Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I hear you OP. I am not even sure I’d want to travel without my DC because I think I’d miss them too much. But I do sometimes envy my friends with younger, more healthy parents because of the way they are able to be involved in their kids lives. Including, yes, overnights at grandmas and that kind of thing. I would appreciate the free childcare of course— who wouldn’t? But the bigger thing is the idea of having more people invested in and involved in my child’s life. Especially since we are unable to have another. When I see grandparents doting on, playing with, or just showing real knowledge of their grandkids, it is heartwarming and also gives me a pang. I know my child would love that but it’s just not part of the family we have. It makes me sad.

OP here. I think you hit on an important part of it that I didn’t really articulate. The free childcare would be lovely but I think it’s the idea of having so many loving, capable family members around that are invested in and can be a real part of my children’s lives. We love my parents but because of their health we usually see them for short visits, and always with me or my husband there. My kids will never have the time and space to build a truly deep bond with them, I fear. Looking at my friend with the eight actively involved grandparents makes me so wish my kids had that.

And yeah, the kid free vacations sound nice too. But reading suggestions here from others about leaving the kids with nanny or a close friend made me realize I wouldn’t even want to do that. It’s something specific about that special time with grandparents. I would so love to be able to go on vacation and know my kids are having a genuinely enriching visit with their grandparents, rather than just having passable childcare.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I feel the same.

I saw my SIL for thanksgiving and spontaneiously burst in to tears when she was talking about a trip to napa valley with her girl friends and then a trip to seattle with her DH a few weeks later.

I am typically not emotional or a crier and was really taken aback by my own response as weird as that sounds.

I have not had more than 90 mins away from my kids (and this has been maybe 4 times to grocery shop, I typically order otherwise) in almost 2 years. I tried to get my haircut in March and got called home before it was my turn in the chair.

You sound like my friend who complains about not having gotten a haircut since DC #1 was born.

It’s because she doesn’t trust her DH to do anything.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I feel the same.

I saw my SIL for thanksgiving and spontaneiously burst in to tears when she was talking about a trip to napa valley with her girl friends and then a trip to seattle with her DH a few weeks later.

I am typically not emotional or a crier and was really taken aback by my own response as weird as that sounds.

I have not had more than 90 mins away from my kids (and this has been maybe 4 times to grocery shop, I typically order otherwise) in almost 2 years. I tried to get my haircut in March and got called home before it was my turn in the chair.

Who called you and for what?

Anonymous wrote:I should say up front: I love my kids, I love my life, and I know I generally have it very good. I’m grateful for all my good fortune.

That said, one thing I do lack is any real family support with my kids. My own parents are in poor health and my husband’s family either doesn’t live nearby or can’t/won’t help with the kids for other reasons. Obviously, this is fine, they’re my kids and I’m responsible for them. I don’t expect anyone else to be. But man, I can’t help but think how nice it would be to have family who was able and interested in watching my kids sometimes..

I have a friend who has an abundance of family support. Her own parents and her husband’s parents are all nearby, retired but relatively healthy, and very happy to help out with her kids. Both sets of grandparents are divorced and remarried so there are four (4!) sets of capable, loving adult family members all clamoring to watch her kids. What a dream! She and her husband are going to Mexico by themselves for a week and I am truly jealous. I’ve always been pretty content so real jealously is not a feeling I have often, but man, an adults only tropical vacation is my wildest dream right now. ! don’t think I’ll get an extended break from my kids like that until they’re all old enough to go to sleep away camp, which seems so far away.

Just venting, no real point to this. I hope everyone with helpful grandparents knows how great they have it!

Anonymous wrote:I feel the same.

I saw my SIL for thanksgiving and spontaneiously burst in to tears when she was talking about a trip to napa valley with her girl friends and then a trip to seattle with her DH a few weeks later.

I am typically not emotional or a crier and was really taken aback by my own response as weird as that sounds.

I have not had more than 90 mins away from my kids (and this has been maybe 4 times to grocery shop, I typically order otherwise) in almost 2 years. I tried to get my haircut in March and got called home before it was my turn in the chair.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I hear you OP. I am not even sure I’d want to travel without my DC because I think I’d miss them too much. But I do sometimes envy my friends with younger, more healthy parents because of the way they are able to be involved in their kids lives. Including, yes, overnights at grandmas and that kind of thing. I would appreciate the free childcare of course— who wouldn’t? But the bigger thing is the idea of having more people invested in and involved in my child’s life. Especially since we are unable to have another. When I see grandparents doting on, playing with, or just showing real knowledge of their grandkids, it is heartwarming and also gives me a pang. I know my child would love that but it’s just not part of the family we have. It makes me sad.

OP here. I think you hit on an important part of it that I didn’t really articulate. The free childcare would be lovely but I think it’s the idea of having so many loving, capable family members around that are invested in and can be a real part of my children’s lives. We love my parents but because of their health we usually see them for short visits, and always with me or my husband there. My kids will never have the time and space to build a truly deep bond with them, I fear. Looking at my friend with the eight actively involved grandparents makes me so wish my kids had that.

And yeah, the kid free vacations sound nice too. But reading suggestions here from others about leaving the kids with nanny or a close friend made me realize I wouldn’t even want to do that. It’s something specific about that special time with grandparents. I would so love to be able to go on vacation and know my kids are having a genuinely enriching visit with their grandparents, rather than just having passable childcare.

