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?

I disagree strongly that people nowadays feel more entitled to free grandparental childcare than they did a couple of decades ago. The reality is that as more and more able bodied and capable adult women are in paid employment, there are fewer and fewer able bodied and capable adult women able to pick up the unpaid/voluntary roles, including childcare, that women have always done. In the absence of able bodied and capable women to plug gaps in life organization, more people feel this lack and wonder why their life doesn't work and we are hearing more voices piping up asking where the helping hands which people grew up believing existed have gone.

I think it’s up to you what you do but don’t expect to see or have a relationship with your grandchildren if you refuse to help at all

This is the way that women are punished for not doing childcare whereas this rarely applies to grandfathers.

I'm mid seventies and looked after my Gs from age 1 when his Mum went back to work. I love my GS but found it really exhausting. No one put pressure on me but I just wanted to help until he went to school . I now just pick him up from school one day a week which is enough for me . My ds and ddil are very grateful for any help they get from me . I think it's fine for the op to say she doesn't want to do childcare at all and she should not be quilted into it .

I had very little help with childcare so had to be a sahm and struggled financially but I never expected my dm to go part time . This is a fairly new phenomenon that GPs are expected to look after. Gc .

Well said, and you are absolutely right to resist the pressure.

I think the root cause of the problem is capitalism. A lot of these women who are asking/pressuring their parents to help out with childcare feel they have no choice but to go back to work to pay their own bills.

The solution is better childcare provision, not pressuring the older generation to step in!

Currently 89% of the poll says YANBU so looks like it is an issue with society at large not just my DC!

I think, in many cases, the increase in Dads attending parties and activities is due to divorce/seperation, and it being "their time".

Grandparents (both sexes) will be working to later and later ages as time goes on, so simply won't be available for financial reasons.

What do you want that would make the OP appear "normal"?

Interesting how the women are deemed to be hypocrites not the men. I have seen this so many times on MN.

This is crazy. The effing cheek of them. The entitlement!! They expect you too be poorer and have a smaller pension so they don't have to pay for childcare??? I can't get over it.

Absolutely no way should you even be entertaining this conversation. Just say it would cost you £xxx to compensate me for lost income and pension contributions - are you going to pay that or do you expect me to be poorer??

I can't believe people have the temerity to be so grabby.

What is cold about it?

I should give up work or go part time to help my adult DC?

Is my DH cold because he won't provide childcare because he travels as part of his job?

I’ve no doubt my daughter will expect this in a few years and I’m already thinking what I might say. It irks me somewhat that I can’t see evidence of cost cutting on their behalf but there will be an expectation that I do without. Yes I want to be involved somehow and regularly but on my terms and not because I’m guilt tripped into it. Women over 50 become invisible don’t we?

YANBU......but......with my DD living in Australia, I would love to be closer to my future grandchildren and be able to provide care, whilst building a bond with them. I fear that we won't really know each other at all. Be careful what you wish for.

Agree but they don't even ask him and have not even considered it. They just make excuses saying he travels and also earns more than me.

A good relationship with your grandkids isn't dependent on regular childcare. My parents never provided it for various reasons. They are very involved and loving grandparents though. They prioritise seeing their grandkids and really getting to know them.

Shame on anyone who uses a lack of relationship as a threat to try and force their parents/in laws to capitulate

Not everyone expects but yours do and you need to just start from that position of what are you able / willing and wanting to do, regardless of cultural expectations. And first and foremost you work!!! You don’t have capacity. End of. That they think you should give up work but not your DH is some next level entitlement

It is not unreasonable IMO to say blanket no to young children / toddlers as that is exhausting. I react similarly to you when I see toddlers playing up and I’m only early 50s (thank goodness I don’t have to do that any more).

Equally the times my elderly father has helped with my young DD years ago were a godsend. And I usually positioned it to him as ‘just keep her alive’ rather than giving him rules and regulations. But those times were few and far between.

He stepped in for a decent amount of babysitting when she was older, but again not regularly.

Now I’m helping him a lot. I think if he hadn’t helped me ever I might not be helping him so much now, not because of some weird tit for tat but simply because your lives are less entwined, more independent, and that inevitably creates distance. But my DD knows and loves him well through maintained contact so helping grandad now is something that falls on all of us

why can’t they use a nursery or holiday clubs
if it’s regular? That’s what we do. My In-laws are very helpful but they on do the odd weekend day I’d never want them to replace professional childcare. I think that’s the key difference - bonding time vs replacement for professional childcare

I think if grandparents do childcare it takes the joy out of the role and makes it into a chore and obligation.
I know childcare is expensive because when I had my children in the 90s the cost of nursery absorbed my entire salary ( in hindsight I wish I'd stayed at home).
However there were very many occasions when they were ill or other problems and my mum took up the short term emergency childcare or babysitting. She probably wouldn't have had the capacity if she had been doing full time childcare.

I think how much you enjoy little ones is fundamental. I don't see the childcare I do as a chore, I have 8 GC from adults to toddlers. Love my time with all of them. Doing what you enjoy isn't work.

My guess is that they don’t think it is okay but money is the driver.
You are the cheap option. Cheap childcare.

There will be all sorts of other rationale suggested. They know you, bond with grandchildren etc. But it is all about money. And interruption to a job or career.
Too many think they have a career when they just have a job.

They also resent the generation that apparently supposedly had it so much easier. A huge generalisation.

And will focus on Granny because Grandad likely didn’t do the bulk of childcare the first time around. Granny will at least know the ropes.

There will always be exceptions. Those who are terrified of feeling redundant of parenting who like to still manage all. And can claim money from the state for doing so. But they will be exhausted.

But the bottom line is money. Crude. But if honest, the reason.

Grandmothers worked part time or not at all. Once children arrived.

If private childcare is not available and the state cannot fund as much as is sought after then Granny should not be automatically seen as the alternative option.

A few of my friends have carried on working even though they want to retire so they do not feel pressure to do childcare.

My thoughts are what next? The cost of nursery subsidy, school lunches and breakfast clubs is huge. What else does this government think should be provided?

Perhaps in the past women either worked less or retired earlier than men, plus were more involved in parenting their own kids than their partners. So they were already a default parent, therefore default grandparent. and I think a lot of grandmothers are keen to help if they’re in a position to.

it is unfair to expect regular childcare from you entailing reducing your work hours. I reduced my own working hours when the dc were young and may well need to work more or for longer to compensate for this. I’m 50 and dc are 12 and 14 so it’s not on the horizon yet, but I am aware of it.

Hasn't taken the joy for me. If you see a lady in her70s on the swings and roundabouts that might be me. I also like swimming with them, going to the Saturday morning cinema show for children or even a sneaky big Mac. We are all different.

Some years ago this was intimated to a friend of mines sister when her son/DIL expected her to do 4 days a week after she had just retired.

They were both very firmly put in their place, but the relationship has never recovered.

They have a polite respectful relationship but she is not involved at all.
They made a huge mistake thinking they could speak to her like that.

She was angrier at her son that his wife.
She had worked 40 years at a very busy career which had provided for the family handsomely, and for her son to think her well earned retirement was to be used for free childcare incensed her.