to resent pressure on grandmothers to provide childcare?

[ReluctantGM]

I feel like there’s a real pressure placed on grandmothers that just isn’t there for grandfathers.

I work and I want to keep working. Partly because I need the income, but also because it gives me structure and some space. But because I’m the grandmother, there’s a clear pressure on me to step in and provide regular childcare so my daughter and daughter-in-law can return to work. I’m often told I could be spending more time with the grandchildren and building a bond with them.

I do understand that childcare is expensive and that life is more expensive these days. I’m not dismissing that at all. But I’ve said more than once that I can’t do it. I don’t have the energy or capacity for it, and I don’t want to take on that level of responsibility.

My DD and DS keep bringing it up and have even suggested that I go part time or rearrange my hours to make it work. It feels like pressure rather than a genuine choice.

I was exhausted by parenting the first time round. My DS had mental health problems and needed a lot of care and support well into his early twenties. I gave everything to that stage of my life. Yes I love my grandchildren, but that doesn’t mean I want to be responsible for them day to day.

I also find it really hard to tolerate crying babies and young children now and I don’t want to keep getting ill from all the bugs they inevitably bring home.

Yesterday I was out shopping and saw a toddler having a full tantrum and felt relieved that I don’t have to deal with that anymore. I walked away to get away from the noise.

What I find particularly frustrating is that there is absolutely no expectation on my husband. No one is asking him to change his work or take this on. It’s just assumed I should be the one to step in.

I’ve spoken to other friends and they feel the same pressure. Their husbands get no pressure and there are no expectations of them to adjust their work hours or give up work to look after children.

Why do adult children/DIL/SIL feel they can pressure grandmothers into providing childcare, while grandfathers are left alone or not even asked, especially if they’re working?

Perhaps those parents who got loads of help from grandparents but don't want to help with GC just didn't like being parents very much, or more likely, prioritised their own social lives over their parents and now children.

I mean the ones specifically who had entire weekends off etc not to work.

Where they had childcare to work I think it's because it was more common for women to be SAHM's or part time jobs and to retire earlier, and the societal expectation that women had to help with GC. Now more women work, they are more likely to have careers rather than "jobs", and they work longer into old age - it's just not the same dynamic.

I am 60 and do not recall 90s/00s as times when gran picked up all the childcare and/or had the kids so regularly. My parents both worked, and so did my peers’ parents. Yes, some will have had the grandkids but not all - and times change so today more grandparents are having to work.

I also don’t recognise the amazing financial times I benefitted from to the point I should be now repaying it to my kids. I am not living in a million pound house I bought for £50 for example though even if I were I don’t know why it would be offensive - I also had 8 weeks of mat leave, no childcare cost support, or any other top up, and there was no living wage, or even minimum wage.

My parents could be said to have benefitted from nearly the last of good pensions and some early retirement funding - I was pleased as they had worked hard, lived in hard times, and why not enjoy any part of life anyway let alone retirement. Why is this type of thing begrudged nowadays - why are we expected to payback with no board, free home or free childcare? A lot of us will also end up with providing free elderly care as well.

Yes some families will do this, some communities do but I think it is more of a joint and sharing approach to everything - this approach discussed here seems to be entitled to but not responsible for.

I’ve actually heard people complain they don’t think it’s fair they should take a day’s leave as grandparents are going away and not providing childcare that week. It baffles me.

And regarding OP’s point it is frustrating in 2026 that it is the women who are asked/expected to do this stuff - it’s like we’re still there just to provide whatever others want and I don’t know why it continues to be the default position - it needs raising and challenging, as all inequalities that ultimately put us in the kitchen box.

Female orcas also live beyond fertility and this is to support their family with knowledge and wisdom, eg knowing sea routes to good hunting grounds - not just do the child rearing for their offspring - be nice to feel valued in this way perhaps!

its astonishing that so many boomers were practically raised by their grandparents, yet they are so reluctant to help at all! I’m not even saying regular childcare while parents are at work- I mean even occasional babysitting or just a quick visit! My MIL has not seen my toddler in a year. She lives 2hrs drive away, has a car and is retired. Yet she expects us to visit her, because it’s “our turn”. We don’t own a car and would have to drag our toddler on a train.

So women need to keep being asked to do even more then? Dads got away with it the first time and then again with grandchildren.

However, I would say that the point about not having such a close relationship with your GC will be relevant.

A close relationship is only possible if childcare is done?

You're right of course you're right, and it's shameful and shocking and frankly bizarre.

