commitment

What seems even harder to find are pre/after-school centres that take children to school and pick them up again. Our daughter has found a good one that looks after both her children, but they are far and few between. Without that, she would not be able to continue her job.

I couldn't start work when I came back to UK after 5 years in Kenya. No-one in those unenlightened days would have taken on a teacher who was 5 months pregnant (planned). We were able to afford a mortgage on ex's salary and it wasn't until DS2 was about 20 months that I started teaching evening classes which was an excellent solution. That gradually became substatial part-time work in FE and AdEd which helped to keep the wolf from the door. Eventually, I achieved a full time job, but nothing like I could have had if I'd continued to work full time when bringing up the boys. Nor do I have a full teacher's pension because all that FE part-time work was not superannuable. But...on the plus side, I have a great relationship with my DSs and their partners.

why cant they have government run nurseries from age one year upwards. the government want all women to work and pay into the system.
This would create jobs and give the little ones a good start, as long as it was not compulsory it would work and it would have to be free of course paid for by the taxpayer. The economy would benefit in the long term as the children would be more receptive to education when arriving at school.

I believe this is what they do in scandanavian countries.

Iam64 the key words are good childcare provision. If we had nurseries where the childcare was provided by really well trained staff not some of the ones I've seen. I've been into plenty of nurseries and generally felt I wouldn't want my child in any of those. I've also had to keep quiet when faced with taking and collecting on behalf of DDs.

mcem - thanks for your post, I agree, children are the responsibility of both their parents, and father's are certainly not "baby sitting" for the children's mother if they are caring for their own children.

I feel this thread is taking an unpleasant anti working parents/mother tone, something grandparents would be better to avoid where possible. These are very different social and economic times than they were when mortgage lenders assumed women would soon have children and give up work, so would lend only on one salary (i.e. the man's). I'm in the north west, where property and rental is so much cheaper than in the south east. It's still difficult for young families to manage without two incomes. The Scandinavian countries don't have this bias about women working, they seem to function with good child care provision and parents much more likely to share child care responsibilities. what's not to like?

No etheltbags you must look after yourself! No one could expect you to put your health and recovery at risk, and I'm sure your family wouldn't want that.

When we aimed for a mortgage the lenders would not lend on my salary only on DH's as the assumption was I would have a family and therefore stop working for several years. To many young families they get a massive mortgage and then are in a mess when they have a child and don't factor in childcare. Both my DDs spend enormous chunks of earnings on childcare. I didn't have children to put them out for other people to bring up and have been very unimpressed with some of the childcare I have seen. My DGS had had pneumonia and some weeks later I went to pick him up from the childminder and he had been put in a pushchair in the garage. This was winter and he had had pneumonia and this was a highly praised and recommended childminder.

* nightowl* I would do the same as you to help my little family, I am considering back to babysitting in 4 weeks instead of the 6 weeks recommended, just hope I feel ok.

If having enough money for one parent to give up work was the criteria that had to be met before anyone could consider having children then only the rich/well off would ever have families Stansgran. My first DGD (9) was unplanned, however her arrival sparked a renewed lease of our entire family including my parents (her GGP's) and my grandma (her GGG).

Things were tough as neither my DS or DDiL have very well paid jobs so neither could give up work. However with the help of myself and tax credits to help with nursery fees they have managed okay. Sometimes even the best made plans go wrong and you just have to muddle through.

I'm sure in your position Nightowl most of us would help as much as we can. that's a very different scenario and hopefully not one that will happen to most people.

No criticism from me Stansgran, but just to put the other side - things don't always go according to plan however much you try. DGS was not planned but has turned out to be the best accident ever to happen to our family (both sides). I'm not sure what DD and SIL would have done without help from us and other family members in their particular circumstances. And now, five years later, DD and SIL, aged 29 and 34 respectively, have out of the blue become live in carers with a very uncertain future as well as both working full time. I would hate to think they can never have a home of their own, or another child just because they are not, strictly speaking, in a position to be completely independent. Will I do whatever I can to take some of the burden off their shoulders? You bet, until I'm on my knees and unable to do it any longer.

