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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]OP again. Some very perceptive points raised by pps. There is definitely a tendency in my family to be "doormats" and not speak up when another relative has done something wrong and shun people when they do speak up.
I've long been the black sheep for speaking up when such things happen like a sis using my car for months and not paying a single car note as promised. I was the bad guy when I wanted to take the car back...but I digress.
I guess in the interest of not rocking the boat I let the sis with the three kids get away with inappropriate behavior. 
But you are all right, this needs to be addressed. [/quote]

OP, while I do understand the approach of "talk to her only about your own issue and don't dredge up other stuff" -- I would consider another approach of doing some kind of group talk -- well, call it an "intervention" for her problem with dumping her kids on others. (Do not bring up the incident with your mom's party and the gaggle of girls; that seems like a separate though equally thoughtless issue on her part; stick to the serial dumping of her kids for very long periods.)

She may feel ganged up on but that may be what it takes to make her realize that ALL of you see what is going on and that you do talk to each other about this behavior. I would bring up the issues others have noted here: What if one of her kids becomes ill? Or even has to be rushed to a hospital? What if one of YOUR kids is ill and you must give that child your full attention? What if you had other plans in four hours' time but it's now six hours after she dumped the kids and ran, and you've already missed your appointment or whatever? She needs to be told up front that she must schedule the kids' time with all family members and must be in touch and must tell you where she is, so if her cell phone conks out, you can reach her in an emergency.

The huge, neon, standout red flag to me was the fact that she leaves the kids and is gone with no contact for [i]five or six hours[/i] at a time. If that were planned for and stated up front, with a way to contact her and knowledge of where she would be all that time -- no problem. But if she is leaving the kids and vanishing without saying where she will be, what time she will be back, and what she's doing, she either is running away from her kids for truly desperate "me time" or she is utterly lousy with time frames or she is up to something. As others have noted, is it possible she's got a habit of some kind she needs to hide--? I would add, is it possible she is depressed and dumps the kids when she is at the breaking point and runs off to hide for a while because she has trouble coping? Ask her. Ask if she needs some help with the kids and when you talk to her, have contact numbers and names for that help available -- look up local babysitters to give her a list if you can, or help her get some "mother's helpers" who stay in the home while she's there but keep some of the kids occupied. Or encourage her to get mental health help if she's possibly depressed.

Whether this is about her being simply flaky and forgetting about time, or it's about her passive-aggressively dumping her own kids because she's so tired of them, or is so depressed she can't cope -- she needs to be told what she's doing isn't acceptable and has to change, for HER sake and for her kids' sakes too.

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