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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To think it's unreasonable to expect Grandparents to live with you for a week every other week after having twins?

184 replies

Annthecat · 09/11/2008 21:41

My DB and wife have told my Mum they 'expect this commitment level' from her, and she is now very worried as this will take over her life.

She will have to travel and stay with them from sunday to saturday and they expect her to go and help every other week (and SIL's mother to go the alternate weeks).

Now, they do have a toddler also, so twins is going to be very hard, and they will need support. but they do have a part time nanny and my mum offered to go and stay once a month but was told this was not enough.

Is it unreasonable to expect a grandmothet to devote half her time to supporting? My mum has a busy and happy life in many clubs and seeing frinds which would have to go, or be very curtailled.

What do you think? My Mum is very anxious about being seen as a disnitersted Gp if she doesn't agree to this.

She was told that 'people they know with twins ahve had this commitment from Gp's.'

Would this be normal or expected?

OP posts:
Turniphead1 · 10/11/2008 11:58

I do hope your mother was fully part of the decision to conceive these twins - given that they are now, somehow, her responsibility

Haven't read the whole thread, but short of some he said/she said kind of misunderstanding as to how your Mother was actually asked to help out, I cannot see how your DB and SiL are being anything other than unreasonable.

Aside from anything, they are having twins (which I understand is a massive understaking) - not sextuplets...and sounds like they will have plenty of help with the nanny/mat nurse/mothers halp/fireman/butcher.... I wouldn't want that many people staying with me for that long.

Hope your Mum sticks to her guns and they realise they are somewhat overegging the pudding in terms of the help needed to raise twins.

avaTsar · 10/11/2008 12:03

They aren't born yet though?

Sounds like some mad illogical thing people say in these sitautions. A knee jerk reaction to 'god how will we ever cope?!' Probably eveyone will look back and laugh at it in years to come. And they will cope and will want to do so alone for the main part.

It's like the crazy build up to weddings that we see from bridezillas. It's just steam and stress.

squiffy · 10/11/2008 12:14

Well, if your mum agrees to every other week, then the good news is that your SIL will have enough spare time on her hands to come round to my house and sort out my AP's - they deffo need soemone this scary to get the ironing into shape

BTW, I think SIL is struggling menatlly here, and control-freakery is probably her default response, so the option chosen by her DM of "I will of course do whatever is needed to support you" sounds like the correct response for your DM.

Original poster
Annthecat · 10/11/2008 12:27

Well, my Mum has spoken to DB and it went well.

She said she couldn't given that much comitment but would go once a month and do any 'extras' they needed as they arose.

She asid she wasn't physically up to it and that she wanted to enjoy her time with the children as well as help.

Db was very nice apparently, said the help offered would be loevly and just asked if she could also stay on a saturady when she came down and she said she could.

Mum seems happy all is resolved and happier that this attitude of saying what she will/won't do a much better way forward with SIL than the tyring to please her route.

I think my Mum is coming to terms with the realisation that SIL may not like always getting her own way but she will have to acept it sometimes. Like the reat of us.

OP posts:
mrsleroyjethrogibbs · 10/11/2008 12:31

well done your mum for standing up for herself. I think sometimes siblings need to know where they stand and just how far they can push it

mumof2222222222222222boys · 10/11/2008 12:39

They are quite incredible - especially now OP has told us that her mum is not in the best of health. I have a friend (in her 60s) whose daughter had unreasonable demands (for one child, very pfb) and moved to live almost next door to her. It put huge strain on Granny, and once the set up was "working" it was very hard to extract herself from the committment.

Good luck to your mum, and I hope the rest of the family get a little perspective.

AnnVan · 10/11/2008 13:27

Godd grief YANBU at all. This is shocking and quite digusting IMO - he obviously has no respect for your mum at all 'he expects this level of commitment'??WTF?? they're HIS kids it was HIS choice your mum shouldn't have to pay the price and be treatd like a slave to boot. Oh my god...

merryberry · 10/11/2008 13:32

rheumatoid arthritis? fnck me! i have this and have to ration myself to activities. it curtails my life a fair bit, even though well managed, just the drugs make me poorly for the 2 days each week after i take them. insisting on physical work from someone with this when there is food on the table and a roof over their heads is thoughtless, selfish and inexcusable.

merryberry · 10/11/2008 13:34

oops, sorry to vent, i see now that this is solved. good on your mum, and i wish her much joy and the ability to help her family as much as she wishes withou being made to feel bad!

PrettyCandles · 10/11/2008 13:40

They 'expect this commitment level' from her? You expect that sort of committment level from the parents or their employee. FGS she's the granma! Her job is to support, love and spoil. Not to be 'committed'.

