Opinions on offer to watch grandchild

In My Humble Opinion
1

I’ll try to keep this short.

My daughter and her husband had a child in June. My daughter is preparing to return to work this month. She will work mostly evenings and weekends, and from noon to 9 on Mondays. She lives 2 suburbs away but works in our suburb. It is a 10 minute drive, maybe 20 in traffic. The husband/father works days, and gets home around 5:30.

Her husband’s parents live in the same burb as my daughter. They have offered to watch the baby during the weekday evenings until the father gets home, but could not do the Mondays. The Mondays were the most difficult time for my daughter to arrange childcare. We would have been very happy and able to watch the baby from 4-5:30 Monday-Thursday.

We told our daughter we’d be willing to watch our grandchild on the Mondays. I work at home Mondays, and would be able to handle the first couple of hours by flexing my lunch, and my wife would be available from 2 on. However, we told her that we wanted to do it in our home, rather than us driving to their home.

We were a little surprised at the strength of my daughter’s expressed preference in response that she preferred that we travel to their home, rather than them bringing their daughter to our home. We left the conversation with her saying she would discuss it with her husband. We weren’t expecting her to gush over the generosity of our offer, but we thought we were not being selfish in what we proposed, and were a little surprised that she did not welcome it more readily.

Yes, we understand that it takes more effort to transport a baby than an adult, but we are prepared to obtain a portable crib and provide other necessities for caring in our home, and think it is not unreasonable for the parents, rather than the caregivers, to do the travel.

I’m very content with what we have offered, and don’t feel any great desire to explain/convince/argue with my daughter and her husband. Nor do I really want to commit to a considerably greater commitment to care for their child on a regular basis. My suspicion is that some element of her response reflects the emotions of a new parent facing the prospect of leaving her child when she returns to work.

Just wondering what humble opinions you all might have.

2

As a single-mom without a local support network, I say this kindly - your daughter is a nut. :slight_smile:

But maybe she’s being a nut because she told the other grandparents that they couldn’t watch the kid in their home (maybe they’re messy or have an unruly dog or something), and now she feels stuck if she drives the kid to your house.

I wouldn’t change the offer if I were you. It would be harder for you and your wife to share the care and for you to work at your daughter’s house.

(Unless you’re the one with the messy house/unruly dog?)

3

Just to get this straight, your current proposal is that you and your wife would watch the grandchild on Monday, and the husband’s parents would watch the baby the rest of the week? When the husband’s parents will be watching the baby, will they do it in their own home, or go to your daughter/their son’s house to do so?

I would ask your daughter why she would prefer you come over to watch the baby. There might be reasonable things about a schedule or something, that you could at least address how you’d accommodate it. Or she might have reasons that seem silly to you, but you could address them without pointing out their silliness.

It sounds like you made a nice offer, I hope you get it worked out.

4

My SIL insisted on this with my parents and both her kids. It was a pain for my mom, especially during the winter (she was retired by this time so there wasn’t an issue with her schedule).

Once the girls got to be less dependent on STUFF - once they just needed to come with diapers, wipes and a change of clothes - well, now there is hardly a time when the kids aren’t at my mom’s house.

I can empathize with the situation…especially with your first kid. You’re inundated with the idea that babies need tons of accessories. And they won’t be able to function without their favorite stuff. And what if they need Rarely Used But Still In Our House Item X and it’s not available? What if mom’s house isn’t clean enough? What if the 20 diapers you brought for the day aren’t enough? What if they really want the stuffed lion and you only brought the stuffed panda? WHY DON’T YOU JUST COME HERE?! :wink:

It might seem like a no-brainer to the seasoned parent that the kid only needs a Pack-n-play and a diaper bag, and something safe to gnaw on. But I think first-time parents feel best when the baby is safe at home in Baby Land and everything is right at hand.

At least that’s my take on it. I am not a parent but everyone I know is, and this is coming from what I’ve observed over the past 5 years.

As for what you should do, I dunno. My mom just went along with it because she’s terrified of being shut out some way (not realistic). But since it’s your own daughter maybe you have more room to push.

5

My wife and I are first time parents of a now 6 month old and when she returned to work full time our original plan was to have my mother provide childcare on Monday’s and we’d pay for a childcare provider the rest of the week. That plan didn’t survive to the date when my wife went back to work. One of the issues was my mother expected to have our baby at her home. Of course there were other reasons we opted instead to go with 5-day a week childcare but to speculate on your question:

The new parent thing - although we trust my mother, we also know her home is not-quite-pathologic hoarding but it is cluttered. She also has several dogs and cats. Not gonna lie, we worried about allergens from dust and pet dander. Are we probably being overly sensitive to the risks? Yep, probably. Tough, we’re the parents and we reserve the right to be as unrealistic as we want. :wink:

Logistic thing - we really wanted to keep things as simple as possible logistically for us. Our baby is at our home 24x7 on the weekends and of course mornings, evenings, and at night during the week before and after time spent in childcare. If my mother was going to provide childcare on Monday’s, we wanted it in our home. It simplified things for us, it meant my mother didn’t have to obtain redundant items like a crib/pack-n-play, formula and bottles, toys, etc., or we didn’t have to lug them around. It also kept things fairly consistent for our baby. She is either at home, or at her daycare. There wasn’t any additional environment we had to worry about at this early stage. That may not seem like a big deal to you as a grandparent but a.) new parents aren’t always rational and b.) we admittedly selfishly felt this made everything easier for us and our baby.

