to feel taken advantage of over childcare?

[zeezay]

I retired a few years ago to help my DD and her DH with their two children under 3, as childcare costs are so high. I’ve been looking after them regularly so they can work, which I was happy to do.

I’ve now come across posts on social media showing they were actually out together having days off fairly regularly. They’d drop the children dressed in work clothes and everything, so I never questioned it.

I did speak to them and they apologised, which I appreciated, but it’s made things awkward. If I’m honest, it’s been quite hard for me looking after two under 3. It’s a lot more full on than I think they realise.

I don’t begrudge them having time together, but I do feel a bit misled and like I’ve become default childcare rather than helping out when they genuinely need it.

Anyone who uses their kids as a weapon deserves everything they get.

If you're using blackmail to get childcare then you need to have a good hard look at yourself.

I guess because she knew her DM would say no, which is odd. The bigger issue is that OP doesn't want to care for her grandchildren. So she shouldn't do it!!

I don't disagree that caring for small children is hard. I just find it odd to begrudge them some couple time during a time that she was going to care for the children anyway.

The OP is fed up and is looking for an excuse to get out of the arrangement. So do it.

If 3 days is now too much then go down to 1 or 2 days per week. It’s clear you are struggling with 3 days and it’s ok to call time on it.

They are able to spend their annual leave doing child free things and can afford child free activities because you are providing free childcare.

You haven't answered any of my questions so I am going to guess that you either offered to retire or were going to soon and jumped at the chance to offer to look after the babies, which is a lovely thing to do but now you've started to find it all too much ( also reasonable ) and are using this as a way to put a stop to the original offer you made.

I actually don't think it's awful of them to make some time for each other if they had the impression you were happy with the arrangement you offered, which you have said you were on here also.

I think you will have to tread carefully, you are clearly unhappy with them and that's your perogative, I certainly wouldn't have taken on 2 babies for 3 days childcare every week but I also think you got excited at being nanny and now they're not small babies anymore you've reached a limit.

they may deserve everything they get, but there is a separate relationship here which is grandparent/grandchild.

By making the decision to “give the parents what they deserve” you are also losing a relationship with a completely innocent party along the way. It isn’t a cost neutral decision.

I would question anyone who can do easily pay the price of losing a relationship with a grandchild

OP hasn't said anywhere that she would have said no. She's said how much should she facilitate their free time when she's already facilitating them working. And I don't think she begrudges them time together. I think she begrudges being lied to.

What they did was wrong. They should have asked you to have the children so they could spend some time together and given you the choice. They have broken your trust and need to realise that this is an issue and deal with the consequences of what ever you decide to do. I have five children and would never have done this and would be hurt and angry as well if it was done to me.

If they were paying for childcare, this would be fine and normal. If they didn’t use the OP for childcare so they could work, it would be perfectly reasonable to ask for additional childcare so they could have date time. It’s the expecting an older family member who has said they find the children tiring to do more childcare than they need for work so they can have date time.

OP- I would step back from 3 days a week, to either offering less time regularly or none at all. Say this has made you reflect, and you are struggling. They can pay for childcare. Then you can offer to just do “date” childcare or if a child is sick and can’t go to nursery/childminder.

I intend to have a relationship with any GC by providing only ad hoc childcare on my own schedule. So maybe once a week for date nights or in emergencies or for a weekend away.

Isn't that enough of a relationship? It will be enough for me.

I question anyone who thinks it's ok to blackmail someone into childcare.

How to say you'd be happy to take the piss out of your mum.
She thinks she's helping them to go to work not to have a lovely child free day. It's deceitful. Completely different to paid childcare.

@Ihaveneedofwaternear Why are kids “your responsibility, all day every day” once you have them?

That is not the case and it has been not the case for all of human history. Kids are and have always been seen as an investment in the future of society, their families and humanity. WE ALL play a role in supporting kids while they are vulnerable and young, just as WE ALL play a role in looking after people who are retired or unwell or in need of support. This is why have free schooling, and some hours of free nursery care, and reduced price music lessons in schools and maternity leave and free bus passes for young kids and milk vouchers and child benefit and playgrounds. It is also why, if they can and want to, grandparents and uncles and cousins play a role in raising and befriending and supporting the kids in their families.