Outrageous IMO. Especially the expectation, rather than a request. And for how long is this arrangment to go on? Will she be given notice of her redundancy when they no longer need her? Will they then travel to visit her, or will she be expected to visit them?

georgimama · 10/11/2008 13:41

Good on your mum.

I think this thread needs to go on MN classics, they only AIBU thread in which not one poster thought the OP was unreasonable.

PrettyCandles · 10/11/2008 13:43

I didnt read the thread before posting.

ilovemydogandPresidentObama · 10/11/2008 16:41

They really have an 'on call' list? That's hillarious. They are running their family like a business.

BTW, are they managers? They speak manager talk: 'level of commitment...' and organizing stuff way in advance and expecting your mom to work despite being ill.

Original poster
Annthecat · 10/11/2008 18:19

To be fair they don't actually have an 'on call' list that was more my Mum's terminology to say she is happy to step in when needed.

They are not managers but solicitors with a highly litigious steak in thier personal lives also.

My SIL is very assertive and very clear about her boundaries about what she will and will not do, which is fine except it seems to be combined with a large degree of self absorbtion and control freakery and when those around her tend to be more laid back pleaser types it does eventually start to feel like you are just dancing to her tune all the time.

I think mu Mum has finally decided that she needs to be equally assertive herself to readdress the balance, which I think will be a good thing in the long run.

OP posts:
avaTsar · 10/11/2008 18:47

Oh dearie me I fear your SIL is going to have to go with the flow much more when the twins arrive. If she is assertive wait until she hears dt's asserting themselves.

ilovemydogandPresidentObama · 10/11/2008 19:11

Good for your mom, but when did grandparents become unpaid help?

It's a genuine question, as I would never dream of asking my mother, let alone my mil to do unpaid child care on a regular basis.

Yes, mil will help out for a few hours here and there if I ask, but usually I wouldn't ask unless really really desperate.

Podrick · 10/11/2008 19:18

Presumably 2 solicitors could afford a full time nanny?

Original poster
Annthecat · 10/11/2008 19:30

They have a part time nanny, 3 days a week, who is apparently unable to incrase her hours (has a duagter of her own).

But I wouldn't want that job, whatever they are paying!

Apparently they are very skint too and very worried about money with having the twins and unsure how they will cope. SIL is worrying about how she will clothe them.

I don't know, but I imagine solicitors in London earn just about enough to clothe their children?

OP posts:
georgimama · 10/11/2008 19:31

My mother has DS every Wednesday and DN every Monday. No one asked her to do this, I constantly check that it is not getting too much for her, and if ever for any reason, even not a "good" reason, she rang me up and said she couldn't have him that would be fine. She has saved us a lot of money and I am nothing but grateful for it.

She was my birth partner and stayed overnight the night after I came home from hospital, then came during the day to help me by doing housework/cooking dinner for a week.

Then she went to Australia for a month to visit my brother We were well and truly on our own.

LadyBuntingofCupcake · 10/11/2008 19:38

So their budget will not stretch to a live-in arse wiper too Ann?

NorbertDentressangle · 10/11/2008 19:47

at what SIL was expecting of your poor mum.

Glad DB was OK when your Mum spoke to him though.

My Mums friend is the Grandmother of triplets and even she (and the other Grandmother) didn't help out that much. Her DS and DIL wouldn't have expected or wanted it.

Original poster
Annthecat · 10/11/2008 19:49

no ladybunting I belive they may just have to wipe thier own arses.

I don't know how they'll manage though what with having twins and everything.

OP posts:
Bubbaluv · 10/11/2008 19:50

Ann, Based on this thread, could you say to DB/SIL that you have now spoken to many people who have had multiples and the consensus was that this was way too much to ask?

Pigstyle · 10/11/2008 19:51

Oh dear
Your poor Mum....good on her for laying out her tems and maybe DB does have ball after all (I was convinced he didn't at beginning of the thread)

IMHO-the more help people get,the more they need so the sooner they learn to "cope" with ONLY the nanny and Mother's help the better.

Original poster
Annthecat · 10/11/2008 21:28

OK, update...
DB phoned my Mum back this evening, after obviously being instructed by SIL, to ask my Mum 'it what way she was ill and how ill?' and then explain that thye really needed this support at least for the first 3 months and would she reconsider? So my Mum has agreed to go down for a week fornightly for 3 months and then monthly.

She seems Ok with this but I am fuming at DB for challenging my MUm about her illness. I think they have handled it really badly.

OP posts: