AIBU not to help DD out with childcare?

[reesep]

DD has a son with special needs age 5, and a daughter age 1.

She has requested I look after them one day at a weekend, every month. She has also requested I do some daytime childcare during the school holidays

This is so she can get into nursing. She's desperate to be a nurse and has been accepted into a Healthcare Assistant role on bank, meaning she can pick shifts

AIBU not to provide such rigid help? It's too much of an expectation and I can't handle it

I do feel bad but it's just too much. She also lives 1.5 hours away so it would mean bringing the DC here

AIBU?

@Cuppasoupmonster obviously but she has clearly stated she cannot do this for her and i respect that.

I completely agree. Unfortunately, the OP has decided she already knows better, as she has 'many friends' who are nurses, so she knows all about life as a student nurse.

I work part time.
Monday mornings, Tuesday mornings. Full day Wednesday and Thursday.
Her child is in school. So we collect feed and keep him til she comes back late in the evenings. Usually 5.30. But sometimes if she has parents evenings then up to 7 in the evening.

She has a course this week friday so she is leaving early. So I'm gonna collect in morning to take to school, then collect from school and keep him til she comes back anytime til 9pm.

She hasnt had a chance to meet her mates for a while so agreed to keep him Saturday evening too.

Op,your daughter can get carers to come and watch your eldest grandchild whilst she is at work.It is a set number of hours and she can choose how to spend them.So you wouldn't have to care for the eldest.Would you then be willing to look after the baby?Could she move back to your home town so she has a support network?

There is a way that she can become a nurse through being a HCA. Not sure if it is only in the West Mids though.All the training is done through the hospital and they have lecture theatres there.This was at The Children's hospital and Queen Elizabeth hospital.Ask her to look into that,it doesn't have to be the traditional route via a University.

Hope you are proud of her,she sounds like a hard worker with ironfist will and hope she achieves her dream.

I really don't think YABU! I just became a mum and any help my family can give is amazing but I don't expect it and would not be angry if they couldn't. I get emotionally it would be lovely to help but given what you have said about the 2:1 ratio, respite care etc his needs sound really severe and best will in the world it takes a lot to take that on and I feel it is reasonable to admit you don't think you can. And it is lovely she has this dream, but say she starts and it isn't what she wanted it will be a quick way to get in dent and training to be a nurse is demanding, draining and not always easy to predict it will be a lot to juggle if his needs are that severe...

Always staggered by how entitled some parents are. Possibly because my own parents couldn’t be arsed to parent me properly, so had I had kids, my kids would’ve been nowhere near them. I’ve always had to do everything on my own, from an early age.

If you want to have a dream career then do it before you had children, or have a plan for paying for childcare. Don’t unilaterally decide that someone else will be doing the childcare and then deem them selfish for objecting to it. And before anyone says “it’s only 12 days a year” - utter naivety. Once DD starts training and working it’ll be full time childcare plus anti social hours. Why wouldn’t it be? If DD can’t get childcare now she won’t be any better off once she starts training. OP will end up essentially raising the kids alongside her own.

I know I’ll get flamed on here because personal responsibility is seen as classist or misogynistic or whatever, but children are the responsibility of their parents alone. If grandparents wish to help, great. But if you’re forcing them into it because “faaaaaamily” then it’s you that’s being selfish.

YANBU OP. Ignore this lot.

Lots of people very confident about how much childcare they’d provide to a grandchild with significant special needs whilst still having children at home. Seems like an amazing untapped resource of ppl who’d be in a position to offer occasional respite care to families in this woman’s position.

Just help her out for goodness sake! It’s not forever!

You never stop being a mother but you can stop being put upon and doing things that are beyond your personal abilities/limits/health. Op is not necessarily cold, just practical within her own limits. We want women to say no and yet some people here are unfairly epxecting the op to say yes. Midlife is a mixture of expectations from all directions, so boundaries and being able to say no is a great skill. People get the hump but then they find another way through. As i said, people need to adjust theiir expectations and make cboices accordingly.

But it’s not sustainable either. She’ll be expected to work shifts, days nights and weekends. Where are her DC going to go?

well…technically it’s up to you. You have no obligation

but you don’t sound very supportive of your daughter. Given your other kids ages, am guessing your daughter is still very young.

she’s also a single parent

why wouldn’t you want to help? You sound like you’ve got a ‘she’s made her bed…’ attitude.

you don’t even sound like you’re even concerned about her predicament.

