To wonder if I'm the only one with no help at all?

[Sofielou]

When I look around at friends and colleagues, it seems that many of them have extended family support when it comes to their DC. For example, someone to call if DC are poorly at childcare and needed picking up early and born DP and I have work meetings we're struggling to cover; or someone to drive older DC to social events with their mates when you're stuck at home with a sick toddler and partner is working.... that sort of thing. We have absolutely no one. Not one person. My DP and I are a FT working (both of us) exhausted two man team, with zero back up from anyone else.

We're surely not alone with this, are we??

I have an ex husband who will help if he has to.

I don't have in laws who could help. I'm non contact with my parents.

It's been odd signing up to a new dentist and not having a next of kin to put on the forms and changing my death in service benefit to the teens.

It's just the way it is.

It won't always be like this for you. They grow up and learn to drive and help more around the house as they grow

I’m a single mum and my family are not much help. So I get it op.

Yes also in a similar position. We have no family to help - both dm and dfil are dead. dmil lives 4 hours away and doesn't travel (visited once in 15 years), and df is local but has dementia so has never been able to help, and actually requires some care from me (so a net loss if I'm being callous!).

I am lucky in that I have a fairly flexible job and work pt, and have dh to juggle things with, but I am definitely envious of friends who have family to help (we live in a rural location with many people born and raised here - I can't think of anyone I know who has no family help except us).

As pp have said, having noone to put down on forms really resonates as a sadness. I also ended up having a planned section for dc 2 (for medical reasons), but was relieved in some ways as no idea who would have had dc1 had I had a natural Labour.

I try to offer help to others now dc are in school ie lifts, pick ups from school, so now at least have friends who I could ask for favours if needed, and that does feel a safety net. They all have their own dc though so no idea who would help if we needed more than an occasional hand.

I get why you feel alone with it

Lone parent here. One woman team.

It sucks. But what can you do? At least there are two of you to do the choldcare and earn the money between you!!

Lol mine are both under 5 and are my next of kin.

Sometimes there just isn't an extended family. It makes things much harder but that us life, nobody ever said it would be fair.

@tcjotm you sound like a lovely person. I agree with everything you said and would do the same for anybody who needed help.

OP I'm so sorry, you're really going through a tough time. I hate scrambling for childcare, I always feel like I'm begging when I have to arrange for it unexpectedly, but I do at least have people I can call. I will say, a VERY new acquaintance who I have spent time with in person only 4 times (met on a neighborhood chat board) reached out two weeks ago because she was in a bind for childcare, I arranged to work from home and took care of her son until she was able to pick him up, I was happy to do it! Last week our old neighbors needed some help in the evening and dropped their daughter off and my husband watched her. He fed her chips and a brownie for dinner but they had fun. Can you make friends with some neighbors? Maybe your family would benefit from moving somewhere a little less isolated, I know it's not easy, but in a year or two you could settled somewhere with more choices. At the very least you should interview and hire a date night babysitter or a laundry service if you can afford it at all, anything really that could take a bit of stress off your plate.

I was in this situation and it basically killed my career. Sorry, I don't mean to discourage you. It's not your fault and yes it's so frustrating to hear other women talk about all the help they have. Especially when they sneer at me for not having a career when their early careers were facilitated by their mothers doing so much childcare. I do resent that a bit.

You say you have a teenage daughter. I think it is fine to pay her for babysitting, because that acknowledges that looking after small children is work. And it is work! I think the way to make the negotiation with your teenager effective is, babysitting is how they earn their "going-out" money. Then they are more motivated to babysit, and you give them the cash for babysitting that you would otherwise have given them anyway, but now it is tied to babysitting. This makes the whole thing work: you get to keep your job, which allows you to have enough cash flow to give cash to your teenager to have fun with her friends, she gets cash, some experience at something that actually is a useful skill that she can use in college or when she has her own children, and builds a sense of responsibility and competence.

