How much childcare do grandparents provide now compared with previous generations?

[TheCatSitterDM]

Inspired by a recent threads, i'm interested to know from current grandparents how much childcare they provide vs how much childcare they recieved as parents?

My Husband and his Cousins spent a lot of weekends and holidays at their Grandparents house as children.
My MIL spent a lot of time with my DC1 as a baby and toddler and offered to have him over night and weekends so we could have time to ourselves. After my FIL got poorly they moved abroad to a warmer climate so my DC2 hasn't had as much time with them but she is still very involved in terms of face time calls and sending gifts ect.
My Auntie in law (MILs sister / husband's cousins mum) has a "I've done my time looking after kids" attitude to her own GC and resents being asked to provide childcare.
Like I said, their mother had their children often and was also a source of emotional support such as being present at the grandchildrens births ect.
Current Grandparents do you feel you're expected to do more childcare than your parents offered you?

I think on average grandparents are probably older than they used to be as people have children later than they used to. Also, more people in their sixties are working for longer.

By the time I was 2 years old, 3 of 4 of my grandparents were dead so they had a good excuse not to babysit.

Nana was of a nervous disposition, once dropped her own newborn, and the only occassion she babysat me and my brother was when my parents took our newborn sister to an otherwise no kids wedding. I apparently baracaded myself in my bedroom and she was terrified of me (I was not quite 3 at this point, so as family lore goes, it was absolutely my fault and I was an awful child, not a normal toddler missing the parents that she'd never been away from before that point to be put in the care of a totally inept adult) That was the sole experience of grandparent care for me as a child, and it's still more than I've had to help with my DC.

DH's parents were dead long before I met him and mine are old so have never and will never offer care to our DC. It's the opposite in fact; we go over to support them because they have made no provision for getting old and refuse any suggestions of help that aren't their children doing stuff for free for them. 3 emergency hospital admissions for mum so far this year, dashing over at all times of day and night on a 2 hour round trip. Still refuses care, in fact sacked the free care provided on hospital discharge.

So, yeah. No help, never any expected and getting extra care responsibility thrown in for good measure. Bottoms up! 🥂

Absolutely 0

Neither grandparents lived near, so no childcare at all, not even during school holidays.

With my dc (born turn of the century, ie, 1999-2002), both grand parents lived near us, but no regular childcare then either. Only occasional evening babysitting and maybe during summer holidays.

Inlaws did provide childcare (afterschool care) for Sil when she was doing a college course for a year but that was one day per week, and dc were older (junior /senior school age).

Also, more women work full time today compared to when I grew up, when you had more sahm or part-time mothers. Childcare was expected to be done by the mother in those days (and you rarely saw dad at the school gates collecting their child).

I was always at my nans growing up, probably spent more time with her than my mum. I've got three children between 1 and 17 and I can count on my hands how many times they have baby sat. All are under 70 and have been retired for years and barely know my children.

My own grandparents never provided any child care. My parents at the time were living with my maternal parents, and even though in the same house my grand parents wouldn't help at all. Grandparents were also still working

My own parents didn't provide child care apart from babysitting or odd emergencies. They were also still working full time.

I also don't provide child care for my grandchild unless required. I am a much older grandparent than my own parents were or my grandparents were.

We were constantly sent to my grandparents in the school holidays, for weeks on end. My mother has never offered to look
after my DC, and on the 2-3 occasions I’ve asked when desperate (2-3 times in 8 years) there has been a huge amount of handwringing and ultimately refusal. So she has never helped. Not even for an hour.

My Grandparents weren't involved much. We would see them once a year. My mum died when I was 17 but my Dad and in laws aren't involved at all with my children. See them once a year if that. My.Ds has made me a Nanny in January. She's still in the hospital so I can't even hug her yet. I'm going to be as involved as I can. I can't wait.

My grandparents were all dead by the time I was born, so my parents had zero support from them. They had also moved a fair distance from other family so had no family support whatsoever. My mum was absolutely clear that she would not provide any childcare support for me or my sister (kids now aged between 17 and 27) and never did. I will offer to provide emergency / occasional care if I have any grandkids.

I agree with this.

And to be fair, just because you have children doesn't mean that you're destined to care for other people for the rest of your life; people are allowed to want to live their older years doing what they want. My oldest child is 27 and my youngest is 15. I've been taking care of other people for the vast majority of my life. At some point I'd like to be able to do what I want to do.

I received no regular childcare from my parents, as they were both working. I paid for my own childcare.

I didn’t provide anyway. My kids paid for their own childcare, once they had children. . They paid for their own.

Both sets of my grandparents were divorced, my mum's mum died when I was two. Two grandparents i didn't meet till I was nine and the other died when I was twelve. The one we did see, we visited about once a month. He was only 67 when he died, but he and his wife seemed very much like 'old' grandparents. So no childcare from any of my GPs but my DM didn't work.

When my DC were little I used to visit my parents with them once a week. My in laws came to our house to visit DH and the DC as he was home one day a week. Once they started school, they used to have DC one day a week each in the school holidays. DM babysat about once a month so we could have a night out. They did very occasional (once or twice a year) overnights once kids were a bit older.

I have one GC and look after them one day a week and we will also do occasional weekend afternoons and overnight about every 2-3 months. They are getting a sibling later this year and I will continue with the one day a week childcare. I wouldn't want to commit to looking after more children after that. I'm not that old, but still working almost full time and it is tiring. A long time till I retire still!