Be grateful your parents still want to see your kids. What some of us are saying is our parents have zero interest in our kids. My mom lives 5 minutes away and we didn't see her yesterday and she never would consider inviting us or seeing what we were doing for Thanksgiving. I'm lucky if she calls on the kids birthdays. Usually its a week or two late, if at all.

I'd take loving parents who cannot babysit over parents like mine who have no interest but could.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I hear you OP. I am not even sure I’d want to travel without my DC because I think I’d miss them too much. But I do sometimes envy my friends with younger, more healthy parents because of the way they are able to be involved in their kids lives. Including, yes, overnights at grandmas and that kind of thing. I would appreciate the free childcare of course— who wouldn’t? But the bigger thing is the idea of having more people invested in and involved in my child’s life. Especially since we are unable to have another. When I see grandparents doting on, playing with, or just showing real knowledge of their grandkids, it is heartwarming and also gives me a pang. I know my child would love that but it’s just not part of the family we have. It makes me sad.

OP here. I think you hit on an important part of it that I didn’t really articulate. The free childcare would be lovely but I think it’s the idea of having so many loving, capable family members around that are invested in and can be a real part of my children’s lives. We love my parents but because of their health we usually see them for short visits, and always with me or my husband there. My kids will never have the time and space to build a truly deep bond with them, I fear. Looking at my friend with the eight actively involved grandparents makes me so wish my kids had that.

And yeah, the kid free vacations sound nice too. But reading suggestions here from others about leaving the kids with nanny or a close friend made me realize I wouldn’t even want to do that. It’s something specific about that special time with grandparents. I would so love to be able to go on vacation and know my kids are having a genuinely enriching visit with their grandparents, rather than just having passable childcare.

Anonymous wrote:I feel the same.

I saw my SIL for thanksgiving and spontaneiously burst in to tears when she was talking about a trip to napa valley with her girl friends and then a trip to seattle with her DH a few weeks later.

I am typically not emotional or a crier and was really taken aback by my own response as weird as that sounds.

I have not had more than 90 mins away from my kids (and this has been maybe 4 times to grocery shop, I typically order otherwise) in almost 2 years. I tried to get my haircut in March and got called home before it was my turn in the chair.

Anonymous wrote:Yup. We have this and its really nice. But on the flip side we always need to check with grandparents before making weekend plans etc. all bdays and holidays etc are always with them etc. and hard to do anything as a small family unit. So expectations are different for other things too.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I hear you OP. I am not even sure I’d want to travel without my DC because I think I’d miss them too much. But I do sometimes envy my friends with younger, more healthy parents because of the way they are able to be involved in their kids lives. Including, yes, overnights at grandmas and that kind of thing. I would appreciate the free childcare of course— who wouldn’t? But the bigger thing is the idea of having more people invested in and involved in my child’s life. Especially since we are unable to have another. When I see grandparents doting on, playing with, or just showing real knowledge of their grandkids, it is heartwarming and also gives me a pang. I know my child would love that but it’s just not part of the family we have. It makes me sad.

OP here. I think you hit on an important part of it that I didn’t really articulate. The free childcare would be lovely but I think it’s the idea of having so many loving, capable family members around that are invested in and can be a real part of my children’s lives. We love my parents but because of their health we usually see them for short visits, and always with me or my husband there. My kids will never have the time and space to build a truly deep bond with them, I fear. Looking at my friend with the eight actively involved grandparents makes me so wish my kids had that.

And yeah, the kid free vacations sound nice too. But reading suggestions here from others about leaving the kids with nanny or a close friend made me realize I wouldn’t even want to do that. It’s something specific about that special time with grandparents. I would so love to be able to go on vacation and know my kids are having a genuinely enriching visit with their grandparents, rather than just having passable childcare.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:And, now we get to why a lot of people are limiting how many children they have.

People expect you to be able to afford to have a nanny or just shut up.
OK.

Yup. We stopped at one for this reason. People expect your family to be able to be completely self-contained, even when they are very small and need so much. It's exhausting and as people who cannot and will not ever be able to afford to just pay people a full time salary to help, we had to stop. If we'd had our first when we were younger, we could have had a second with a big age gap (6 years), but we couldn't afford to have kids before our mid-30s to begin with.

Many people are fully in the "only rich people deserve children" camp at this point, and that's not going to work out well for society in the long run. But people are short sighted.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I should say up front: I love my kids, I love my life, and I know I generally have it very good. I’m grateful for all my good fortune.

That said, one thing I do lack is any real family support with my kids. My own parents are in poor health and my husband’s family either doesn’t live nearby or can’t/won’t help with the kids for other reasons. Obviously, this is fine, they’re my kids and I’m responsible for them. I don’t expect anyone else to be. But man, I can’t help but think how nice it would be to have family who was able and interested in watching my kids sometimes..

I have a friend who has an abundance of family support. Her own parents and her husband’s parents are all nearby, retired but relatively healthy, and very happy to help out with her kids. Both sets of grandparents are divorced and remarried so there are four (4!) sets of capable, loving adult family members all clamoring to watch her kids. What a dream! She and her husband are going to Mexico by themselves for a week and I am truly jealous. I’ve always been pretty content so real jealously is not a feeling I have often, but man, an adults only tropical vacation is my wildest dream right now. ! don’t think I’ll get an extended break from my kids like that until they’re all old enough to go to sleep away camp, which seems so far away.

Just venting, no real point to this. I hope everyone with helpful grandparents knows how great they have it!

There is a point and it is that you are a self-centered Horse's patoot. Memories are made of vacations and holidays spent with your children.