I get some hints that you don't feel your teenager can be trusted to watch your younger child. Now this is a different story. So it is up to you to decide if there is a way to train her to babysit or if she's just too immature. All teenagers would prefer to just be given stuff for free and be driven everywhere on command. That part is normal.

I'm so sorry about your mum OP. My mum also died and she never met her grandchildren so I also get quite upset when people say to me "cant your mum look after them?". More than anything in the world I would love that to be true but it isnt. People can be so heartless and cruel - even in this thread you have people saying its "odd" that some of us have no family. Well, so sorry that you find my mother dying to be "odd" but consider yourself lucky you dont have to worry about that. Not everyone has a large, movie perfect family.

We have some family nearby but have a disabled teenager that no one else can manage so we have no one else who could look after him.

No one we could pay either. If even one of us was ill for more than a short period SS would have to find a residential placement for him.

We don't have any family near enough to be practically useful on an emergency basis. My parents are 3 hours away and DH's parents are dead and the rest of his family are 9 hours' drive away.

I am very fortunate to have met some lovely women through antenatal group though who would be there for us in an emergency. One is one of my DD's nursery emergency numbers (and I'm the same for her DC) and is on call if I go into labour early with DC2 (having a planned section that my mum is coming to stay for if all goes to plan). The other two would also help out in a crisis, and we would all help each other. I think quite a few people are without help day to day: I was speaking to a nursery mum recently who is in same boat as us so we both have agreed that if the other ever needs something, we should call each other.

We don't have any family nearby, the grandparents are all very supportive so we are very lucky that way but too far away to help with anything without a lot of planning which is tricky as in laws look after their other (local, parents work shifts) grandchild a lot at short notice so can't commit to visiting us. It does get easier as they get older, mainly because it's less of a big ask to ask someone to look after a sensible 8 year old than a livewire toddler. I found it tricky trying to build up a network when they were younger in the ways described because I struggled to cope with mine quite often and definitely struggled with an extra toddler I didn't know so well in the mix. I did it if people asked for help but always found it very stressful. It's mostly easier now to have friends round on drop off playdates or similar because older children are mostly easier. I also think there's a huge difference between asking someone to have your older child for an hour and asking someone to have your toddler all day or overnight. I was also very relieved to have a planned section for second child because I could plan help for the older one. A friend had to take their toddler to the birth of sibling. My worst moment of lack of help was probably having to take a toddler to my smear test. Also having to take a 1 year old to a funeral - I really had to be there but it was some distance away so I would have needed care from early morning to late afternoon and there just wasn't anybody I could ask for that long. Oh and parents evenings - trying to listen to what teacher was saying about older child while juggling a screaming toddler. Phone call parents evenings since Covid much easier! But I know we still have it easier than some people here so hats off to the lone parents etx.

Agree! And not all school mums are friendly, seriously annoys me the way people make out like school mum friends are the answer to everything. Some schools are friendlier than others and more of a community feel, some are not.

I agree also, it's all very easy to say just make friends, build a community around you, talk to the school mums etc. I've never made friends with school mums as I literally drop off and rush to get to work, at pick ups the mums are all in their little groups. My dd went to a classmates party and the week after I tried to start up a conversation with the mum at drop off as she was walking the same way as me, she looked at me like I was bonkers !!

ChiswickFlo
*I think sometimes one needs to push onself outside ones comfort zone tbh. No one likes asking for help.

I can't imagine saying "no" to one of my dcs friends parents if they were desperate for help...
Exactly. Make friends OP! this is what you should have done years ago and then maybe these people could be a support network now. Never too late to ger started.*

How patronising. Not everyone can make friends that easily.

I think to have literally no one is odd.

We made sure to live very close to my mum before having kids as knew she wanted to be involved anyway with grandkids and this would make it easier.

We also still live close to friends and my husbands siblings, we see them all regularly and they all work different work patterns so there are people we can ask in an emergency. Essentially we have stayed close to family and friends.

