to think grandparents do not have to treat their step grandchildren exactly the same way as their blood grandchildren?

[betnet]

Firstly, I am not advocating for step children to be treated badly in anyway.

But I think it is fine if grandparents do not give gifts or gifts to the same value to the stepchildren as to their grandchildren. If there was a divorce the stepchildren would generally not be seen anymore anyway.

People generally would not expect grandparents to give their non related stepchildren an inheritance. Those who advocate for stepchildren to be treated exactly equally, do you think they should inherit from non related grandparents?

I am talking about stepchildren in this instance where ones DD or DS has married a partner who has children from an ex partner.

Same for family holidays. Often grandparents will pay for a family holiday and want their grandchildren to join them. They should not have to pay for the step grandchildren also.

Stepchildren can end up with four sets of grandparents.

I am not fixated. A lot of people who keep saying SC should be treated the same then do not apply that when it comes to SC being included in the will. If people really feel they should be treated equally then why do so many SC not inherit but the GC do?

SIL couldn't afford private school for his four kids. Neither could the mother of the kids. DD could initially but then ran into some financial issues where I stepped in.

Hang on, so the 4 SGC were in private education? If not, what does that mean that she could afford to pay that for them initially but then couldn't?

Of course there is a big difference between the grandparents as the father’s parents have six biological grandchildren, OP only has the younger two biological GC.

I took this as meaning OP’s daughter was paying for her own two children.

That isn't what it says though, it specifically says for his 4 children:

SIL couldn't afford private school for his four kids. Neither could the mother of the kids. DD could initially but then ran into some financial issues

Indeed. But you haven’t answered the question.

Not giving them a free holiday isn’t ’cruelty’. Smacking them and saying ‘you’re not welcome in this family’ would be cruelty however.

YANBU - if stepmums are repeatedly told on here that their step kids are not their emotional or financial problem, why is is different for step grandparents?

If people really feel they should be treated equally then why do so many SC not inherit but the GC do?

I think I understand, you mentioned it in your OP that's all, before you had any responses. Were you already aware of a double standard and wanted people to give their reasoning behind why it could happen do you mean?

Surely the cases of SC not 'inheriting' are cases like yours, where they aren't ever treated quite the same anyway (which is valid), rather than cases where they are treated the same in all other ways but then are not included in inheritance? Maybe that isn't really a thing, as I think Grandparents that truly treat SGC as their own would also allow for them in any inheritance surely?

Surely some of the people advocating for SC to be treated the same are people that have grown up with step parents and felt unwanted, rather than people in your position of actually having SGC or SC?

Oh for lords sake. RTFT.
The op is grandmother to two children. Her daughter married a man with four children. The couple decided to put the two youngest into private school. The first families children are in state. The daughter was paying the fees. She lost a job and her mother stepped in to cover the cost.
The husband has now asked if his mil will pay for his four other children too.
The grandmother does not have the funds for six children. The husband asked this behind his wife's back. His ex wife doesn't have the money for this but that side of the family have some wealthy relatives. However the sil decided to hit on his new mother in law. She must be embarrassed and questioning if she is being mean. It is so difficult to blend families but a man with four children prior to a new marriage is always going to be a nightmare unless his name is Rothchild! Why the daughter married him is anyone's guess. He's a chancer.
The daughter has the right to spend her wages on her children and is probably already paying half of a 8 person household albeit part time. What she hasn't thought about is the impact on these children. If they are near in age it will be noticed.
If they are teenagers I'd look at tutoring for the others but in my opinion not a cost that should be on the grandmother.
I'd be saying look DC 1-4 we are going to put in some kumon or suchlike.
I think the ops daughter may have come from a more privslaged background and that's another complication. She wants what she had and so does the grabby husband. He's got the green eyed monster but that's not the ops fault.
As for the inheritance, the op can leave it to the donkies. It's her choice legally. Intestate estates are where it gets messy between siblings and half siblings.

I am both a step grandparent and a step child so can see things from both sides. I never saw my stepfather as anything other than my DMs husband - I first met him when I was around 10, and ended up being the one person who sat with him 50 years later as he passed away. I never expected him to treat me the same as my father did. That doesn’t mean I wasn’t fond of him though.
I met my step grandchild when she was 10, before my children had their own children. I don’t treat them identically, but that doesn’t mean I treat her badly. She uses my first name, sees me more as an aunt figure and we have a laugh. Do I worry about her if she’s ill? Not really. Am I anxious about how her life will pan out? Not really. That doesn’t mean I don’t care about her. We spend time alone together, I spend similar amounts on her for birthdays and Christmas as I do my grandchildren. I believe more people in my situation think the same way.

The 4 SGC were in state schools. DD and SIL got married and had 2 children who went to private school. DD paid for their education. She ran into financial issues and I stepped in as not to disrupt the GC education.