Why isn't the father of the children not looking after his kids while the mother works? He should be whether they are together as a couple or not. Can your daughter's dad look after his grandchildren? The most annoying thing about this is that the men aren't doing anything and the women are expected to do everything - everything even just to have a bloody job! And are expected to look after the grandchildren.

Good grief, of course you are not being unreasonable. You have kids yourself, you are presumably busy with them at the weekends. If you can help out ad hoc then great, but don’t sign up for regular child care if you don’t want/can’t do it.

@HerMajestysRoyalCoven hear hear and i love your name 😜

You come across as being quite selfish

Oohh the heinous crime of being 'selfish'. Burn her at the stake for already being a good mum and saying no.

This is such a sad post. You have said you don't work. Both your younger children are at school so you aren't using weekends or holidays to catch up on life admin. It is an insignificant amount of time in your life which could result in a hugely significant positive change in your daughter's and grandchildrens life-why wouldn't you?
I am a nurse and know for a fact that parents of young children get allowances made for placement etc (I was one of them!).
She is trying to better her life and in 10-15 years it will be so much harder to get herself through a course.
I am assuming she would like help with childcare to do bank work as a CSW-this will help make her decision as to whether nursing is for her or not and get an insight into what the training would be like. Even if you are absolutely convinced her being a nurse would not work, why not let her do these shifts and either become more determined or agree with you? These shifts may also be a welcome respite for what I am sure is a really tough life with her additional needs child.
She is your daughter and is trying to make a better life for her and her children-be proud and be her biggest cheerleader. She will not regret or resent you for doing it, but she will regret not trying.

My DD is a nurse. Standard shifts are 12.5 hours, and she's already finding the job close to untenable even with a three year old and a DH (who unfortunately also works shifts). There are no nurseries open past 6pm, and she works until 7:30 (and almost almost always beyond when she simply cannot leave the ward because of a problem or not enough staff).

They're only coping because her DH had a manager who's being very thoughtful and fitting his shifts around nursery time, just for now. But it can't last.

I can't see any way at all that your daughter could work as a nurse (there are no shorter 'early' or 'late' shifts as there used to be when my DD first trained. Three/four 12.5 or 13 hour long days is how hospitals run these days. And another reason why nurses with children are leaving. Child care is pretty much impossible, and that's without factoring in a child with severe special needs.

That apart, two six hour return journeys to facilitate a single day of childcare is total madness.

That's not true-outpatient departments such as orthopaedics, day surgery, community nurses, school nurses, radiology nurses etc are often band 5 jobs and 9-5 mon-fri. (Radiology nurse here who was an ex orthopaedics outpatient nurse newly qualified).

Just embarrassing yourself now

Yabu

Damn,some people on here are very generous with other peoples' time! As an RN I remember how difficult nursing school was as an adult with no children and not to mention working grueling shifts at hospital as a brand new nurse! I had my special needs son two years after graduating and I tag teamed with my husband working evenings and weekends for my entire career but new employee orientation always took months before a nurse could work independently at hospital. Every special needs child is different and I know realistically there's very few people who can care for my son and it sounds like it applies to the OP's grandson

YANBU but being realistic OP.

It is a very sad thing that, no matter how much capability and motivation you have, by being the carer of a disabled dc your career and work situation becomes very limited by your caring responsibilities. Even more limited if you're an SP.

Three jobs are as rare as hens teeth, as you'll know. And day surgery was what my DD was doing until a year ago. Same hours. Patients come into the ward at 7:15am, and were there until late (in fact that was the job that kept her late most, as everyone was supposed to go home, but more often than not there was a single patient left that transport hadn't been arranged for or something.

Trust me, if there was an opening for one of those office hours rules DD would jump on it. But so will just about every other nurse with children, especially the single ones.

It's a relatively big ask but i can't believe you're saying no.

There's something very off about your dismissive attitude to her ambition - she hasn't thought it through, she won't cope, she has a job already caring for her son.

You're not supporting her full stop. You're oddly controlling because you're determined that you know best. I note you don't work - did you ever? Do you think a career should not be a priority for a mum?

I can't believe you won't support her dreams here. She has a deadbeat ex and this could set up a new life for her. She sounds determined, resilient and frankly, great. Be very careful, my mother was / is dismissive of my goals, abilities, drive and achievements. It has negatively affected our relationship. I'm not surprised your daughter doesn't want to moved near you. I don't think you'd give respite, just criticism and busybodying.