Feeling pushed out of DGC life

[NannyJignea]

Hi all, I have 2 children, my son is 25, he has 3 children a 5 year old and twin 3 year olds. Obviously he was young when he became a dad but he and his partner were always amazing parents.

In January he and his partner broke up, he’s a joiner but works for the council so not making loads and decided on a one bedroom flat. He has children every other Saturday night from 4pm and until 5pm on Sunday.
Now we only see the children for a few hours on a Sunday afternoon every other week. My son likes them to stay at his on the Saturday night.
We have asked their mum if we could have them the Friday before but she said no as they have tennis on a Saturday morning, we have offered to take them to tennis, still no. We have asked if we could even have them for dinner one night a week or fortnight - still no.

Mum works in a school nursery so she has said we can have the children on in service days, but otherwise we arrange it through our son.

I have asked our son to have the children all weekend every other week and they can stay with us on the Friday but he has said no he’s happy as is.

In addition to this, they have agreed the children will always spend Christmas with mum, so we won’t see them until Boxing Day. They also spent birthday with mum but she did invite us to their party on the weekend before and out for dinner on their actual birthday.

Tomorrow is our eldest granddaughters first day of school, we had the children today as it was in service day. When mum picked them up I asked if we could go over and see them off in the morning, she said no she just wanted it to be her the children and my son as otherwise they would be overwhelmed.

We bought our eldest granddaughter her blazer (which is stupidly expensive), lelli kellys and her school bag and coat, and nursery shoes, bag and coats for the twins. We always spoil them when we have them here etc.

Am I being unreasonable to feel it’s not fair how little we are seeing them, and that mum is being quite controlling?

Oh these are lovely ideas I'll be stealing them! I live in a different country to where I'm from and am always sad of how little my mum sees my son!

So he pays for a childminder to cover the wraparound. Honestly, how on earth do you think the rest of us working parents cope? Ridiculous.

The ds does drive. The grandparents do not.

This reminds me of when we had dc1. Mil expected to have him Friday night to Sunday night every weekend when i went back to work (I worked monday to friday full time). DH quickly shot that one down before it was even mentioned to me

It doesn’t sound like there’s much you can do right now to have more time with your GC. Time with their father should rightly take priority. Your son needs to learn to drive as that would help massively, or move closer to the children. Once a fortnight access is not good enough, and he can definitely push for more. I’m afraid you’ll have to take a back seat for now until he’s got more time with his children.

He’s not an ‘amazing parent.’ He sees his children once every two weeks ffs

Kindly, I think you are seeing your grandchildren quite a lot. Is it really in the children's best interests to stay at a third location while they are getting used to being away from their Dad?

I would suggest that the priority should be your son finding ways he can spend more time with them so he can be a more equal parent. He could arrange this by asking for flexible working so he could take them to school every other Monday and having them overnight maybe once during the week (or alternate weeks). You could potentially offer to help him by collecting from school on that day while he takes them to school the next day. He can drive so should be able to join work late. He needs to realise this is important for the children and keeps him in the loop with school etc.. I think the parent's arrangements for Christmas are actually really thoughtful to the children's feelings- and it is especially good that they are amicable enough that they can do presents together.

My PIL tried to blame my BILs ex-wife for not arranging contact with them and it ended up really sadly with the children refusing to see them at all. I don't think it occurred to them (or my BIL) that it was my BIL's responsibility to facilitate this relationship rather than their ex-DILs.

Sounds like your son is totally telling you to back off too in a less than direct way.

He doesn’t want to live in or stay at your 3 bed house with his kids.

You sound demanding and slightly obsessed with these children. They aren’t yours. You’re not the parents. You don’t sound at all helpful. Just only concerned with what you want. But what you want is way way way way down any list of priorities.

Utter madness.

But if he pushed I imagine she would give in, he doesn’t see the point as she likes taking them to tennis and why argue if they’d be staying with us anyway and not him.

This says it all. Even you admit that your son could have his kids Friday to Saturday but "doesn't see the point". And he's not going to bother facilitating them spending that time with you either.

But still you blame the mother.

As kindly as possible OP, you probably need to back off a bit, while making sure everyone involved knows you're available when needed.

Don't burn bridges. Try and keep as good a relationship as possible with the kids Mum (and your son). As inevitably they will need support. Just wait.

I understand its frustrating, and you miss them. But its not about you, and you'll only drive them further away.

Not read the full thread but are you close enough to collect/drop off the children for your son to have a night mid-week? Even if everyone stays at yours to limit travel for the children.
DD's dad sees her 1, perhaps 2 days every 2 weeks. I'm mindful of the impact on her GPs but when I've asked if they want to see her over the holidays they haven't yet.

ETA: I see your son wants his children at his place. Can you pick them up from school/nursery to facilitate that? Ultimately, everyone needs to work in the best interests of the children. Not stamping their feet over who sees them more.

I agree.

Does that not tell you something - that you might be a bit overbearing?

I feel for you but - This is all on your son, he could have them more and drive them 25 mins to school or tennis, don’t blame the mother who has invited you and included you in parties that she didn’t have to. It’s nice that your son agreed to allow children to wake up in their usual home on Xmas day to be honest, but again that’s on him (not mum). If you stay on very good terms it’s likely mum would let you drop presents around but honestly you can have another Xmas celebration with them - it’s a whole holiday season. It’s really un reasonable to try to go to their first day of school (whether separated or not) as mum has said it would be overwhelming .
But here is an idea - dad needs to offer to take them on Friday nights at your house, you could drop them at tennis and mum could go to tennis with them (this way she gets a Friday night out but doesn’t miss out on enjoying tennis lessons with her kids), and then you could pick them up from tennis and then drive them to dads? It’s likely as kids get bigger that if dad offers he will have more /half of the schooL Holidays time. Mum might not offer this if she’s off with the kids anyway, but court would usually grant this, so you might see them more then.

you could also offer to mum if she has any last minute appointments or offers of evenings out you’d be happy to watch them for an hour or so whenever she likes at hers - be helpful to her to build up a good trusting relationship first and then build on that. If you want something regular you could suggest Friday pick up from school and cafe trip once a month on dads weekends, for example.

ps don’t blame the maintenance - you’ve just said that your son doesn’t earn much, it’ll only be a few pounds a day that her kids get from him it will barely cover their food and consumables, she would save money if he had them more and provided for them on his days, don’t promote such tropes.

Yeah - “he doesn’t see the point” 🙄

Wow. These are his children! Yet he apparently can’t see the point of asking for more time with them? I presume he also can’t see the point of requesting flexible hours at work either.

He sounds like a complete deadbeat dad.

Also, you haven’t answered about the first school day. Why do you need to be there in person to ‘wave them off’? It’s all a bit much, most grandparents just get a photo of the kid in their school uniform, while the actual parents of the child get that special moment. It would overwhelm the child and not what the parents need on that first day of school. It’s not about you and your needs here.

Ps councils are great at offering flexible working, I’m sure he could do a later start time once a week or fortnight and make up those hours elsewhere in the week

I'd say you are being pretty unreasonable. Seeing them for a few hours every fortnight is actually quite a lot compared to what most people see their grandchildren. I certainly never saw my grandchildren that much growing up, and my kids don't see any of their grandparents that often. They still have a close bond and love them (as I do/did with my grandparents). We always saw them a bit more in the school holidays, maybe staying over theirs a few days here and there.

But it sounds like you're looking for some sort of weekly commitment, which is a bit much, unnecessary, and would be pretty annoying for both the parents, who will want to be able to make their own plans without constantly having to plan around a commitment they've made to you.

Going round in the morning before first day of school is a bit much. And expecting to see the kids on Christmas Day and being disappointed with Boxing Day is also a bit much. Most people use Boxing Day to go and visit the family they weren't able to see on Christmas Day. It's hard enough working out what to do on Christmas Day when parents are divorced, without the grandparents assuming they have a claim to the children's time on the 25th too.

Please think about this. You are being so overbearing. They are NOT your children. Please leave them alone as I absolutely guarantee you have caused problems in their relationship being this overbearing. The first day of school is for them. Sleeping is for their beds at their home with their mum / dad. Christmas is for them. Kids don’t want to be pulled here there and everywhere. They want to be at home. If their mum wants to be with her children then that is the best thing in the world - so without knowing her she seems like she is doing her best and loves them and wants to be with them. You’ve done all that with your two children. You have no entitlement here. If you love children you could work with them, volunteer, foster. Children are lovely, they don’t have to be your grandchildren.

You have children, focus on them.
let them be parents. Don’t cause stress in an already stressful situation.

I'm also wondering about how many times he got up on Saturday mornings and went along to tennis whilst they were still a couple.

You see so many mums being expected to give up precious time that the dads weren't arsed about when they were in a relationship with mum.

I could be wrong but if I'm not I kind of don't blame her for gatekeeping it now...

Mum works in a school nursery so she has said we can have the children on in service days

I'm not sure what having the children "on in service days" means, in terms of you seeing them.

Anyway, this is really the fault of your son for not wanting them more. He literally has 24 hours with them every other week. That's hardly anything.

It's a pity your DIL won't let you have them for dinner in the off-week. That's mean. Sorry, OP.

It sounds like neither your son nor his ex want you to be more involved with the children than you are at the moment. If the break up happened quickly, they are probably both still navigating single life and co-parenting as best they can. If I were you, I would try and avoid apportioning blame (for example, blaming his ex for wanting him to pay maintenance, thinking she's being controlling) I would imagine she, like most mothers, has her children's best interests at the forefront of her mind. She is still allowing you to be involved in their life, just not as much as you want to be. I'm afraid in this situation, your wants take a back seat to the parents and little children who are all having to get used to a new normal. Make the most of your time with your grandchildren and do your best to maintain a good relationship with their mother if you want to continue to spend time with them. As they get older, if you've built a good supportive relationship, hopefully they will want you there for high days and holidays.

@NannyJignea well that’s not strictly true going by your previous post where you suggested he had them for the full weekend and he said no.

it must be very difficult… but you have to accept that your son having custody for 24 hours in a two week period is a pretty poor effort and therefore utterly unsurprising that you don’t see your grandchildren much.

She means inset days eg kids not at school on a weekday but mum still has work