To tell my DSIS she is taking the piss!?

[Whatevernext2]

Nc’d for this
I have 2 dc who are now 5.5 and 7.5. When I had my dc my dm had retired and offered to mind them when I went to work. Dm wouldn’t accept payment as such so I used to do things such as fill up her car, pay her grocery bill whenever I was with her, take her clothes shopping, take her away on spa weekends etc etc. So anyway this continued up until last year when my youngest started school and at the same time dh got a new job whereby he works from home so he can drop the dc and collect them (school is 2mins around the corner) and they are quiet happy staying quiet in the next room colouring etc until I get home at 4.30.

Now the MAIN issue...my dsis got married 2 years ago and said she would wait until she was ready to have children as she couldn’t afford it. My Dm then said well “I’m not minding dg’s any more so I will have yours now if you want. So dsis decided that would work and started trying, baby was born 3 months ago ( baby is a very demanding baby)...Now my dm has decided that she would like to work a part time job (her friend had opened a shop) and that she needs money and that on reflection she will be too tired to do childcare. Fine... she’s entitled to change her mind. Dsis is fuming and has now...WAIT for it!!...decided that as I benefited from years of free childcare that I should help pay half towards HER childcare costs when she goes back to work!! She announced it last night when she popped round, I laughed as I thought she was joking...turns out she wasn’t and insisted it was partly my fault because I told her dm was great and saved me loads of money by minding my two!!and that by saying this I had convinced her to go ahead and get pregnant in the first place.

If you have stayed with me this long...thank you!! And also just to note it’s not that they would suffer money wise, my dsis just loves her current lifestyle and doesn’t want to lose it!

@LakieLady it's not old, but minding young children that are not your own is absolutely shattering.
The OP's mother did it for years and may only have a few good years left and has realised she doesn't want to spend them on the clock minding children.
Completely reasonable IMO.

Just a pity she ever suggested she would.
She probably meant it kindly but when reality hit of what was involved again...she balked. Totally believable.

By the time I get to grand children, please God, I certainly won't ever offer to do childcare fulltime.
Emergency help, certainly, but day in day out....fxxk No.

I have seen how shattering that is for women in their 60's and 70's....not a chance.

She didn’t just offer though, she talked her daughter into having a child she couldn’t afford and was going to delay based on her offer.

This isn’t the sister was going to have a baby anyway, or that she can afford child care, the is a woman who knew she couldn’t afford it,was going to put it off, till her own mother stepped in.

Then when she had the baby said sorry,no I’ve changed my mind.

You sound smug as shit and are far too liberal with exclamation points.

For that reason, 10 pages in, I'm out. Golden kids get on my bloody nerves.

So much speculation and over investment in this thread.

If you had been asked “ should we have a baby now even thought I can’t afford it because my mother has said she will help look after it when it’s born but not in three years time?”

Most of you would have rightly said no. Who really has a baby because the ultimate influencing factor was their mother saying you’d better have one sooner rather than later i you want me to help out? That is ludicrous!

What if god forbid the mother had died of a heart attack or was run over and killed or got cancer?

Shit happens
If you become a parent the buck stops with you. End of.

You lot are so over invested 😂 projecting much?

Projection?

Or just empathy for a struggling new mother who has been landed in the shit.

@Splitsunrise no I’m not projecting
At all.
I am just telling it like it is.

Over invested would be if I’d spent the last three days of my life wittering in this thread
I haven’t

@dwum
“This thread is batshit! Things change, its life. If you can't afford ffs kids, don't have them! It is no one else's responsibility. Simples!”

Do you not realise you’ve contradicted yourself? The sister could afford kids on the condition her mother did the childminding. Her mother agreed to it. Then, as you wrote “things change it’s life”. No babysitter and suddenly you can’t afford it.

Do you also offer such helpful advice to people with kids who receive benefits? Maybe to those who should’ve foreseen a redundancy?

@springydaff
I repeat, if a person has a baby on the basis of something anyone promising them something to do with childcare they are nuts.

Anything could happen
Families are notorious for things like this it seems to me

I am a single mother and have every empathy for the knowledge of hard it is but at the end of the day she is the mother. Not her mother

@Nekoness
And if the mother at the centre of this had died or had a stroke or moved what then?

She is entitled to change her mind.

You repeat? What for if you've said it already?

Your poor sister OP, she must feel very rejected and hurt.

Saying that, no you should definitely not pay for her childcare but I really think you should offer to help as and when you can.

OP, YABU, big style.

My heart breaks for your DSis, your mum has acted terribly, but it isn't beyond rectifying.

I'm in similar position and might start my own thread. I have children and never had any interesting or childcare from DParents. Dbro has recently got a dog and my parents mind it x3 per week while Dbro works! Super jealous, and it has impacted how I feel about them all.

This whole thing was bonkers...

I think that the dsis mom shouldn't have offered, if that was the only reason the dsis went ahead, then she was bonkers but regardless of all of that,
The dm does not now want to mind the baby, but even if she was willing to suck it up and give up her yoga and her job because she had committed two years previously, who among us would give their baby (pfb) to someone who didn't really want to care for them and was doing it under sufferance. I know i wouldn't and i'd be really really annoyed if my mom said nothing to me about changing her mind but felt she had to take my child anyway. i would always worry that my child would sense some resentment.

