AIBU to not do EVERYTHING for guests in my house :(

[Babyno22018]

My dad lives up North. I live South. Actually I'm the only person left living within an hour of where I grew up, my family all moved around the country. So I have two children, husband works long hours and no other support with the children (other than friends who have enough to do with their own children).

My dad comes to stay fairly regularly. He expects me to make him all food and drinks (breakfast, lunch, dinner, tea, coffee, water, squash). I make dinner as I'm making family dinner but I refuse to do anything else! This morning I was getting ready for work, giving the two children breakfast and emptying the dishwasher (I hadn't eaten or drunk anything yet) when he had the cheek to ask me to make him some cereal too! I told him to get his own.

I love my dad but I find him tiring, he doesn't offer to clear up after dinner or help lift a finger AT ALL. He does help with the children so I guess he feels he does enough. But really I just find it too exhausting to have him stay, I don't ever get any help and just feel like everyone wants something from me and I don't have a lot left to give right now!! Especially for grown adults who can't make themselves a bowl of cereal.

Just to add, he comes to stay regularly so it's not like he doesn't know where anything is!

You’ll have to train him to sort out snacks, simple meals and drinks for himself.

Has he come to stay to do childcare due to summer hols and you having to work? I think if he has then when you're around you should be going all out host. If he's just come for a a little holiday then yanbu.

@makingmemories I've tried!!

@seven201 no he did have the oldest for a few hours today but more because I'm a childminder and he didn't want to be in a house full of kids

It's the same when my MIL comes to stay from overseas. ONE night of her three week trip I had a migraine and went to bed early and she and DH left their dinner plates on the table with food left on them, along with a ton of mess. In the morning it transpired she'd suggested they leave it for the morning as it had got late.
Fine, but they knew I'd be up two hours before them for work.
Never lifts a finger.

My dad walks in to my house puts the kettle on and asks me if I want a cup of coffee, sometimes he'll empty the dishwasher while the kettle is boiling, that's a good guest. (Disclaimer - I am usually dealing with the baby and cook him dinner at least one a week)

Clicker training.

Ask him to do something, everytime he does it press the clicker and throw him and M&M

I think ‘he had the cheek to ask’ is a bit OTT. If you were getting breakfast for the kids anyway he probably thought it would be just as easy for you to pour one more bowl of cereal (‘making’ cereal is really overstating the effort involved).

@stillcoughingandlaughing

Nope I had already got breakfast for the children and was half way through emptying the dishwasher. I think it's cheeky to ask me to stop what I was doing and make him one rather than make it himself when he wasn't actually doing anything!

@WhyBirdStop that would be AMAZING!! I wish he could be like this :(

@wheresmymojo I snorted like a porker laughing at that.

I would sit down with him and say that I found having him to stay exhausting. Explain all you’ve said and say he either needs to pull his weight or not stay regularly.

Does he live alone?

Everyone over the age of 5 should always serve their own cereal. Surely? Nobody pours cereal for other adults!

Nautiloid - i hope you left it for them to sort 2 hours later!

I would be having him to stay a bit less if I were you. Why on earth would you wait on him hand and foot. He's not the bloody queen and he'd be getting short shrift from me if he expected treating like her. Just laugh at him like. Every time, be like no, are your legs broken? What did your last slave die of? etc. Get the kids involved with the piss taking Grandad's lazy etc. He'll soon stop or stop staying so much!

Nope I had already got breakfast for the children and was half way through emptying the dishwasher.

That’s a bit different then; if you’d moved on another job, he could have left you to it and got it himself.

Is there a chance he just doesn’t feel comfortable doing it as a ‘guest’? (He could just be a lazy old sod of course, but worth considering the possibility!)