I agree the OP’s daughter, is taking the piss by lying, and that if the OP is doing more than she wants to, she should discuss that and cut back. But saying, kids are entirely the responsibility of their parents and that parents that want / need any help or any time to themselves occasionally are somehow in the wrong because the kids are entirely on them, is just patently untrue and ignores the reality of raising kids and the role of kids in society and the responsibility we all have to kids.

Your way of thinking - that everyone is entirely responsible for themselves - leads to a society with no free healthcare, no state pension, no social workers, no free schools, no council housing, no paid for sick leave - not a society I would want to live in.

Yes 100%. But it is very individual.

All I have been trying to say on this thread is that the OP is currently doing a lot. To go from 3 days a week to one day a week or less as she is saying at the moment will be a massive change. Is she sure she is happy to go from 12 days a month to 2 or 4?

If she is, absolutely fine. But she just needs to be sure that it is what she wants and not the anger talking.

Everyone is backing her up saying she should just tell them where to go etc. but I just think she should take some time to assess what outcome she actually wants- when you take the hurt and offence out of the equation.

I am 65.

It's not that though is it? It is almost fibbing or lying, pretending to be working hard but actually just swanning off and having a fun day out whilst Granny is run ragged looking after two little children.
Especially when Mum and Dad WFH and can have a lunch together!

I am not begrudging them some time. It is one thing them having lunch together and another taking time off and going out for the day or afternoon while I am doing the childcare. I retired to help them with childcare for work.

That is exactly what I do, and it is exhausting! I am older than the OP. My DD is very upfront about what she and her partner are doing when she asks me to help out, like tomorrow when they desperately need to work on their allotment but can't with a crawling baby!
I would be really really hacked off if I was looking after GC and finding it tiring and then discovered they weren't actually working like they said, but off for a nice day out!
It's fine if you know.

What do you actually want to happen as an outcome @zeezay?

I am thinking it through before I make a decision.

I doubt the Ops DD and SIL are paying her to care for their DC, the whole point of her doing childcare is to save them money. The Ops probably annoyed because she's retired to facilitate this, giving her a drop in income, so that they could work.

Yes that's true, collectively as a society I completely agree. I suppose I haven't worded it well. And I know that historically we all had more of a village around us.

I suppose I just feel like OPs daughter and son in law have been very underhanded here, which I would find hurtful. I don't like the narrative of "it's hard and we all should help each other out, why begrudge them" as an excuse for their behaviour. I don't feel like our roles in society are what's being discussed - it's more of a personal insult.

And I suppose I do feel a very heavy weight of responsibility for my own children at all times, which has probably coloured my responses!!

Thanks. Op this is your time to enjoy life now. I would be starting to reduce days now and then when the kids are in school you stop completely forget school drop offs pick ups this is parents responsibility other people manage. Op if something happened to you they would have to manage now as for couple time that’s on them to work on. I can’t even imagine going off doing my own thing knowing my mum was stuck with kids and I certainly would have asked first. Op they taking advantage of you no other words can describe this set up. I hope you manage to get your freedom back soon before it’s too late.

They are taking the piss big time, being very sneaky and acting like teenagers . If they wanted time alone they should have thought about that before having 2 children close together. How can you trust they are actually working when they say they are now? Id say no more childcare fond a nursery like everyone else has to and pay for it.
You have a life too! Where are your days out

The OP is 65, it's much harder looking after small children in your 60s and 70s.
A lot of people don't have the same energy, they might have minor health issues, before they know it, their healthy retirement has gone, and they haven't done any of the things they had planned because they have been caring for grandchildren. We have paid, professional child care for a reason,because it doesn't rely on the goodwill of grandparents and is reliable. I understand it's expensive for parents especially when those children are small, I've been there, but taking the piss and not understanding that grandparents might want their own life is not acceptable. And it's usually women who are inconvenienced.

Don't have fucking kids then. Absolute arseholes, the pair of them.