Enslaved grandparent syndrome

It is time this problem had a name. It is in essence a form of elder abuse. I agree M0nica and IMO the thread title is an appropriate one.

Sarnia

I wouldn't have missed a second of helping out with my 9 GC.
Come September I will have a GS in his final year at College and 3 GD's in secondary school. I have a wonderful relationship with them and would have missed so much had I not been so involved. Their parents have been able to use the tens of thousands of pounds I have saved them in free childcare in other ways to benefit their families. It has kept me going and now it is all slowing down as they grow and become more independent, I will miss it.

But this thread is not about grand child care given willingly and with love. It is about grandparents, often ill and/or disabled being forced into childcare, way beyond what they can safely manage by threats of estrangement of or other by AC.

We get so many threads of this nature on GN. It is time this problem had a name. It is in essence a form of elder abuse.

We said we would be there when needed as we had no desire to commit to a set timetable. This worked well for us but their other granny went part time and had them one afternoon a week.
Now they have emigrated and realise that school holidays in Australia are totally different to here. Consequently other granny is there now for three weeks for child care and is booked to go again in January, their long holidays. We are going out in November, we hope, so will offer school pickups and support but we refuse to live our lives around the girls. Our energy levels are diminishing , especially OH , and our bank balance is limited for long haul travel.

I wouldn't have missed a second of helping out with my 9 GC.
Come September I will have a GS in his final year at College and 3 GD's in secondary school. I have a wonderful relationship with them and would have missed so much had I not been so involved. Their parents have been able to use the tens of thousands of pounds I have saved them in free childcare in other ways to benefit their families. It has kept me going and now it is all slowing down as they grow and become more independent, I will miss it.

In 60s when GS and GD appeared and had retired. Families not living nearby. No regular childminding but what I did was go stay with family and bring GC home with me for a couple of weeks and then take them back. They loved the plane trips. I don't think I would have been prepared to be a constant chijdminder. I had no parents availablecwhen my kids were young and I managed albeit stressful at times. Also husband's work necessitated him working away with no regular hours or schedule. He was able to book his days off but not his working hours. I do feel a lot of younger generation just do not know how to cope (or want to) with stressful situations.

I think its a bit of an unpleasant terminology but also a fact of life for many. My MiL does the daily school runs for her youngest grandchildren as well as looking after them a couple of nights a week and taking them on a summer holiday. I think it gives her days purpose and she loves being around them so it works.
My DH and I have GC but as we both still both work full time its not an option for us to help out except at weekends.
Many of us are having to work longer so I wonder if this 'enslaved grandparent' will not be a thing in years to come since we will not be retired to be able to do it?

My exact thoughts luckygirl. Our first GS lived with us and we brought him up due to mental health issues with DD. He moved out aged27! Second GC we had 3 days a week and helped with school runs. After that they came along very fast and I now have 12! During this time my LH health deteriorated and I had to take the decision to take a step back. It did cause some issues. DS became defensive because we saw some GC and helped more and couldn’t understand when I explained DD unfortunately became a single parent, whereas his wife didn’t work and was a full time mom! Thankfully all is forgotten now but I have made it clear that I will always help out when necessary but since loosing my DH I have no desire to do full time child care. After nursing my husband who eventually succumbed to dementia I feel completely burned out. I would not have the patience or energy anymore. But I still love all my GC and enjoy their visit and messages. It really is a very personal choice.

When offering to help it is worth remembering that what you are able to do for one GC might present a problem when there are 2 then 3 ... and in my case 7! How to be fair???

I have five grandchildren under five, in three families. It was easy peasy and pure joy when there were only two but I must say trying to be equally fair to all three families is very difficult and very time consuming. I love them all and have great relationships with them. I’m just back from holiday and have come home determined to ring fence a couple of days a week to enjoy my own hobbies.

Grandparent enslavement in our case led to burn out. Up at 5am to be there by 6am.

Housework in the morning and school lunches to be made.
Afternoon run and minding with more housework . Parents home at 9pm.

Dont mention school holidays.
We felt our role as grandparents was hijacked.
We tried to get other grandparents to help but that didnt work

It was all very sad when we had to stop. Caused a huge rift which is still painful.

Parents worked hard I know and we did what we could but age and exhaustion got the better of us.

MOnica -it's a very tricky situation .
I don't know her that well .
I don't even have her address only her phone number..
Talking to her is exhausting,because she's so confused .
I suspect dementia.
I only know what I witnessed and it rang alarm bells.
She has friends from school and I think that they are more aware of her situation than I am.
Last time,I became involved in a similar situation-it blew up in my face .
About two decades ago ,I made friends with a lady .
She told me that her husband was an abusive , unfaithful drunk .
I met him -a grotesquely overweight man with appalling manners .
She was tiny ,fragile and seemed traumatised .
Within a few weeks-she inflicted the most appalling verbal assaults on me .
I think that there were six in a six month period and finally she physically assaulted me .
I walked away .
She ,then began to stalk me even to my father's house and began to phone me at his home . The number was ex -directory.
It took me a very long time to make her understand that our relationship had finished .
I don't want to go down that road again.
So this time I shall be more cautious .

