Parents faking poverty and not buying dc gifts

[FakeFinances]

for some reason approx 6 years ago my parents decided to stop all gifts for birthday Easter and Christmas. They said they just didn’t have the money to do them for the GC. Fine.

Excpet it’s 1. Not true that they can’t afford it and 2. They still buy gifts etc for both my sisters dc???

Everytime I go to see them they openly show me expensive new things, tell me about the cruises and holidays booked and talk finances (positively) then in the same visit they’ll say they have no money so sorry there’s no cake to have with coffee and reiterate that’s why they don’t do gifts anymore???

I have found out that they have still given gifts to all their other GC (I have 2 sisters) and I’m shocked ? When I asked them about it all they said they would not be speaking to me anymore as I was ‘money grabbing’ ? They haven’t spoken to me for 3 months now.

We hadn’t fallen out prior to this I genuinely believed when they first started this that they had just decided no more gifts ? I have 2 dc, my sisters have 6 between them.

The OP hasn't said they are struggling either.

I don't ask for costs to be covered if I do anything for/with DGC but DC offer if its at their request. When my DP did stuff with DC to help us I would offer costs and they would usually decline just as I do. However neither we nor our children have ever taken it for granted as an entitlement. However I know families where they do things a bit differently financially. Every family is a bit different.
The OP has stressed her parents are not short of money (the MN cruise, sibling house deposits) but OTOH there is nothing in the posts to suggest the OP is short of money either.

The OP has said nothing about the emotional relationships, time spent together, whether the GDC enjoy time with their DGPs, whether they support in non financial ways - the only point of discussion here is how much money they spend on the OP's family. I find that an odd way to describe a relationship.

If there was an unexpected change in a relationship at a point in time I would normally suggest be direct and ask about it but we know nothing about this relationship beyond money.

Yes, its rare for people to be quite so one dimensional. Its also not me equating love with money here:

Buying gifts for some GC and not others has nothing to do with money. It's about effort, love, inclusion and fairness

Since the OP has only talked about money we have no idea what effort, love and inclusion the DGPs show in other ways. I disagree with the premise that you can't show love without spending money and ensuring that money is equal to the last penny.

This provides an interesting insight. You and your sisters would have been raised almost as two separate families.i've seen this them-and-us dynamic in the children in my blended family, but they outgrew it.

I think they've ganged up and are pressuring your parents to squeeze you out.

You need to think how this toxic situation is affecting your children andvthen do what you can to mitigate it.

You also need to give serious thought to how you navigate the decline of your parents into their old age. I expect you have already been written out of any will. But how are you going to handle a situation where your sisters expect you to contribute time or money for care ( and configure it between them so that you bear an unfair share of the burden)?

Personally, I'd tell them all to do one. I hope you don't buy presents forvany of them!

Firstly the car DID NOT need petrol, it was half tank but her dad prefers it full tank so he decided to top it up.

He had his own car and asked to use OPs car because it was bigger. She never asked him to take the kids out, he offered.

Secondly it is very very very cheap and tightfisted as a grandparent to offer to take your grandchildren on a day out then send an invoice for petrol to your daughter especially when they can obviously afford it with all their cruises etc.

Again OP did not ask them to take the kids out, they offered to take them out then asked if they can use OPs car instead of their own car.

Sending an invoice to your own daughter for petrol to take your own grandchildren out of absolutely stingy and cheap. I can understand if they couldn't afford it but that's not rey case here and OP did not ask them or demand that they take the kids out or even ask that they refill her tank. If he returned the card quarter tank OP would probably have moved on not send an invoice to him to get it back to half tank.

Frankly good riddance, they sound like horrible people who don't see anything wrong treating not only their children but grandchildren differently. Really they are too poor to buy a birthday present for their grandchildren yet they continue to buy for the others. They are too poor to offer cake with tea yet continue to post pictures on social media of tea with cake with their other daughters and you are trying to justify all this because of the petrol situation.

If OP paid for the petrol are you saying every thing else that'd happening is ok because you seem to be focusing on the petrol situation.