I am going to get flamed here but i had two children purely by choice courtesy of the Pill. They were planned and we understood that they would have to be looked after by us no one else as my DM had an ageing and demanding family and MIL had a very difficult teenage son. They both looked on time with my children as a break and they were treated like honoured guests. Money was very very tight and The Paupers cookbook never closed. Why is it suddenly so possible to have children without any forward planning?

ethelt my first reaction to your post was that DGd's dad shouldn't be grumbling as he is equally responsible, whether he likes it or not.
If I read your post correctly, it's his parents who are off on holiday.

BUT then I had to remind myself that my own DD was in a very similar position with her now ex-partner.
If left with the children for a (very short) time he'd mutter about babysitting for her!
Now they're apart and the children are older he's actually better at parenting - has them 2 nights most weeks, takes them swimming.
Still don't like his sexist and self-centred attitudes but DD feels she has little choice.

From a selfish point of view I'm needed a little less but it's difficult to get GC duties on a regular, predictable basis as he always chooses times/days to suit himself.
I always consult with DD and other GP's before booking a holiday and work round them.
A holiday for me is a 5 day break not a long spell away.
This summer I'm having 2 breaks of 5 days each - one with the DGC's!!
Now your DD has settled this problem I hope your recovery stays on course and you'll be back to enjoying your quality time with DGD before too long.

My husband is of the opinion that people who have never taken on commitment in their lives can become rather odd and self centered in their old age. He has several golfing friends who have never had children and he finds their lives, which appear to revolve completely around themselves somewhat lacking. One of these friends not only doesn't have children, has also never married, in spite of having quite a number of "lady" friends. My husband loves his golf but has always had a great sense of "family" and is only a 5 day member at his club. Unattached friend was trying to persuade him to become 7 day member, said he missed a lot by not coming up the club at week-ends. Husband tells me that he tried explaining to friend, "I have a wife, 3 children, a widowed d-i-law and 5 grandchildren which I like to see at week-ends, (not all at once) if I played golf seven days a week there wouldn't be any time left to spend with the family". Apparently the friend's brow furrowed as if he was speaking in a strange forked tongue as none of this resonated with him at all. Life, at it's best, is all about balance, which sadly can't always be achieved.

Excellent post nightowl and my thoughts exactly. Families should help each other. One of the reasons I am so close to my own dear grandma is that I remember how she looked after us when we were children. It is now payback time and I am happy to do it. even if she does drive me nuts sometimes

ethelbags1 I can see two sides here. We look after our DGC 2-3 days every week including an overnight. We have done since they were only weeks old and they are now 9,7 and 5. Before they went to school they attended nursery for the other three days (my DS and DDiL received tax credits to help pay for this as neither of them have a good wage).

My DiL's parents are very lucky and have 10+ holidays every year. They wouldn't worry about whether they should look after the DGC they enjoy their life and do what they want when they want.

I on the other hand very rarely have a holiday and when we do have a few days away we normally have the DGC in tow anyway.

Who is right?

I cannot blame the other GP's for having lots of holidays. they are very lucky and I am a tiny bit jealous if the truth were told. At the end of the day I chose to look after the DGC. I wasn't hoodwinked into it. On the other hand because DS and DDiL rely on me heavily for childcare I think it would only be fair and polite to give them as much notice as possible if we were unable to do so for whatever reason.

I agree with a lot of these comments but to refer to the OP, which was commitment. I do think that if you commit to child minding then you should stick to it unless illness or other serious change of circumstances.
DD has now got childcare covered by her partner taking time off for the next week but he is a very demanding person and will take every opportunity to remind her of what he has done and will be critical for the next few days as he really didn't want to be off work at that particular time

We are lucky to have just 2 days a week caring for DGS2, who is an absolute joy, and we have built up a great relationship with him. Perhaps the "seen as the one who tells him off" scenario applies with older children (DGS2 is only 23 months old), but we haven't had that yet. We are as grateful for the chance to be such a close part of his life as my DD2 and SIL are to us for helping out. Saying that, we are never taken for granted and always feel appreciated, and we can "take time off" when we want to. I would always give a couple of months notice though - two weeks is very inconsiderate, IMHO, unless it were a genuine emergency. And because of our schedule, we can always fit in long weekends on our free days.