I've made friends with a couple of mums at my dds nursery so again in an emergency i could ask them.

Both me and my husband work full time and always have*

How nice for you, I lived close to my mum too, she got diagnosed with dementia when my dd was little so was obviously unable to help me anymore as she had before.

We're the same in that both our families live too far away to help with childcare or pickups etc in day to day life. Most mums I've met at school have family support but I'm certainly not the only one.
However since the DC have started school we have made friends with a family around the corner whose DC is in the same class as our eldest, and they have offered to pick up DC if we ever needed. Of course it's not quite the same as family and we haven't taken them up on their offer yet but at least it's there.
It will get easier as yours get older at least.

@Lazypuppy just give it a rest, no one on here is interested in your privileged position.

All of this.

I'm sorry for your loss, too.

Yes, we’re in the same boat OP. My in-laws live a long way away and are quite elderly. My parents live closer and aren’t elderly but still a long way (2 hour drive in completely clear traffic) and they aren’t the kind of people I would want looking after my children in any case. I’m an only child so no siblings.

I am really envious of people who have involved parents who love helping them out with childcare and I know lots of people who have that. In particular I think it’s a huge help when it comes to climbing the career ladder if you have someone who can take care of your kids when they’re off sick from nursery/school.

However, I do know quite a few people in a similar boat to us. I don’t know whereabouts you live but I think it’s not at all uncommon in London and the South East, where people have moved from all over the country or from abroad to pursue their careers then have settled down in London or just outside.

I try (not always successfully!) not to be jealous of people with more help but I do wish it was acknowledged more how much of a difference family support makes, especially in relation to childcare for work. Unless you earn enough for a nanny, relying on paid childcare is expensive and inflexible, esp when children are small. (Definitely not the fault of the childcare settings.) And I think sometimes there's a mindset of 'i did x job/career around children so there's no excuse' without recognising that partner works flexibly from home and can cover sick days or granny is up the road and does regular childcare. Most annoying though is people who have lots of help and then complain that grandparents give them too many sweets while doing weekly long days of free and flexible childcare...

It’s annoying isn’t it, I put up a post a little while ago how lonely I am as have no friends and the comments I got was “oh just make friends with the mums at school” I mean really? I hadn’t thought of that 🙄 my oldest is in year 6 and I’ve never managed to make a friend, beyond saying hello to two of the mums that is it, they are not like that at my kids school and they don’t do class WhatsApp etc, no one speaks to each other, there was a woman I use to say hello to but sometimes she would say hello and sometimes she would blank me so I stopped bothering, I now don’t see any of the mums at all because I have a different pick up time to them now but my youngest has started reception now and apparently I should put notes in my dds bag inviting them over to my house, I’m sorry but I’m not going to do that, inviting people I’ve never met for play dates would come across as very weird! People put way too much emphasis on school mum friends like they are the answer to everyone’s problems unless I was to literally go up to people and beg them to be my friends it’s doesn’t happen.

Yesterday I slipped my disc at work (reoccurring) today dh is working so had to get dc ready, drive to school and walk across playground literally crying in pain because we have no one to ask. And I've just discovered my sons bag in car so have Togo back 😩😩😩 my sil would just ask pil and it would all be sorted.

We do it all ourselves. One set of grandparents live far away and the other are utterly disinterested and never visit. No relationship at all.

We're just used to it though. The kids are well behaved so we still go anywhere we want to and include them. We work full time but can do school runs ourselves.

I agree with this. I tried to make mum friends at the school gates but most of them seemed to already know each other (maybe from nursery pick up) and already had formed little cliques. I chatted superficially with most of them and they chatted back but made it very clear who their "real" friends were in the group and so that was that, and it never went any further. The thing is, most friendships form organically. If someone makes it clear they already have their friends and arent making any more what else can you do but leave it? if you start pushing to be friends you come across as a weirdo stalker and people are even less inclined to be friends.

My friendship circle now are people I met at school/college/work.