Esmay

One of my friends is seriously ill and can't get a diagnosis.
Sally has had to retire early.
She doesn't have grandchildren yet ,but what she has is an extremely demanding son .
I think that Sally is actually scared of him .
I could be wrong of course ,but it has begun to worry me .

If so it would be elder abuse, and is a crime. It is always worth talking to Age UK about the issue.

It might be worth talking to your friend, but approach the subject carefully. The problem, in my experience is that so often the person being abused by a son or daughter do not want to admit to themselves, let alone anyone else and theywill defend, deny, justify the most appalling treatment rather than admit that they are being abused by their grown child.

I was involved in a case when I worked for Age Concern (as was). The family were known to the police and social services as well as us, but even when acts of violence had been seen by outsiders the parents would not give statements or do anything to incriminate their son. They just told me that they thought he would benefit from counselling!!!!!

I know the mothers of today are entitled to a career should they choose, but one of my (many) hobby horses is that the role of a parent in the home is terribly undervalued.

I agree. I do not think it matters which parent it is as long as whoever is at home keeping things afloat at that end and caring for children is valued for the hard work that they do.

I am hoping that the AC who estrange their own parents for providing insufficient child care are very much in the minority. I certainly know of no-one in real life who is in that situation. It is an appalling way for those AC to behave.

I am lucky that my AC expected nothing from me as regards child care but were grateful when I offered, and were aware of my needs too and always fitted around these.

I think sometimes a shock word helps people sit up and think about exactly the position they are in.

I dont. I think it is the opposite.

It downgrades and diminshes what some people who are really enslaved, suffer.

Absolutely.
Agree.

Luckygirl3

In this case enslavement is a choice because we are all capable of saying no.

I agree. I offered to be back up (emergencies, needs) and that suited all of us well. I did not choose to be enslaved by my children and theirs.

TerriBull

I do think financial necessity has taken the choice away from many to be a SAHM. When my children were at school in the nineties and noughties, many of us were especially for the early years. Then the after school clubs weren't such a thing as they are now. Now it's so noticeable passing any junior school after 3.30 parents will be intermittently picking up their offspring up to 6ish.

I think it depends what you class as financial ‘necessity’. We did one sleepover a week with our middle grandchildren and dropped them off at school, and that was quite sufficient for me!
Working in Early Years, I saw many elderly grandparents looking after children, and must say that some of them were so knackered they were really only fit for seeing that the child was fed and came to no harm, though often they were only too happy to tell us what a wonderful job/ home/ car/ holiday etc their children had, and I’m sure those children would say they worked out of ‘financial necessity’!
I know the mothers of today are entitled to a career should they choose, but one of my (many) hobby horses is that the role of a parent in the home is terribly undervalued.

I've seen a variety of responses on this subject on GsNet and have often been astonished by the monstrous selfishness and unpleasantness of people who have chosen to have children towards their own parents , who they are supposed to love. The reason being that insufficient "grandparenting" services are not being provided or not being provided in the precise way that the children's parents wished or expected.Voluntarily doing whatever you wish( or whatever the parents will allow(sic)) for your grandchildren is one thing.Blackmail on pain of your children estranging you is another. Beggars belief , some of it.

If you are not able to do it then children should understand. I did lots but it was because I offered.
Families and careers should not be planned on the basis that GPs will become the default carers.
I am sorry that not being able to offer has caused estrangements. I, and all my friends, had no family care at all and simply did not expect it.
It us not acceptable that this should be expected.

One of my friends is seriously ill and can't get a diagnosis.
Sally has had to retire early.
She doesn't have grandchildren yet ,but what she has is an extremely demanding son .
I think that Sally is actually scared of him .
I could be wrong of course ,but it has begun to worry me .

Smileless2012

As others have said Luckygirl it isn't much of a choice is it, if saying 'no' means you risk being estranged by your AC and from your GC.

Well said.

NotSpaghetti

...all things being equal "No" is an option but sometimes it really isn't (unless you can tolerate unspeakable consequences).

Exactly. And in our case, it wasn't. Prior to that, we'd been more than happy to look after our GS from time to time, in the same way that I think most grandparents would. But to be plunged from that into him living with us full time was not something we could have foreseen. It's a different kettle of fish altogether when it's not something you volunteered for.

...all things being equal "No" is an option but sometimes it really isn't (unless you can tolerate unspeakable consequences).

Luckygirl3

In this case enslavement is a choice because we are all capable of saying no.

We had no choice in the matter.

As others have said Luckygirl it isn't much of a choice is it, if saying 'no' means you risk being estranged by your AC and from your GC.