Do I have to? Is that the rule here? Do you own MN?

I honestly hope not all do.

My stepdad raised us as his own, and to my sister’s kids is referred to as Grandad, not just his name. We don’t call him dad, because at the time we still had a relationship with my biological father. But my stepdad walked me down the aisle, was there when my sisters kids came home from hospital, and is the one we call on in an emergency etc.

I’m a stepmum now, and raise my stepson like my own. His mum is supportive of this, it wouldn’t be happening if she wasn’t, and refers to me as his “other Mama,” and that we’re a team around him.

My mum treats him the same for Christmas, birthdays, she gets him random stuff throughout the year, checks on his wellbeing. She doesn’t babysit, and he doesn’t call her by any name, because he’s SENd and neither of those are possible. But I’d be devastated if she held him or our household dynamic in less regard, because I think it would go against everything we were brought up to believe about my stepdad, who has never been just her husband.

This is such a weird way of looking at it OP. Of course you shouldn’t be expected to suddenly start funding your 4 SGC’s education when they have never been privately educated anyway. Your son in law is taking the piss.

If you had written out the situation as it is from the start (my daughter has fallen on hard times, I’ve stepped in to pay my DGC’s school fees, and now their father wants me to pay for his other DC and I don’t want to, AIBU?) I think the vast majority would have been on your side. Instead you made it some weird theoretical thing about whether step GC should be treated equally to biological GC, which in day to day life, id hope they would be! I’m forever grateful my step family were lovely to me, but would never have expected them to pay private school fees!

@betnet I'd go and make tea and leave the Friday nighters to it.
Lots of wine and trolls after 8pm!

Im sorry for this mess you're in. I'm to come into some money later this year and my family will be out in force. I'm not too well so I I'm happy to say bog off! 😄

OP, kindly, I couldn't go beyond page 12, because you keep repeating the same questions. I am not sure what on earth you want from this post - and I won't read further.

But I do not believe YABU. Your dd decided to marry a man with 4 (4!!!!!!) kids.
Her choices are her own and absolutely nothing to do with you in how they are schooled, what they eat, wear... etc. They are simply an addition of your daughter's choice of husband.

You absolutely do not owe them any form of inheritance and it is laughable you should think or feel guilty because your loser son in law can't provide for his own kids that you are in any way responsible for their schooling.

Please know that you seem most kind and generous. It ends with your own GC. Your daughter's marital consequences are on her and her husband.

My ex had a step dad who absolutely adored my children. They always saw him as grandad.

If one of mine married a partner who already had children they would by default become part of my family and I’d treat them the same.

You seem to be obsessed with the inheritance side of things but I think that’s a different issue. There’s no way I would allow my mother to invite me & my children on holiday and not my stepchildren/partner! Or give some children obviously cheaper/less thoughtful gifts if all the kids are spending Christmas together & are opening them together. I guess some people are more open to blended families than others though.

Well, nevermind GP's treating stepkids unequally, even the stepmum doesn't as she was only paying for school for her kids.

What?
People adopt dogs and stray cats and start loving them after a month.
But it is unreasonable to love a child you spend years building relationship because you are not blood related?

I love my husband ffs.
This is not Alabama.

Absolutely.

Steps do not live with other kids full time. They don’t all live in same house during school week.

They other kids live with their mum during school week.

I’m torn. When Ds left her husband and got with another man, my parents treated his child like a grandchild. He was one of us, as a family we embraced dsis partner and his son as one of us. That relationship lasted four years.

it fucking hurt to lose that nephew. And my parents to lose the grandchild. Dad had committed to teaching that boy to play chess. I knew his favourite cakes and baked them for family gatherings. Dmum helped him with homework and cared about his educational outcomes. His father didn’t see any benefit in keeping us in the loop when he and dsis broke up. Which i understand.

the second family sister took on, we practice a more restrained approach. I’m nice to, and like the children. But they aren’t my relatives. I’m kind and respectful, but that’s all. 50% of marriages end in divorce. That’s marriage. Relationships is probably a higher number. Children’s feeling matter. But so do everyone else’s.

It’s not unreasonable to love a child you’ve known for years, no. I don’t believe I said it was. It’s also not unreasonable not to. Regardless, loved or not, it is not OP’s responsibility to either consider or treat them as her grandchildren. They aren’t.

You may not place importance on blood relationships and that’s fine, no one said you had to. That doesn’t mean that others don’t and/or shouldn’t.

I personally think it's completely fair. The parents made the choice to send only two to private schools. In an ideal world, you could be a millionaire and extend the offer to the other children but we all have to make decisions based on our financial situation at that time. The other children will also have their own grandparents. In day to day life, when you're all together, they should all be treated the same.