Grandparents pleasing themselves

[WanderingScotty]

My MIL and FIL look after DS once a week and occasionally at the weekend and have done since he was 1 (now 4.5). (They used to look after him twice a week but we already reduced this because of this issue).

MIL and FIL are fantastic with DS in many ways - he loves spending time with them and they love having him. He’s very lucky to have them.

We have always had some “ground rules” for when they look after him - e.g watch sugar intake, limit screen time etc. It’s not strict, essentially everything in moderation and we just ask them to keep us informed so we can adapt as needed.

MIL and FIL would admit themselves they are not the healthiest of eaters and have no desire to change this. This has caused confusion in the past where they’ve given DS something they think is healthy but we wouldn’t think is (e.g ultra processed, low calorie). FIL also doesn’t take well to being told what to do and can sometimes be a bully (which I admit gets my back up and makes it hard for me to back down). MIL is very unconfrontational and will go along with anything even if she disagrees to avoid an argument (but will make subtle comments so we know if she doesn’t agree).

FIL wants free rein to do what he wishes with DS when they look after him. He wants to spoil DS as that’s “his right as a grandparent”. Mainly this is give him sweets, chocolate, ice cream etc, buy him any toy DS wants etc. Whilst we understand this to a degree FIL looks after DS too often to spoil him as much as he wants to. My mum also looks after DS and it’s not fair on her if she follows what we ask when she too would like to spoil him more. More importantly, this isn’t fair on DS as he gets confused or upset when there isn’t a consistent approach and takes sugar crashes after eating too much sugar.

DS is getting older and is able to understand and verbalise more. This afternoon, he came home and told us he had 3 chocolate treats which they hadn’t told us about. We asked them and they denied this. DS insisted he was telling the truth so we questioned them more.

FIL got defensive asking if we’d been quizzing DS after they’d left - we did but only after DS initially told us. This has led to a heated discussion tonight as FIL says he should be able to do what he wants, he’s raised 2 boys who turned out fine, DS is only with them one day, we’re imagining the sugar crashes etc. He also thinks we should trust them and not question them (despite saying he doesn’t want to go along with what we’re asking).

We have outlined the reasons we’re asking them to follow our rules. Ultimately he’s our son but we have them there because it’s what we think is best for him. MIL is agreeable but FIL is grudgingly backing down. It’ll likely raise its head again in a few months as this seems to be the way it goes.

AIBU for expecting them to follow our wishes or am I getting too bothered about it?

Oh, did that come out later?
My sincerest apologies for not scrutinising the subsequent posts hard enough.

In that case,

Fire them and find someone else that meets sugar standards.

I agree OP, that it shouldn’t make a difference whether you pay them or not. But the number of people here accusing you of being ungrateful for free childcare and telling you you should just pay for a nursery instead is infuriating. Nobody’s asking anyone to read an entire thread but if you’re going to weigh in on something that’s as long as this one, then at least read the OP’s posts. There a handy button for it and everything.

I love my DGC and they appear to love me

But my 'treating' them is the occasional ice cream and taking them out

Not stuffing them full of chocolate

Oh, did that come out later?
My sincerest apologies for not scrutinising the subsequent posts hard enough.

You'd really just need to filter for and read them, it's not difficult and no major scrutiny is required.

I’m not a grandparent but I am a mother and in my opinion it’s a grandparents prerogative to spoil their grandchildren.
My dad used to have my kids for days on end and when I asked them what they’d eaten it’d be fish fingers, crisps and chocolate.
Thats ok but back to vegetables and healthy food when back home.
Leave them to it.
As long as your child is safe, cared for and loved that’s what should matter

I'd be upset as a mother. This is your child and you know the dietary issues for kids these days, not to mention gum and teeth health. So, what should parents do then? Should we Now let teachers feed our kids whatever they choose to give them too? How about strangers while we are at it? For those saying these are GPs and theyre not poisoning the kid, well, I disagree. Feeding children ultra-processed, high sugar foods is a poison.

As a mother, you need to set boundaries, and if they are crossed, your child cannot visit. You have to trust the people you leave your child with, and while they love him and all the rest, this is something you as a parent have to be strict about. Someone has to for the child's sake! No one loves that child more than you. And no one will ensure the health of that child more than you.

I don't know why but it was much easier to ration treats as a parent than it is as a grandparent. Perhaps because, if we spoil them, we don't have to live with the consequences?

I wouldn't be happy with this situation, but, if you're in the UK (and not planning to have more children where this would be an ongoing problem), then your child is going to be in full-time school soon. Given that, I would have some more firm conversations, as several of the pp have outlined above, about boundaries from now on, but I also wouldn't be looking to move childcare provision to a full-time nursery place for just a few months. I would put up with it, knowing that from September your child won't be regularly in their care anymore.

Oh my what some other people would do to have grandparents spoiling their DC. You are in such a truly fortunate blessed place as is your DC so just go with the flow. I would be livid if I was looking after a child and I was being questioned. It is undermining them.
let your DC go to his grandparents and be spoilt that is was life is about. They are only young once and what goes on at grandparents house should stay at grandparents house.
relish in the fact you DC is being looked after. Some of us would love to be in that situation

The best thing for your son is to be safe, loved and happy. It really doesn’t matter if he has one day a week where he has extra treats. Grandparents come with different rules and different privileges.

Nobody’s asking anyone to read an entire thread but if you’re going to weigh in on something that’s as long as this one, then at least read the OP’s posts. There a handy button for it and everything.

Absolutely. I don’t know why people even bother posting for advice on AIBU with the amount of posters who can only be bothered to read the first post and the amount of massive projection.

I wouldn’t want to deal with these types of grandparents and be quite happy paying a nursery vs them with their type of thought process.

How do I filter

@Verv if you look at the OPs first post you'll see at the bottom a bit that says:
OPs posts: see all. Then you could read of all them without scrolling through every post on the thread.

Apologies for being a bit snarky previously.

Depends what the chocolate treats are and if they will spoil his appetite for meals. 3 freddos isn't going to but 3 full size chocolate bars obviously will.

You’re too controlling and being a bit ridiculous.
If you want to control everything you need to pay for a nanny.

For them to spoil him once a week and your getting like this is ridiculous. It’s a bit petty tbh. Life’s to short to worry if your kid had 1 or 2 chocolate bars one day if the week

If you don’t like what they’re doing you could always pay for childcare.

As I’ve mentioned, I do pay them for this (not as much as we pay his nursery for the other days) but I’m not really sure why that makes a difference to them following our requests. If I was asking them not to let him smoke would it be ok if they were looking after him for free?

There is a difference between informal time with grandparents and asking them to commit to childcare and organise their lives around that one day a week, regardless of whether you pay them.

The question is not whether you want him to spend time with them (You can organise that so you are all present as a family, or for shorter visits), but whether, on balance, you trust them to provide childcare.

Really only you can make that choice.

It’s February. I wouldn’t call almost seven months a short time and OP would be replacing the GPs one a week with nursery so not really full time either. Is the 15 hours not done anymore? Both of our sons were in nursery 2-3 days a week using the 15 hours and we would pay the difference. I think the summer was more expensive since the 15 hours didn’t count out of term time, but I can’t recall fully.

Sorry just read OP’s most recent post. Ignore me. 🙂

Ah! Found it. I'd not noticed that before.
Ive only been here a year or so 😂
No worries re snark, fair trade for pointing the feature out.

I think GPs will often spoil grandchildren because they feel freed from the constraints being a parent. I also think that in your capacity as parent it’s your job to do exactly what you’re trying to do - toe a tricky line between letting the GPs indulge their DGC, and reining in the more extreme tendencies of some GPs!
Maybe you can let PIL and your own mum spoil your dc in some areas (toys, days out etc) and you can rave positively about how much dc loves his new stuff/experiences to offset being gently firm about diet.

I don’t think your PIL are branding your dc “a liar”, or encouraging lies, are they? That’s quite extreme. He’s not even 5 years old - these are years full of fantasy and tale-telling. Last week alone my 4 yo son told me he had no lunch at school due to flooding in the hall; that Phoebe had punched him in the face; and that he had to do maths all day and wasn’t allowed to go outside at all, and that there was a witch in his bedroom. All of this was untrue. I don’t really listen too much - so if I heard he had three pieces of cake at his granny’s I really would just smile and say “wow! Three is a lot. Did you feel sick after?” And let it go. It’s not lying - it’s their imaginations firing off and their enjoyment in spinning a tale.

Oh my God, OP PAYS THEM. It's not free childcare.

The best thing for your son is not to be around people who lie to his parents, regardless of who they are.

You can’t trust them. You shouldn’t send him there unsupervised.

Op said it is often sweets/treats throughout the day and often no proper lunch. This is the exact issue I had with my parents when my kids were small. It wasn’t just a few small treats, it was my child not eating anything proper the whole time they were with them, and being told “oh he didn’t want his sandwich or eggs”- well not because you let him eat a doughnut and an ice cream and a coke instead.

I think people are not grasping the difference between a grandparent that spoils their grandchild with a cake or a chocolate bar but then also provide them ACTUAL food…and a grandparent that allows their grandchild to eat whatever they want with no constraint.

FIL wants free rein to do what he wishes with DS when they look after him. He wants to spoil DS as that’s “his right as a grandparent”. Mainly this is give him sweets, chocolate, ice cream etc, buy him any toy DS wants etc. Whilst we understand this to a degree FIL looks after DS too often to spoil him as much as he wants to.

he dosent sound very sensible to be honest. Just because your a grandparent dosent mean you can do what you want? He wont be helping you either buy buying him a toy everytime he wants one. Hes making a rod for your back.