No grandmother should ever be expected to provide childcare for her adult children's kids. Full stop. End of sentence. No ifs, no ands, no buts.

Btw let's save ourself the nonsense replies from those pretending not to get it - those grandmothers who want to are not under discussion, it's the millions around the world who don't we are talking about.

Those who disagree with the simple reality that they are not owed any childcare and that their mother has a right to say no often demonstrate a clear lack of theory of mind. They simply have never developed the maturity and understanding that other people have beliefs, desires, intentions and emotions all of their own that may well be different to their own.

They also fail to think clearly about the reality that their mothers have ALREADY DONE THEIR OWN CHILD REARING AND THAT'S WHY THEY EXIST. Your mothers has already done her entire share. Fin.

They seem to never be able to accept the simple reality that nobody at all (absolutely nobody on this earth) is ethically responsible for childcare beyond the parents of that child. The buck stops directly at the parents.

All the oh buts and what ifs don't change that simple reality.

They seem not to see their own mothers as fully rounded independent human beings with rights.

They either pretend not to realise or genuinely don't have the cognitive and emotional ability to process the simple reality that many women endure child rearing even when they dislike it simply because it is expected of them at the time, or because it falls to them through duty and through love.

Millions of women loathe parenting - not me, to be clear, for the most part I actually enjoyed it - but I do not lack theory of mind or empathy, I am able to understand and accept that other people are not me and feel differently to me.

They also cannot seem to grasp that after raising a family, even those who did enjoy it have often simply reached capacity. They don't want to. And that's enough.

But whether the grandmother found the experience of raising her own family rewarding or burdensome the simple truth is that not wanting to is entirely valid.

No, of course you are not entitled to argue with her. No, of course she doesn't owe you tearing her guts and heart out for you to examine them and decide if he has a right to her feelings. She said no. End.

Grandmothers are complete human beings with her own desires, needs and emotional life. Their decision not to take on another round of childcare is valid on its own, no further justification is required.

As someone determined to force childcare onto your unwilling mother, your feelings carry no greater weight than hers.

In truth, your feelings hold no importance at all when it comes to how another adult chooses to spend her own seconds, moments, and hours. No one has the right to override another person's desires, needs, and personal boundaries simply because they want something from her. When an adult child demands that their mother provide ongoing childcare and she says no, their own frustration or disappointment is irrelevant to the decision because her time belongs exclusively to her. Exclusively. Without question.

It's not your time and its not your choice to give, take or use. Her time is not a piece of cake for you to slice a share from.

Grandmother's energy, her peace of mind, and her autonomy are hers alone to manage. The fact that you want her help does not create any obligation on her part.

Further, those who respond by threatening to withhold a relationship or by treating her more harshly because she refuses to care for their children is behaving in an abusive manner.

Such reactions ignore the fundamental reality that she has already done more than her share. She raised you. Her entire obligation is now fulfilled and her time now belongs entirely to her and no one is owed any portion of it.

People who push back against this basic boundary often view oldre women as little more than an NPC whose only purpose is to meet their needs and display a striking absence of empathy and compassion. Only what they want matters, how can grandmother be reshaped to serve your desires?

And then there are those who understand perfectly well that their demands are unfair and unkind yet they choose to feign confusion and repeat the same tired arguments in the hope that persistent pressure will eventually wear her down and force her into submission. This is straightforward bullying which unfortunately often works.

These are straightforward facts about respect autonomy and basic human dignity and are inarguable.

You cannot disagree with any of what I have said, not one word of it is incorrect.

And yet, some of you will keep bullying, keep shouting, keep putting your wants first, keep pretending not to get it keep "oh butting" and "what iffing" and "Well then I'll justing"

Demanding or thinking you have any entitlement at all to childcare for YOUR CHILDREN from your mother is bizarre behaviour, it's ugly behaviour and it's bullying behaviour.

If she says no she says no. She's done her bit already.

Leave your mothers in peace. They've earned it.

What both sides can you see?

Your mum had help and now you are upset because she won't help you. Did your dad not benefit from the arrangement also? But he wont get criticised only the woman.

It is like the men do not exist.

So many times I have seen older women criticised because they won't help and the men do not even get mentioned. Rarely do you see expectations of grandfathers. How dare a woman get help and then not pay it back?

Here is another example of how older women are criticised but not older men.

And most of us saw our grandparents for a visit on the weekend a couple of times a month and that was that. But even if we were raised by our grandparents (and I'm in my 50s and I know nobody who was or who even saw much of their grandparents beyond visiting now and then) and even if we had help (I had none, was living abroad and raised them with my husband and later school and outside hours care etc, no family help at any time) as you say that doesn't create an obligation anyway.