@springydaff

I repeated it because it seems astounding to me that anyone would have a baby earlier just because of someone saying they would help look after them. People are getting caught up in the machinations of entirely peripheral issues. The fact is it is not the OP’s fault, it’s not something the mother is obliged to do. The sister is however obliged to care for her own baby regardless so suck it up like millions of us do!

Even if what her mother did is unfair - which I can see to some it might be - the fact remains that once you become a parent the responsibility for that life resides with you unless you sign your parental responsibility away.
It’s that simple
Life throws all sorts at us and it includes this sort of thing quite frequently. We have to just carry on.

I am in a precarious position and worry constantly about making ends meet, my health, my future, my old age etc but it’s not my mothers fault or anyone else that made me promises they did or didn’t keep apart from their father.

I still have to be their mother

@StillCounting123
Looking after one of your adult children’s dog is not really the same as caring for grandchildren three days a week.

I can kind of understand the resentment side of it that your DM was willing to help you out but not your Dsis but at same time I think she shouldn't have thought it was a given right that your DM would be helping out with child care costs and that she should have seriously have gone with the thought of we will be doing this on our own if we get any offer of help great if we don't no drama after all your DM raised her own children so it's not her job to also raise her GCs

I would tell your Dsis that you won't be paying for child care as you technically did pay for child care when your DM helped out by buying her shopping putting fuel in her car etc

The sister can’t win here

She was doing the right thing and was waiting till she was in a better position to have children.

The mother persuaded her to go ahead as she would look after the children of the sister

What would have been the reaction if sister had turned to mother and said that she didn’t believe her.
She wasn’t going to have a child just yet because her mother would probably screw her over and refuse to baby sit.

Do you think the mother would have been happy that her daughter was throwing a generous offer back in her face and saying she didn’t trust her mother enough to not rescind the proposal

But on accepting the offer and having the child she finds out the mother was going to work elsewhere and was leaving her high and dry

Apparently she should have waited and saved before having a baby and not trusted her mother

I am a grandparent carer and two of my grandsons live with me. It really didn't start off like this nor was it my intention. My dd had her two boys very, very young and went off the rails. We ended up taking them on via the Family Courts. This was all fine when we were in our forties, but I am now in my late fifties. One is more or less grown up but we do have two teenage boys in our home. I don't ever regret taking them on and see them as children of our family rather than our own sons.

But my youngest dd is now expecting. She is a lovely caring girl who helped out with the boys and really enjoyed doing things with them. She is generous to a fault. But I have really had enough of children and babies (I have also helped out with two other grandsons having them overnight, taking them to appointments etc).

I really feel I owe her because why should she miss out because of her sister's mess ups in life. But I honestly don't feel I can face any more childcare. I have told her from the outset how I feel but her and her dh have said they really have no-one else to help them out.

I would make the point that I paid for nursery places for my two gs's who live with me and no-one provided free childcare for them or my own girls.

But I do not work now and I have no excuse and feel really worried about it all. I am wondering if your mum is the same op and that is the reality. Hope my post doesnt offend - it is simply to provide another perspective.

@Whatevernext2
Irrespective of anything else has the baby been checked for a milk protein allergy? It can make babies seem really difficult, scream constantly, be impossible to settle. There are a range of symptoms which could be present. Look up CMPA or pm me. Was just a thought

I'd say she might be a bit jealous or resentful of you. The fact that she was annoyed about you speaking at your father's funeral and getting compliments I think it sounds like she has a chip on her shoulder where your concerned. However though I agree this is unfair to you and I also ludicrous that she expects you to pay for her childcare i can understand why she is so upset. Your mum made her a promise and broke that promise so she is now prob feeling really worried and hurt that you got childcare and she isn't going to get any help despite being told she would. She is also prob completely frazzled with having a small baby esp one who is harder work. Best thing you can do op is be there for her best you can maybe suggest to your sister that it isn't your fault and that she take it up with your mother since it's not anything to do with you. Good luck. X

@Nekoness not a contradiction at all. Just because you initially plan for someone to do (free) childcare doesn't mean that will be a given for as long as you need it.

Childcare costs are a part of having a child. It should always be budgeted for. If you can not afford it, or to be a SAHP, then you can't afford a family.

Of course it’s contradictory. I could have had a couple of years of savings and a steady job when I was trying to conceive and be financially crippled and unable to “afford” my kids two years later. That you don’t get this just shows the little bubble you live in.

2beautifulbabs the sister didn’t think it was a ‘given right* . The mother told her to go ahead with having children as she would do child care.
But now the mother has decided that despite providing 7 years of free child care for OPs child yoga and her friend shop are more important.

Yes, you said, stop. A few times now. This is a very long thread and people feel passionately about it. Repeating the same point over and over clutters the thread. Many people agree with you, you don't need to keep saying it.

In fact I was going to make another scapegoat point but I've already said a lot about the family scapegoat and I don't want to be bashing people over the head with my opinion though I may say something later .