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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To think life would be much easier if my family could help?

149 replies

wishihadfamilytohelp · 05/12/2024 13:02

I know I probably am BU, as I’m sure it is not all roses but …

I have friends with similarly aged children who have parents who have the children overnight: they get to sleep through and get a lie in the next day.

They will take a child or even both if parents are under the weather or very busy.

They will have them even for a weekend or longer

i don’t think I would take the piss or anything … but it would make the world of difference I feel and I am very wistful! My parents have died so obviously can’t help! Or AIBU?

OP posts:
Caterina99 · 05/12/2024 13:46

Yes it makes a huge difference. I live near my family now and it’s amazing, but until my eldest was 6 we lived abroad and had no one.

I agree with another poster that if you can find friends in the same boat then you can help each other. Often those with helpful family nearby just don’t get it. DH and I were a great team but he worked full time and was away quite often so it was basically just me.

Igavebirthtoabanana · 05/12/2024 13:47

We had no family help at all, it was really tough at times. I wouldn’t have asked for much, it would have been nice to have a child free night once every six months maybe. What a luxury. Or someone to take DC to cinema on Sunday afternoon. Having to be everything and everyone to your DC was really hard and exhausting.

Silver lining was my other local mum friends. Some of them foreign like me and/or DH working away a lot. Having my mum friends helped a lot. Without them I would have certainly felt a lot more isolated.

DC are in their teens now, DH and I suddenly have a lot more freedom.

Seaitoverthere · 05/12/2024 13:50

I think it makes a big difference. I am still a bit scarred after small DC and sick parents even though my DC are adults now and not sad that my DC don't want children .

Fluufer · 05/12/2024 13:51

YANBU. Even an hour or two a month would make such a difference.
We've built up a community (mostly from DHs home country) in the same boat, and we try to do that for each other. But it's not quite the same.

Strawberrycheesecake7 · 05/12/2024 13:55

wishihadfamilytohelp · 05/12/2024 13:37

@Strawberrycheesecake7 the title is re no family to help … it isn’t set up as a competition at all Flowers family who won’t help is as hard as family who can’t. Either way is no family help!

Not trying to turn anything into a competition. I was just pointing out that not all family that can help do.

romdowa · 05/12/2024 13:58

Its really difficult with no help. We've 4 grandparents and none interested. Dhs are a decade younger than mine and would visit for a week , spend a few hours at our house and then take themselves off and do whatever they fancied. Not once did they offer to mind their gc so we could have a break. They had plenty help when dh was young. In the end he's asked them to stop coming to visit as it's actually more work for us. My dp live bear by but have no interest at all

Colinswheels · 05/12/2024 13:59

YANBU, I have family nearby who do help and I don't know what I would do without them honestly. However, as much as I am very grateful for what they do they mostly fall into the helping when asked category.

I remember feeling like crying when I went to a baby swimming class with a friend and our two newborns and friend turned up with her Mum to help her with the baby so she could just get herself organised. I have never had that level of support.

Also another friend whose parents have her kids constantly for sleepovers, long weekends etc. It must be amazing to have that much free time.

noclouds · 05/12/2024 14:04

@wishihadfamilytohelp
I actually said in the rare instances we needed help, eg when I had a job interview and my DH was not around or a hospital appointment with one child.

I think catching up with sleep is just being a parent and you can do that with your partners help

Curlygirl06 · 05/12/2024 14:05

I feel very sorry for parents who have grandparents near but don't help, it's really awful. I hope that when those grandparents need help later in life they reflect on their choices.
I've done school runs, nursery runs, holiday care, overnights, baby sitting, long term daily care, even for parents that aren't family in emergencies, you name it I've done it. I'm lucky as I only work part time so I can do it but that's not the point. We have a fantastic relationship with the grandchildren, they'll have lovely memories to look back on.

GraySweatpants · 05/12/2024 14:08

Not unreasonable at all!

My parents live in my home country so can’t help. I do sometimes feel jealous of my SIL and her husband. My PILs have their DD after preschool 2 afternoons per week, plus a midweek overnight stay and occasionally some weekends overnights if SIL and BIL have a wedding to attend or meeting their friends out of town. And they all normally spend at least one day of the weekend together anyway.