Someone doing you a favour does not mean you are obliged to carry out the same favour for others, it creates absolutely no obligation at any time. Everyone is absolutely entitled to their autonomy, boundaries, wants and feelings. Including older women.

👏👏

I feel the pressure and I don’t even have grandchildren yet. I don’t see how my dd will be able to afford childcare to go to work, they will need help that help will have to come from me and dh. I would never want my children to struggle and would do anything for them but the thought of being full time childcare for very young children fills me with dread because it’s so hard. I have 3 children and would give the same to all of them but what happens if the all have children around the same time will I end up with 3 babies under a year like I have triplets. Yes I could refuse (and probably will) but how awful to be in that position to have to refuse to help your children because childcare and life is so unaffordable.

I wonder how women would take if if their mothers said “Okay, I’ll have little Noah on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 8-6 if you’ll come round here from 8-6 every Saturday and Sunday and do my cleaning, laundry, gardening and shopping”? What do they give in return for the actual job their parents are doing for nothing?

If someone’s DH started a business and expected his DW to work for him for days each week, but refused to share any of the income with her, and kept it all for himself we would call it financial abuse.

Thank you for starting this thread. It's something I have noticed on Mumsnet particularly. The level of entitlement that women feel to their mothers' ongoing care of their own children and the nasty punishing attitude to those women who don't get involved 'enough' is unreal and shows that misogyny is alive and well. These daughters think they are the main character and their mother is a support actor who should be there for ever to support their lives and they also get on their moral high horses saying how they would 'do anything for their own children' (who are usually still under 18 at this point, not 30, 40, 50 etc). It shows a huge level of immaturity and hypocrisy because despite feeling that their own mother should be helping them for ever, they don't see childcare as their own sole task but feel it should be shared equally with their male partners. The hypocrisy demonstrates the self centred nature of the belief that mothers should always help otherwise they would apply their feminism to their fathers as much as to their male partners.

Well- her ex husband is far more involved, so…? I’m not saying that your statement is not generally true, just commenting on my own experience.

That is horrendous. I never ask my parents for regular childcare. My son went to nursery. As a consequence they are happy to babysit and have him for an occasional weekend away. It hasn't impacted on their relationship on the contrary because they aren't worn out with the day to day they can spend shorter bursts of positive time with him.

@Owly11 you have conveniently ignored that OP has a DS as well as a DD and both have asked OP for childcare,

In case it wasn't clear 🙄 I am commenting on what I see on Mumsnet which is women complaining about their mothers not providing free childcare and threatening them with withholding a relationship with grandchildren. Trying to redirect the attention away from the women doing it towards the men who also do it doesn't change the fact that this is what women are doing to their mothers and doesn't change what I wrote one bit. Nice attempt at deflection though.

I’m not deflecting, what a strange thing to say. You posted on a thread where a DS and a DD have both asked this, complaining that women are bad feminists for asking this of their mothers. I pointed out it was rather strange, in context of the thread you have posted on, to ignore the request from the DS.

Of course you are deflecting. I raised a point about what I see women do on Mumsnet and then you said ah but what about the son. Whatever the son does or doesn't do is irrelevant to what many many women do on Mumsnet. Deflecting is when you try to argue against something by saying 'but what about them? They do it too?' It's irrelevant and doesn't address the argument. If you wish to actually engage with the point I made then I am happy to listen.

On this thread, the thread you chose to post on, what the son does or doesn’t do is relevant.

You disagree. That’s your prerogative. I’m not changing my mind about the relevance and you aren’t either.

🤷‍♀️

Have a good day.

Ok, do expand. In what way is it relevant that the son also asked for childcare, and in what way is it 'convenient' that I did not include that point?

It is relevant because your post was about the poor feminism of daughters who asked for this.

It’s convenient for you making your post about the poor feminism of daughters that you ignored the fact a son was making one of the requests here.

I shan’t respond to you further because I have better things to do with my day than play chess with a pigeon.

I find this absolutely wild to be throwing back what the OP did for child care and saying it's hypocritical to now refuse to do it.

Times have changed massively - not least the age at which we all have kids. My parents generation had kids in their mid twenties and her parents were also in their mid twenties. So they were only in their early 50s at this point anyway.

After my grandmother had children she never worked again. That was just the way it was. But then salaries and the cost of living reflected that for middle class families in post war Britain. You could support a family on just one (male) salary and since there was limited childcare option there wasn't an alternative. My grandparents moved away from their parents for work so they didn't have available family childcare. My parents say there just wasn't a nursery industry available for child care.