Reading some of the posts on this thread, I feel that we are very fortunate indeed. Hats off to anyone who has committed to so much childcare that they can't enjoy their own retirement. I don't think I could do it. Or to those managing on their own, or who have commitments to care for their own partners and/or parents as well.

night owl - I think you make good points which I don't disagree with. I also sympathise with MamaCaz's posts, some of which resonates with me, my husband also older than me, raised one family before we got together, was a young father first time around, father again with ours mid and late 40s and then became a very strong presence, still is, in first set of gc who live fairly near, when his son their father died. He tells me he sometimes feels that he has been bringing up children for the whole of his adult life in between running a business. I absolutely defend his stance on "we should be free to do our own thing now" that's not to say he doesn't want to see our gc often, but absolutely rules anything out "set in stone" We have our gd for a whole day at week-ends, I sometimes feel knackered afterwards. The other grandparents do much more than us, but they are younger and I have no intention of trying to match them. We lead fairly full lives, my husband plays golf 3 times a week and do a lot together going up to London for exhibitions visiting NT places and we do go away quite a lot I suppose. I think my husband gets annoyed with the presumption that our son and partner presume that we are sitting around with nothing better to do, plus it's our "duty attitude" to be there when required. I think if I had more energy I would do more with the children, posted about this subject on hypothyroidism thread. Children can't always understand that we have been their age, but they have yet to reach our age and tiredness can sometimes take over. I can see from a lot of what has been said here, that the unforeseen happens with grandparents and child care and the grandparents worry about what will happen when they can't continue to child mind. I imagine that it's doubly difficult if there are also aged parents that need time and care. Ours are now dead but we both needed to spend time with our respective parents when they were alive a few years ago.

I've been the squeezed middle, with elderly parents needing daily support, grandchildren needing care/escort to school etc, teenage children still in school and a full time job. I look back in wonder that I somehow got through without the wheel coming off. In my case the care of grandchildren wasn't due to parents working sadly.

I agree with night owl about the way families look out for each other and share the care of children but this shouldn't be at the expense of the health and well being of family members. Like others here, I know a number of grandparents whose own health has been ground down by the demands of caring for grandchildren whilst their parents work. I feel for Tegan and think ginny is right, grandparents, ideally, need to be exactly that, grandparents rather than substitute parents. My parents were fantastic stand ins when neither of us could take time off work when the children were ill but I wouldn't have dreamed of asking them to be full time carers.

I have several friends and acquaintances who have taken on this role willingly at first. They are now realising how restricting it is on their lives . They are retired but really still working. When other friends and I are talking about places we have been and clubs and societies we enjoy they are saying ' oh, we can't do that because of the children'. A number of them also find that like* Tegan* their contact with DGC is seen as a job ( albeit an unpaid one in most cases) and they miss out on just enjoying their DGC.

Having said all that, grown up children have to understand that we are getting older, and we may simply reach a point (as my mother did) when we are not up to doing it any longer. They should be able to accept that with a good grace when the time comes, and if they can't then they haven't learnt by example

I am going to make a very controversial point here but it is my view that by helping to look after our grandchildren, to whatever extent our health and circumstances permit, we are setting an example to our grown up children of how families work in the long term. We are all getting older, and will at some point be dependent on our children to either care for us or at least make sure we are cared for properly in our very old age. Although the childcare I provide is given freely, with no expectations, I would hope that it has been one factor in helping my children (who were also looked after by grandparents) form the view that families look after one another from cradle to grave, as I did

Ginny: I certainly won't shoot you down for saying that. I would have said the same thing myself until I found myself in this situation, and don't disagree with you at all.
However, having started this, it's very difficult to end the commitment knowing how much DS and DiL will struggle financially, even though I never said that I would do it forever.

Annsixty: I don't think that we have really gone away from commitment, have we? The situation I described is all part of that commitment, and describes some of the potential (perhaps unforseen) consequences of it from a grandparents' point of view. That was my intention, anyway, though I must admit that my posts do tend to get a little long-winded sometimes.

I think most people do go into it wilingly and with no illusions but, when circumstances change [which they always will] it often results in resentment. I really don't know what my relationship with my DD is any more other than the fact that, now that I'm not childminding I don't seem to have any sort of role within the family at all.