Nannying grandson infant full time, nanny cam, boundaries and advice

The younger generation can be so selfish and self obsessed. They are treating you like a poorly paid servant. Tell them straight that you’re done and watch them self destruct in front of your eyes.

Tell them that you are happy to “help out” but full time childcare is not possible . Your health is suffering. Do they care? You are entitled to your own life, whether that is going out and about or simply chilling and doing nothing. I guess they won’t be happy, but you’re not happy either so fix it.

Oh dear you sound so overwhelmed, rather than enjoying your grandchild. My daughter in law wanted me to look after the 1st grandchild in their house, I did for a short while, said I’ve nothing to do when the child sleeps, my cheeky son left a list for me. The next day I took the child to my house, and told them to pick him up from me, and in future I will look after him at my house. Now all my grandchildren enjoy my house for sitting and staying over. Good luck to you.

Many posts on Gransnet have made me spit out my tea, but this one tops them all, I’m afraid you are going to have to put on your big girls pants and speak to them both calmly and succinctly, this cannot continue you need to be able to be a Grandma not a lowly paid skivvy. Tell them they need to turn off the cam and get a proper nanny at least three days a week, you risk a big fall out but more than that your health both mental and physical cannot go on like this. Best of luck, please let us know what you do.

You are doing far too much and they are.taking advantage of you.

Don't know what your financial situation is If you depend on the money. None of my business

But l would maybe do the cleaning but not look after to the baby.

How many hours cleaning do you do?

Add it up and find out out what the commercial hourly rate would be.
Say it came to £20 and hour for 10 hours. Total £200.

Tell you daughter you want paying the commercial rate if you clean for. her.

Both she and her husband have been mean to you and l m sorry you are so upset.

Let them go into the real world and pay market rates for help

Best Wishes
X

This is truly shocking.
I wouldn’t put up with it and resign.

You know they are taking the pee.

It’s a horrible situation for you, but you must take control.

Let them hire a nanny or whatever.
Feign illness as the reason or whatever.
You will be properly ill if you don’t stop it now.

Unbelievable. First task is to put a blanket over that beep camera!
Do you live near? Is it possible to take baby to your own house?

Farmor15

As far as I know, there is little paid maternity leave in US, so mother tend to go back to work much earlier than in European countries.
So being back at work after only 2 months would not be unusual.

however, is employing one’s mother/parents, without pay and under surveillance usual? legal? moral?

grammiebe if you have another babysitting shift before having the much needed conversation with the parents I suggest starting that shift by covering all the surveillance cameras. That’ll be a good conversation starter for them. Tell them if you need constant video monitoring then they obviously don’t think you’re capable of the job.

Grammiebe, is this for real or a wind up?! I amazed that you had the time or energy to type such a long post. Stop this nonsense immediately! I looked after my grandchildren one day a week and that was hard enough. You’ve done your bit.

Not a chance. I looked after my own 3 full time. I'd offer a couple of days to help but no way would I want to be on camera all day. I'm exhausted for you just reading that.

I'm sorry but I'd be saying this arrangement isn't working for me. I can look after the baby twice a week at my home but the rest of the time you're going to have to arrange other child care. I'm your mother and the baby's grandmother, not an employee. I won't be filmed and if you don't trust me to look after him without you filming me then you can find full time child care for him.

Goodness me, you are being treated as an undervalued servant. You need to consider what is best FOR YOU. Make some notes on the good & bad aspects of your care regime. Decide which elements must change so you can actually enjoy your grandson as well as helping your daughter. The days/hours you WORK (it is work), need to be carefully considered, note down what will work for you going forward. The idea of having part (or all!) of the time in your own house is important to establish, as is the actual hours you can cover - 11 hours daily is far too much. The webcam can be turned off while you are there and your daughter should NEVER request you to wake her son up so she can coo for a few minutes, that's ridiculous. While you are at her house you need to only care for the baby, not do any laundry or cleaning, that's a housekeeper's job! You need to prioritise your own health and welfare, so write out what would allow this arrangement to continue.