I also wonder if the “other grandparents” may have been told i must be in the parent’s home for a very valid reason and although your daughter doesn’t have the same concerns about you they feel they need to be consistent to avoid damaging their relationship between the husband and his parents, etc. If my in-laws lived in town and wanted our baby for the day we’d have no reservations except how it would appear my mother.

Anyway, just my 2 cents…

6

The in-laws will be going to my daughter’s house. Not sure why they decided that, but they do live MUCH closer, the guy is retired… I’m not interested in “comparing” with what the in-laws want to do - they can decide what is best for them as are we. We get along very well with the in-laws.

No one involved has a horribly messy/dangerous home. Everyone has dogs.

Yeah, I know my daughter might “wish” for things to be different, but I strongly believe that she and her husband made the decision to start a family, and they have to be realistic about bearing the costs of having done so. Neither I nor my wife are about to be shamed or blackmailed into doing anything we find uncomfortable. In just about every respect, we have a great relationship with our daughter. We see her several times a week, discuss just about anything with her, etc. Last weekend we went out of town with their family - we bore all costs other than their gas. I think a fine time was had by all.

Our main considerations are:

-Neither my wife nor I are overly eager to do any driving in rush hour traffic. Even 10-20 minutes in Chicago-area can be pretty unpleasant. Someone is going to have to make the drive in any event - we’d just as soon have it be my daughter and the husband. If we are selfish/unreasonable in not wanting to make the drive, why aren’t they selfish/unreasonable for the same reason?

-In fact, since my wife and I would be essentially pulling swing shifts, I’d have to drive over and back for the first shift, and my wife over and back for the second. Thereby, we would be doing twice the driving our SIL would have to do.

-Simply being out of our home the entire time is A LOT more inconvenient. For example, we couldn’t do simple chores around our house - either while the kid is awake or napping. Moreover, we REALLY LIKE our house. We have it set up exactly as we wish, know where everything is, etc. We simply prefer to be in our house/yard, than a visitor in someone else’s.

-Finally, we think there is some importance in my daughter and her husband recognizing and having to deal with the costs/demands of parenting. I don’t want this to sound like we’re going out of our way to “teach her a lesson”. But we raised our kids, and made all the decisions about which of us would work when, what childcare we would use, and the impact on our household finances. My daughter and her husband are adults with a house and a family. They are both employed at jobs they enjoy, but which do not pay terribly highly. We are EXTREMELY eager to ASSIST them and to play an active, ongoing role in their and our grandchild’s lives, but we do not want to SUBSIDIZE them in leading a lifestyle they cannot afford.

I haven’t done any calculations, but we give them cash for birthdays and x-mas that I’m pretty sure would go a long way towards childcare. Of course, we do not ask, nor do we care, what they spend it on. Just trying to give a full picture. We also anticipate putting some money away that could be used for the kid’s education. Both of our families have historically strongly supported education. We think it very important. We will not be giving them enough money to pay for 4-years of college.

I don’t want to write a dissertation, and I know this could come across as selfish, but at this point in our lives, my wife and I are cognizant of how extensive of obligations we wish to take on in order to allow my daughter to work part-time at a relatively low-paying job. You might think us lousy parents, but our thought-out conclusion is that we are being more helpful in encouraging our daughter to acknowledge and personally address such factors.

7

I wouldn’t agonize over this. You made a reasonable offer that would help them out and work for you. They can accept, or figure something else out. No need for hurt feelings or drama anywhere.

8

I watch my infant grandson on Sundays as both my son and dil have jobs that require them to work most Sundays. And when they aren’t working, I still watch the baby to give them a chance to do some adult things. My grandson was a 25-week preemie, and when he was finally able to come home, he came home with a lot of ‘things’, including oxygen tanks, minimal exposure to unfamiliar germs, and a requirement for constant surveillance while he was sleeping. Because of this equipment, plus the proximity of both parents’ workplaces to their home, and the hospital (should there be an emergency) was only 6 blocks away, all babysitting had to be done at their home. I understood that and was totally on board.

Now that he is 7 months old and doing well, and needs no more equipment than the average child, they usually bring him to be (about a 10 min drive away). A few weeks back, though, when he was running a slight fever, I watched him at their house.