Remember that women only got equal pay rights in the 1970s so expecting anything other than the women in the family to do childcare was very unusual indeed.

On my Dad's side, his father moved around a lot and he didn't live close to family either. My grandfather was however a stay at home Dad in the late 1970s/80s to his second son. He took early retirement to do it, whilst his second wife worked. That was deemed exceptionally odd for the time. Noting he was financially secure enough and old enough to do this.

So both my grandparents and parents never had help with childcare as a result. And they weren't untypical. I can look throughout my family and honestly this hasn't been a thing for generations across the board. I don't think this was unusual. You just had stay at home parents and that was that. But even by my parents, going back to work had become normal. A generation before this didn't happen so much.

Fast forward to now and it's more like grandparents are ten years older because of how much later we are having kids. Many have had to work later because of pension age changing and pension schemes being increasingly less favourable.

Both parents have to work. Even ten years ago, a stay at home parent wasn't unusual. Now it is. But childcare is available in a way it wasn't and this is crucial. The situation has changed for both grandparents and adults children.

The balance has shifted to expecting Dads to do more - sometimes because they earn less which was unthinkable probably even a generation ago. Why on earth we are blaming the OP for not doing more to be less sexist about child care when there were less paternal rights and wages were still biased to men and we didn't have the availability of funded childcare is absolutely fucking nuts.

The whole model of care has shifted from mothers to paid care to stop mothers being saddled with it, and yet we STILL have these attitudes that it's a mother's role. Some of the comments in this thread which ignore the adult sons / sons in law and ignore the grandfather are staggering and really part of the problem.

There are four parents all in the same position who could work out flexibility to suit all without asking grandma to give up even more of her life as a support human. Four parents who have much more access to childcare and have greater employment rights than the OP ever had when she had young children. They need to use the system as it stands.

Grandma needs to work because her kids attitude to taking responsibility for the care of other family members is troubling. She will not be able to retire as young as her parents and she will have to consider the cost of care in a way her parents didn't. She doesn't want to give up her financial independence only for them to dump her and not help out in the future which honestly given their attitude now, isn't unrealistic. She has to take responsibility for herself with those shitty attitudes lurking. She needs to ignore the emotional blackmail that if she doesn't provide childcare she won't see the grandkids / get care precisely because that's just emotionally abusive and puts her in a vulnerable position for the future.

I swear there are some really hard of thinking individuals who just think things are the same as they've always been or that social change is irrelevant. Of course it's not.

Realistically I don't think it's viable nor fair for most grandparents to provide childcare. It's too much.

My mum was 63 when DS was born and was still in work. She needed to work. She didn't have much of a pension of her own. And my parents got shafted by endowment mortgages in the 90s... Tbh I never wanted her to do it anyway.

I was 37 when I had DS. If he has children late, I'll be in my 70s. Looking at my mum now, it's just not viable and realistic to be looking after toddlers in your 70s.

OP, i don't think you are unreasonable in the slightest. They need to sort their shit out between themselves. The four of them could work together in mutual self interest. The bottom line is you are the easy option and seen as a cheap doormat.

Don't do it.

I think some people are being deliberately combative and obtuse in their failure to acknowledge that, despite anecdotes to the contrary, their remains a societal pattern of women as default child carer. This isn't something controversial or up for debate, it's supported statistically. So there is a level of contrariness at play in posters choosing to overlook this to argue your family set up was to blame.
I imagine you're my generation. I'm 56. My DC are 20/30s and if they were alive my parents would be in their 80s.
Women in their 80s almost always did the lions share of domestics and childcare. And the odd story about someone's 85 year old dad who was their primary carer doesn't change the pattern. So when they looked after our (gen X's) children, they would often replicate this model. So this is what our adult DC grew up thinking grandma's and grandfather's did. It's grandma who does the looking after.
Our generation changed things somewhat. But in the 90s/00s the pattern remained of man as bread winner woman as primary domestic worker, and this is what our children saw.
So when they are looking for someone to care for their children, they think of you as the obvious choice because that's what they grew up seeing grandmas (not grandpas) do.
Perhaps the gen X grandfather's will step up and start changing the pattern.

Another thread on here had a poster wailing about her grandmother (not her mother) letting her down with respect to childcare because she had breast cancer. She was asking how long would her grandmother need off from childcare duties.
Bloody hell, I missed that one!!!
I would have made a few comments if I'd seen it!