to not give up my Saturdays?

[Frey11]

My husband shares a daughter with his ex who does a hobby. She has practice during the week, which DH and ex take her to depending who's night it is and at the weekend she has a game on a Saturday. The time varies but it's typically around mid day and takes at least a couple of hours.

My husband has always worked Saturday days, he has a day off in the week and works Saturday. We have SD 2 nights a week, one in the week and at the weekend it alternates one week Saturday night with DH collecting on his way home from work and the next weekend it's Sunday night.

SDs mum has just changed jobs which requires her to also work Saturdays. This was never mentioned to us until she'd already taken the job and I'm now being asked to have SD every Saturday and take her to said game. This means my whole day revolves around this as it's always in the middle of the day.

I also have two pre school children and work all week myself. This is my time with them to do things we don't get to do in the week, see friends, soft play etc..

AIBU to not want to do this every Saturday?

She can't do it a different time - the Saturdays are fixtures. They don't run at other times.

Still not OP’s problem. Her parents knew they were parents and how that can restrict freedom to work weekends.

How old is SC? And now mum is working Saturdays- who was she expecting to look after her? I would see if she can get a lift with other parents/ get dropped off afterwards at grandparents etc I don't think it's reasonable for you to do this every Saturday, but maybe a compromise can be reached, where you do it once a month etc your own children will soon be starting their own hobbies, swimming lessons etc and so you couldn't commit to SC hobby weekly anyway.

!00% DO NOT DO IT!!

Not even once. She has two parents. It's their job to facilitate this. Surely they can arrange a lift for her? What age is she?

YANBU.

If your husband and his ex wife have both chosen to work Saturdays then their daughter can't do her hobby on Saturdays.

If it's that important to them for her to continue her hobby, then one of them needs to not work Saturdays, or they need to alternate their Saturdays.

Completely irrespective of the hobby, it's really not great for your stepdaughter if her dad works every Saturday during the already limited amount of time they get to spend together. What is the point of her having contact with her dad on a Saturday if he's going to be at work all day and palm her off on you? This is the case whether or not you have to organise your day around driving her to her hobby.

Your husband needs to rearrange his working pattern so he is not working on weekends when he has his daughter, and his ex wife needs to make her own childcare arrangements for the Saturdays when she is working.

This is all very much not your circus, not your monkeys.

My ex has the kids weds and sat

I work weds and sat

Those are his days off

The amount of times I've been told the week before that he's actually having to work those days is unreal. I can't rearrange my working days at short notice, so yes I do think it's fair that if he suddenly has to work different days (he's supposed to work the same days each week) then it's up to him to sort it out. Obviously if I can help I will but the onus is on him

Assuming this is football, you are def not bu. It is cold and miserable, especially dragging siblings along. Such is my life. You could compromise and suggest doing every other or once a month until end of season then she must move to a Sunday league?

This doesn’t happen, SD is collected at 4pm after her dad finishes work. She then presumably spends all of Saturday evening and Sunday with him. It sounds likely that the day SD comes during the week is the day her dad has off from work so he can do school pick-up.

It doesn't really matter, it's still not the OP's problem.

Her stepdaughter's mother shouldn't have taken a new job requiring her to work on Saturdays without sorting out any childcare first.

Informing the OP that she will be doing unpaid childcare on Saturdays is next level cheeky fuckery from the husband and the ex wife.

Is it the SDs mum who has asked you to do it or has she told your DH he needs to, and in turn, he has asked you to?

Either way this is something for the child's two parents to sort, not you. Especially baring in mind you do 100% of the Saturday childcare for yours dhs other 2 kids.

Oh absolutely. It’s not OP’s problem, it’s her SD’s mum’s for booking work without arranging childcare first.

I was commenting as some posters seem to have decided OP’s husband is a deadbeat who doesn’t see his child, when actually he seems to see her on both his days off each week. Often it’s the mother who insists on contact not being a 50/50 contact arrangement, not the father.

I have this grief every week with my son’s football team. Sometimes the game is super early miles away so we all have to get up at 6am or something stupid. Other times it’s close by but around lunchtime so messes up the day.

However we as a family made this commitment . There’s no way in hell I’d be taking it on for another person’s child even if I myself was childless never mind with two young children!

If the mother had the good grace to discuss this before taking the job I may have considered but not now! It’s as if you are supposed to deal with the fall out of her decisions.

Maybe in return she will provide a day's childcare for your kids during the week...?

Is that a flying pig I see?

This!

Mum should not have taken a job that required her to work Saturdays without arranging child care for that day. She knew ex worked Saturdays and that his contact day was Sunday. To just assume that she could change the contact arrangements cos it suddenly suited her and to just assume OP (with two small DC) would be available is daft.

I've been a single mum. I've never taken a job that required a Saturday without figuring out and arranging beforehand what I was doing with the kids.

This is your SD's mum's problem to solve and she needs to reach out to her network to solve it, not her ex-husband's. You can't just take a job that requires different work days without figuring out the impact on your kids and trying to manage that.

Always remind yourself and your husband that when it is your SD's mum's weekend it is on her to ensure that her children are appropriately cared for. That is what co-parenting means.

Other options SD s DM and dp could investigate:
Friend takes
Relative takes
Sports coach takes

Other option is your dh increases maintenance so SDs DM does not work Saturdays

If none of these work it occurs to me that you could end up with looking after her on Saturdays anyway resenting you for the rest of her life as you stopped her sport.

It might not last for very long anyway. It could be she gets bored of going and stops going or one of her parents changed jobs again quite quickly. Or she gets dropped from the team.

You can take books or simple crafts or colouring for little ones in the car if wet or go to a nearby playground or short walk and actually have quality time with them or meet a friend at a nearby cafe

Or mum arranges paid childcare to solve the problem she has created by accepting a job without doing so first.

That's what I'm trying to understand- how have the two parents been working this so far, or have they already been reliant on OP to make it work?

Paid childcare on a Saturday is rare

Of course YANBU. If they were still together and both wanted to work Saturdays they’d have to sort something out, wouldn’t they? Same applies here (although I do think your DH has got off quite easily with the arrangement to date!). I’d be pretty bloody furious at the assumption that you are endlessly available as a Saturday nanny.

I think the ex has actually been quite generous in facilitating the sporting events on a Saturday when it's the father's weekend to have her. That's more generous than she strictly needed to be.

That said, the fact that she's now got a job that clashes doesn't mean it's OPs responsibility to solve.

As PP have said, as parents they'd have had to resolve the childcare issues if they were still together, so it's up to them to resolve it now.

They have every right to ask you if you're able to do it, but you're 100% within your rights to say no. They either need to find someone else that will do it (another parent of a child on the team that's going anyway? Grandparent? Mix of both?), or one of them will need to change their work if they still want their DD to go.

Why on earth should SD’s dad pay her mum extra money so she doesn’t have to work, on top of what’s actually required for SD via CMS?

If OP and her husband were so flush, I’m sure OP wouldn’t be working Mon-Fri with two pre-schoolers and her husband wouldn’t be working Saturdays himself.

Apologies if I was unclear - I didn't mean to imply that at all.

I intended only to point out that one of the suggested solutions was a non-starter

(My earlier posts cover what I think are possible ways forward)

Situation has changed so mum can no longer cover Saturday daytime care for their child. I would say dad has to cover 50% of the Saturday's so I would help dh by doing alternate Saturday's if he can't reorganise shifts or have anyone else to help.

The other 50% are for mum to sort childcare for.

(That said surely if dad back at 4pm and another person takes the child to activity in middle of the day it is only mornings to help with?)