You still haven't said what your relationship with your sisters is like away from your parents. What do they say when you ask them what this is all about? Why are you not included? Surely they might give you some idea.

I can understand how the inequality hurts more than the lack of gifts . But how old the the grandchildren? My parents, dispite being comfortably off, stopped buying gifts for birthday for all grandchildren when they reached 18, so on the face of it there were years when some grandchildren got gifts and others didn't. It's was a bit brutal but at 18 my children accepted the situation and as they only spent about £10.00 each gift it wasn't really a big deal to the children..

It was simply that my parents had never been big gift givers in their own families or to each other, or for us as children. All gifts to use as children were modest and all stopped at age 18, which relieved my mother of the burden of getting gifts

I still buy a gift for my mother as I feel I shouldn't let any mean spirited tendancies affect me. She still tells me off for buying my adult children gifts as if her way is the right way to treat people. .

Reading your post i wanted to ask if you were the eldest

Nothing as extreme as you, but ive been treated differently by my parents with money, and Im the eldest.

All other siblings given more in house deposits (that hurt). No wedding present. It's odd. Ive also been the one to earn the least, single for most of my adult life (only one to buy a property alone, yet siblings "needed" it more).

In my case my mum acts like my sister sometimes.

I think you won't get a straight answer out of your parents, and it's not really about money.

I feel really sorry for your kids, but i don't think you can change them.

I recommend therapy. Just try and get it sorted in your head, and understanding it will hopefully take a bit of the sting out of it

Clearly the relationship with the sisters is also awful otherwise she’d have surely known at some point in the last 6 years about the chairman’s present situation. Obviously there is an enormous amount of information missing

But the car didn’t need petrol 🤯 ; the number of people on MN who struggle with comprehension just baffles me.

I'm sorry OP. What a horrible way to be treated by your parents.

My suggestion was to accept the low contact the parents have already imposed, not to expose the children to that toxicity. I apologise that it wasn't well expressed.

My experience as a parent was that children do what they see, particularly when they become adults. Showing them massive family dust ups and teaching them that it is a thing to disown people can become a rod for our own backs. I am suggesting taking the controls away from the toxic family and quietly setting the terms.

By showing strength and kindness in adversity, we are helping children become resilient. If they grow up to be graceful while preserving their own space the kids might be better prepared for adult life.

In the US, the cultural mores can be very different. In much of the UK reciprocity can be complex. Even returned presents may create a trail of caring sometimes. In the UK, trying to force someone to face how they have hurt you may be surprisingly counterproductive. My dad said people become what we tell them they are.

Chairman should read Christmas!!

I'd be cutting contact to a minimum personally. There's obviously some kind of prejudice involved, and life's too short to play their pathetic games.

A lot of words…

@FakeFinances

I'm just going to raise two points to think about.

1-Political. I'm in the US and I can tell you that there were plenty of Democrats and Republicans within families who got along just fine until Trump and MAGA raised its ugly head. Now many of those families (and friendship groups) are splintered and no longer speak to each other. My estranged DH lost his best friend to MAGA. And many of the 'schisms' happened during Covid as a result of the restrictions and MAGA denial. So think back those 6 years as to whether a rise in right-wing ideology happened then and whether your parents bought into it. Covid denial, 'immigrants brought Covid, and the 'deep state' was a real thing.

2-Paternity. You say you look like your dad. Well, I'm adopted and I as a child I was a dead ringer for one of my maternal aunts (she's not my mum, she couldn't have children either). Now that I'm old(er) I look very much like my late mum. So much so that people who don't know I'm adopted remark on it. I did the Ancestry DNA test as I was curious about my genetic history and it turns out that my biological ancestry is very similar to my mum's, so that may be why there is a similarity in our looks. So don't discount that you might have a different father, especially as it appears your mum was unhappy you raised the issue in some way.

If no one is speaking to you about the specific cause, you may just have to find peace with knowing that you'll never know. And IMHO you are better without them in your life. You'd never have peace and happiness when you and your DC are being treated unfairly.

TLDR; be kind so your kids might learn to be, and dont let cruel people control the narrative peeple will uncover later.