We holidayed and spent loads of time with our maternal GP. School holidays and sleepovers with our paternal GP. My DM helped with our DC ad hoc in school holidays and occasional emergency childcare cover but never ever had them ‘just because’ and could go six weeks without seeing them. Never had them once for a sleepover in 13 years.
I don’t think she enjoyed the company of young children really, probably why she was always at my GP with us when we were young.

I lived with my GP's during Primary school and for the last two years my parents lived elsewhere with us visiting them at the weekends. And after that would be sent to the GP's at the drop of a hat. My folks never had to think of they needed childcare

I did move 100 odd miles from them so on the whole they were mostly hands off on a daily /weekly basis but would have DS1 during some holidays, probably about 2 weeks a year

They have only ever had DS2 for a few days and about 4-5 overnights

My mum has been known to say that they are older so couldn't have DS2 and I do understand that. Though I reminded them that it was a good thing my GP's didn't think that as they were 60 and 64 (grandad was still working) when they took us on

My father's parents had both died before I was born. Mother's parents lived 400 miles away so we would go to stay for a couple of weeks in the summer (either whole family or just with mum). They had also died by the time I was a teenager. When I had my DC, my in-laws lived overseas and my father was full-time carer for my mum. We visited my parents monthly and my dad was as involved as he could be. DH's parents we saw perhaps once a year (although for a couple of weeks at a time).

We are fortunate that DH and I are both retired and live close enough to one DC to look after their children one day a week. We offered this and we also occasionally babysit, look after sick DGC, have overnight sometimes. We have other DGC who live several hours away and we sadly can't see them as often or do regular childcare.

I was a child of the 80's and always at my grandparents. School pickups, summer holidays and occasional weekends.

My family did help with my dc's but they lived too far away once they were both at school. Hardly any sleepovers.

I don’t think I know anyone my age (50s) who was looked after regularly by their grandparents.

My maternal grandmother looked after me, my siblings and my cousins. Often 10 kids running around at any one time. Lots of sleepovers too. She always had food on the pan to feed us. She was. Grandmother at about 42 and had 21 grandkids in total. My own parents have done a lot of childcare for my siblings kids (I lived abroad when my dc were little). This has included school pick ups, babysitting at the weekends and holiday cover. Everyone within my friends circle has lots of grandparents support.

My grandparents pretty much raised me. I considered my gran my second mum (although to be honest she was a much better mother than my biological one). I was there constantly and even had friends in that area who I used to be outside playing with. The ice cream man knew me well and so did the neighbours/local shop keepers.

my mother hasn’t seen my children since Christmas or spoke to them. She lives about a 2 minute drive away. None of her neighbours know my kids (they have been neighbours for 20 odd years) and she knows almost nothing about our lives. Entirely her choice. Her time is ‘done’ apparently

I am mid 50’s, i was never looked after by my DGP’s, my parents both worked full time and I went to either after school clubs, briefly a childminder and then let myself in after school. In the holidays I had great fun at clubs learning to trampoline, play badminton, tennis, kayak etc.
I had fabulous relationships with my DGP’s.
My own DC were never looked after by DGP’s and had a nice relationship with them.
We’ve never been a family who all live close together, it’s always been a range of an hour to three hours from parents/grandparents.
I always preferred my DC in a professional setting doing lots of activities than with either set of DGP’s.

All my grandparents were dead when I was born.
My father was dead (and had abandoned the family when I was 1) when my children were born. My mother was ill and died when my dd was 5.

I have looked after my 2 dgds 3 days most weeks, more if ill or on holiday. (They are 200 miles away.) 2 year old is at nursery pt, 5 year old in reception,

It sounds as though previous generations were not so involved with family but nothing could be further from the truth. My many aunts, uncles, cousins lived in various combinations due to poverty, WW1 and WW2 and the aftermath, according to need. My mother kept her widowed father, her unemployed brother, sister and brother in law. They happily handed over houses to sisters/brothers if they were in need, took in relatives, visited often etc.

If there was a problem all the members of the family thought it was a joint problem to solve.

We have our little gs 2 days and 1 night per week whilst our dd and sil are working (we live too far to go there and back in a day).
We’ve had him extra this weekend- all day Saturday, overnight. Parents came for Sunday lunch and took him back home.

We r moving closer to them in the near future to provide more help.

I grew up with no GP care really in the 1960s/70s. My parents lived in various places, myself and siblings were all born in different countries in the world, when they returned to the UK we were a couple of hours from GPs (both my parents are from same town originally and went to school together). When we were pre-school my DM was a SAHM and Dad worked. At one point she did a bit of part time and we went to a lady/CM she knew. She went back to work once we were all at school.

We visited GPs for the day, probably ever month or so once we were back here. But none of them ever looked after us as childcare. I never spent the night at my grandparents' house. They were old. Both my grandads were 70 when I was born.

My parents got lots -think every school holiday, after / before school, over nights whilst they went on holiday etc. They provide none. Their choice! It’s safe to say as my children grew up, then l won’t be entering another cycle of care with my parents as they age. They can pay for it or last without it, it’s what l have done after all! They may hear their phrases come back to haunt them “it’s too tying”, “l have got other plans for that day”, “lm not in the mood for more commitments”