn't ask to be born. I hate people like that. Her son's need to speak up, though.