How absolutely disgusting for a daughter to treat her mother like this! Surely you were firm at some time with her when she was growing up and set boundaries for her? Now's the time to do it again. Her behaviour is outrageous. It doesn't matter if you think it's mostly the husband. She shouldn't allow her mother to be treated in this way. I'm horrified.

They are not treating you with respect, care or understanding, as so many others have said. And they are family. So I hope you can calmly and simply say to them it is too much and another way has to be found.
I am saying this because I am sure you do not want to alienate your daughter and husband - the consequences of that could be so painful for you.
I am suggesting being straightforward - it really is too much - but not criticising or blaming them. This might feel good in an angry moment but lead to a rift you and all the family would suffer from, maybe for a long time.
I am sure you can pause , take a deep breath, and then handle this with the love and understanding which seem to be a significant part of who you are.

You felt devalued as a child and you are now devaluing yourself. I felt quite angry on your behalf for being such a doormat and that unscrupulous daughter - who should now be looking to make your life easier and her frankly weird husband, should be given a good telling off. Maybe your ‘blabbermouth’ husband should be the one to do it! What do your other kids think?

petra

I couldn’t get past the lack of paragraphs.

Oh, do sit down.

You are obviously in the US, so the advice given above, about telling your daughter to go chase herself may not be appropriate.

Sit her down and tell her nicely two things:

One a full-time nanny looks after a child. She does not, repeat NOT, in any circumstances at all do housework. If your daughter cannot do her own housework after work, with our without her husband's help, they will need to employ someone to do it for them.

Two the nanny cam is going out the window, if she wants you to look after her precious baby. You brought her up, didn't you, satisfactorily, or she would not want you looking after her baby.

If she wants to monitor every blessed minute of her baby's first year, then the answer is simply that she gives up her job and becomes a full-time mum. If they cannot afford that, then they either do as you ask, or find a person who does not feel abused by being observed for ever minute of the day.

Everyone else has given you such good advice which l can’t really add to.
You MUST look after yourself. Tell your daughter tomorrow you will no longer put up with being treated like a slave from her and her son in law. It’s as simple as that. You sound unbelievably kind and loving, and that l’m afraid is why you are taken advantage of.
Don’t let them continue to treat you like this for another minute.

My son has a camera system in the house, which he leaves on when he's not at home. I don't mind when I pop in to feed the cats, but I won't tolerate it on when I'm spending time babysitting the 3 children. He totally understood, and turns it off then.

It sounds like you just need some boundaries. Now!

No weekends, no interuptions, webcam only at certain times or not at all . These new parents who are expecting you to be their slave, do not lay down the law to experienced DGP no way!

What are they trying to see on that spy camera?
Either they trust you with the baby and he's happy and healthy or he's not and the arrangement would stop right away.
As someone said upthread these things are for strangers not for grandparents who love the child.

How would it go if you just handed over this thread for them to read?

Thank you! Yes, looking for tips, tricks and advice. I'm used to the US, so you are delightful!

grammiebe - you may find it interesting browsing around this forum. It's a good way to pass the time! You'll find that not everyone on this site is as polite as you have the impression Btitish and Irish are- though posters do get reprimanded if the make very rude remarks.

Yes, US - they send moms back way too early. So, I can understand wanting to see baby on cam. But maybe at agreed times - and like I said, if she is telling me she watched her dad to make sure he tested the milk temp, then she must be watching me like a hawk. I don't know how she does it at work either. I know they are both having a hard time adjusting to being parents. I think my son-in-law more than my daughter. He has been on his own for many years, so this is a total inconvenience to him. However, he will post on Facebook about what a great Dad he is putting him in a football onesie, and going to church. Ugg. But seriously, and the whole family had a good laugh on this one, it took him 2 months to change a poopy diaper. Like he was scared of it. I was not used to this at all, as my husband was in the trenches since day one. Poop, puke, spit up - didn't bother him a bit. So I had a very hard time understanding where son in law was coming from. He was spoiled by his mother too, she did everything for him. Ok, I'm done complaining. Time to navigate a fair solution and quit talking about them. Thanks for listening though, I appreciate it as I am quite isolated.