All of this took a series of conversations and compromises between the parents and myself in the weeks before he came home from the hospital. We had the game plan in place and had the issues hammered out in advance, which simplified everything and minimized arguments.

You might want to ask the parents if there is a real reason they need you to watch the baby in their home. Perhaps there is and they just haven’t thought to tell you about it. But if not, let them know how much easier it would be for you to do the job in your home and let them know what prepartions and/or changes you are willing to make to accommodate the child. It could all be a matter of insufficient understanding.

Ultimately, it should be your daughter who does the bending, as you are doing her a favor. I’m sure you enjoy spending time with the baby (I know I do with my little fellow), but it is disruptive of your life and your daughter should appreciate that fact.

I didn’t have any family near when my sons were little and there were times that forced me to make some difficult choices. Your daughter is very fortunate to have you near and willing to help.

9

I have a couple of little ones (5 years and 5 months).

I say do whatever you are comfortable with. If you don’t want to go to their house, then don’t. They can get a nanny or whatever if they don’t want the baby to leave the house. (We ended up doing this, although partly because infant daycare is rare in our area.) I recommend care.com.

You’re offering to do them a favor, and a really nice one too. They can either accommodate you in your perfectly reasonable requests or decide the favor’s not for them this time. Their choice. If she doesn’t take you up on it, no big deal.

Unless, as stillowned points out, there is a legitimate medical need – then I could see being a little more flexible to help them out… but… I also suspect it’s just first-time parent overwhelmedness. Which is fine! I remember what it was like to be a first-time parent, and it is overwhelming! (And, like I said, we did end up getting the nanny.) But they need to learn to deal with it.

Add me to the choir that thinks your daughter is very lucky to have you nearby and willing to help out.

10

It’s far more inconvenient for the two of you to be away from your home than for the baby to be away from hers.

11

I agree. If your daughter says that you can only watch on Mondays if you come over, explain why that won’t work for you, and let her know that the offer is still open if she changes her mind in the future about bringing the baby to your house. No one is crazy or selfish, you just have different responsibilities and priorities.

12

You made the offer, she can accept it or leave it and she ought not be upset about it not being the offer she wishes it were.

On the other hand, you ought not be upset if she rejects it. If she feels like your house is too dangerous (and parents can be really, really paranoid) or too chaotic or whatever, and so would rather not accept the offer, that’s on her. She’s allowed to prefer to pay for a mother’s day out or something.

13

Thanks for all the feedback. Yeah, I’m pretty comfortable in the “accept it or not” camp. I think my wife tends to “analyze” relational dynamics such as this more than I.

Update, wife received a text from daughter apologizing for coming across so “entitled” (her word, not ours), in the phone call, and saying that she is finding returning to work harder than she had anticipated. Did not accept our offer, but I imagine she will when she has the chance to discuss w/ SIL. I think we raised a pretty good kid.

Meanwhile, I’m off to celebrate the apparently unprecedented situation that I have posted something here having to do with my family and NO ONE has chimed in to say my wife or I were totally off base, clueless, evil, etc! :wink:

14

I get where the daughter is coming from. Hauling a baby back and forth is a pain in the ass when you have to schedule around their sleeping and feeding times. It’s a hell of a lot easier if someone can just show up and take over.

On the other hand, both my parents and in-laws live much too far away to consider as an option for daily childcare. If drop off and pick up at one of their houses 20 minutes away for free childcare was available, we’d sign up for that in a heartbeat.

15

Not going to look for a cite, but as I understand it, allergies are now thought to be the bodies response to not enough exposure to various things when young. So exposing the little darling to dog and cat hair regularly may be a good thing. Or not - as you said, your kid, your rules.

Not So Mean Joe

16

This, more or less. I’m not a single parent, but we have a nine month old in a city 2500 miles away from our closest relatives. If anyone we trust offers to watch him, we’ll deliver that child damn near anywhere within driving distance, and we’ll do it with a smile.

Good luck working it out!

17

Your whole family sounds weirdly inflexible. It’s probably best if the parents hire someone for this task so they can fire the person when things don’t go exactly as they please and not cause a family rift.

18

I think you should accommodate them if you can for the short term based on an agreement that you’ll discuss this again after a few months. Right now your daughter’s life is stressful, give her time to adjust to the baby and the return to work. However, if she’s the type that has her mind made up and won’t honestly reconsider maybe you just have to say no.

19

There ya go! Thanks! :smiley:

20

Hopefully, you will have 18+ years to help out with the baby. Assuming your daughter isn’t impoverished, finding someone to take do home childcare is a relatively easy task compared to all the other things she’ll be asking favors for in the future. You have your boundaries too, and this is as good a time as any to stand firmly on them. The fact that she is “picky” about whom comes to whom indicates that she’s not in a desparate situation.