I often joke with DH that our niece sees her GPs more than her own parents haha. Wish we could have some help like that but I do find it a little but suffocating how close PILs and SIL are.

Original poster
wishihadfamilytohelp · 05/12/2024 14:08

noclouds · 05/12/2024 14:04

@wishihadfamilytohelp
I actually said in the rare instances we needed help, eg when I had a job interview and my DH was not around or a hospital appointment with one child.

I think catching up with sleep is just being a parent and you can do that with your partners help

Yes, you can, of course you can.

But I’m talking about help. How lovely it is to have it. And it’s hard if you don’t.

OP posts:
doodleschnoodle · 05/12/2024 14:09

YANBU. We have no family help (dead parents bar one uninvolved one 4 hours away). We do have some lovely friends who will help when we need but they obviously have their own lives and families so outside of genuine emergencies we cover everything ourselves and often have to divide and conquer to cover events, with one parent going to parents evening or a show or whatever while the other watches the kids,

MrRobinsonsQuango · 05/12/2024 14:10

BadPeopleFan · 05/12/2024 13:11

Yanbu, my parents lived 20 minutes away and had retired. They refused point blank to look after my children even for a minute.
The odd thing was my grandmother doted on us and had us all the time so my parents should have realised it would have been nice to help!
I am NC with my parents now (not because of this) but it all adds to the bigger picture, they didn't really care about me and by extension they didn't care about their grandchildren.

Sounds like my parents. Got a world of support from my mums mum. I get zero support, haven’t even ever changed a nappy

teatoast8 · 05/12/2024 14:12

Yanbu x

coxesorangepippin · 05/12/2024 14:13

Yanbu

Kool4katz · 05/12/2024 14:14

Obviously YANBU but you just have to cope.

Our parents are deceased too and it was hard in the early years particularly as our school holidays are very long here (10 weeks in the summer for primary aged children). I did used to feel envious of those families who palmed their kids off with grandparents during the daytime as I had to give up work so I could be at home as the few summer camps that are available only run for about 3-4 hours a day max.

In the early years one of my mum friends was a life saver when she collected toddler DS and looked after him with her toddler son for the whole day when I had a migraine and was vomiting everywhere. She brought him home when DH returned from work. I’ll never forget her kindness. 🥰

When DH was having chemo, it was quite tricky as I couldn’t take the 3yr old into hospital so had to drop DH off outside and collect him from the car park later in the evening. Luckily, DH was able to walk enough to get to the car.

Probably the worst was when DH and I both caught flu one Christmas. I lay on the sofa in the living room with the TV on a kids channel and 2yr old DS pottering around the living room. I made him beans on toast for his Christmas dinner that year as that’s all I could cope with. DH had the bed to himself for a fortnight. That was also the first time I tried ordering a supermarket shop online as we had no fresh food in. It was delivered on the 28th and I’d started to feel a bit better by then.

ICarriedTheWatermelon · 05/12/2024 14:18

Mine are the same. They won’t even come out with for a day trip with us and the kids.

MIL loves to tell me how tired I look, whilst turning the other way and pretending not to hear when the kids ask for sleepovers 🙄

It is so disappointing and hurtful. You are not being unreasonable.

Tired887 · 05/12/2024 14:18

noclouds · 05/12/2024 13:41

I understand where you are coming from, however my parents had no help from family due to living quite far away, and managed, by making sacrifices.

I have 3 children and whilst our parents are near by for various reasons they have not been in a position to support, and have not helped with childcare. However we have made lifestyle/ career changes to give us the balance we needed. I am actually glad we have not had have childcare support, and infant the rare instances where we have needed it, we have asked friends for support

@noclouds for me it's not about regular childcare. It's about someone popping by to help for an hour here and there. To take baby for a walk, or make a cup of tea, small things that a mum or an auntie would do.

SundayDread · 05/12/2024 14:20

I see a huge difference with people who have support. I know a few people who have masses of support. They’ve been able to have careers where they can work all hours as they know the kids are cared for.
I have a friend who is a lone parent, one of her children is disabled. Her parents have the children constantly. She goes away at least once a month without them. I don’t begrudge her it but she doesn’t understand others don’t have the freedom she has.

DH wanted to move back to his hometown at one point as he thought we would get loads of support. We wouldn’t have though, his aunts do look after their own grandchildren but I doubt they would want to look after our DC.

thehousewiththesagegreensofa · 05/12/2024 14:24

Totally! Our neighbours had their DC1 6 weeks after we had ours. My parents were 5hrs away and worked full time; in-laws were 4hrs away, FIL worked full time & they had a number of pets. Our neighbours had her parents 20 mins away, his parents 30 mins away and various siblings, aunts etc varying from 5 mins away to 45 mins away. They all seemed to like each other which is important! There was always someone there, perhaps often with a child of their own but it was company, someone different to try settling the baby when they'd been screaming for 20 mins and, if someone without a baby, there to help fold the laundry or take the baby for a walk whilst you had a nap. And that was before any overnight or full day care! Once the babies were past about 6 months, my neighbour's mother would occasionally offer to take my DD as well as her granddaughter for a walk as she had a double buggy. OMG!! It was bliss.
When my mum did come to stay, it was amazing. A good friend of hers has just become a grandparent for the first time and lives 10 mins from her daughter and granddaughter. My mum keeps saying how ridiculous it is that they all see each other most days and I just think how amazing that must be. My DC are only teens but I do hope that they're local when they have DC of their own just so I can offer that support.

Alina3 · 05/12/2024 14:26

Yes and no...

We are the same, we have no 'help' from family in any way. Nobody has ever watched our child etc. other than paid nursery staff.

However, I've seen with friends who have a lot of family support it often comes with strings! That old saying, if you're not paying for it with cash you're paying for it another way. When you are asking someone to take on a caring role for your child it can be quite difficult to navigate things like boundaries, being given unwanted advice, being undermined etc. an in-law of mine lives with in-laws and it sounds good on paper having an extra few adults around, but in reality, I would literally last a day. Everyone gets to have a say on how they do things, they undermine decisions (like no more sweets today, she goes upstairs, comes back down and grandparents have given them a bowl of haribo cos they like seeing the children happy), generational differences and wanting to do things we now know are unsafe, or thinking they know best, adding in the power dynamics of 'elders must be respected' and it is a recipe for disaster.

There's also something really amazing about the fact that you have raised your child, just you (and your partner obviously), nobody has bailed you out, you've stood on your own two feet and raised a human being, with all of the sacrifices and challenges that come with that. I feel similarly about having bought a house without financial help from family. Yes, some friends had it easier due to a financial gift or being allowed to live rent free to save up, but when we got our keys knowing we'd done it all ourselves, it was truly special. Knowing we worked for every bit of it.

The hardest part of no 'help' imo is when you're sick and have nobody to come swoop in and take them so you can rest and recover, that absolutely sucks, truly. I find it quite scary at times when you're genuinely so unwell. But on the whole I much prefer this independence to the alternative.

Bornnotbourne · 05/12/2024 14:28

@SundayDread i agree with you about people being understanding. I’ve had two recent conversations (one with my own mum) where I’ve had to explain that I can’t apply for shift work as I’d have no one to look after my children who are 6 and 11!!
I think people with family support just cannot comprehend those who don’t have it. My mum only shows up to criticise me.

NerrSnerr · 05/12/2024 14:28

It's not easy at all. My children and 10 and 7 and we've had no support from family at all. What is frustrating is the people who assume that you have childcare, always from your mum- you see people ask on threads on here all the time 'can your mum come and help?'.

MsAnnFrope · 05/12/2024 14:30

Tired887 · 05/12/2024 13:20

Yanbu. I have a 3 month old and need to come to terms with not having another baby ever again as being on my own all day with zero help is killing me. I would give anything for my mum to pop by once in a while for a cup of tea and hold the baby so I can nap or something. As it is, life is utter and complete misery.

This genuinely made me wish I lived near you and could help. I remember how lonesome and exhausting those early days could be and I had support nearby.

Trambopoline · 05/12/2024 14:30

YANBU. I have a 2 year old & a 7 month old, both my parents are dead, one living PIL lives hundreds of miles away. This is the family we planned knowing our circumstances but it does get hard to listen to friends moan about ‘not getting a break’ when their parents have the kids every other weekend so they can spend time together as a couple and catch up on jobs.