Grandma and Parenting Plans

Ugh, what you need is a lawyer and a backbone.

So many loose ends here YOU need to resolve.

:(

The benefits of having your mom watch your kids does not outweigh the negatives. Time to find a daycare - and tell them that only YOU can pick up your kids, not your mom or their dad.

ETA: To pay for it, apply for assistance and also take your ex to court to get child support. Just because he's not working doesn't mean that kids stop eating and growing. He is still responsible for supporting them.

Here is a shot summary of my thoughts below. You can choose to tell your Mom to leave. However,.you need help to do the things she does now. If you aren't able to get help after she leaves, she would be smart to not comeback. This situation is also painful for her.

Asking her to leave or asking her to stay is not simple. If you want to have a stable home for your children and be reasonably happy, you will need to make major changes in your life with this decisions. Grandma stays or goes. You are between a rock and a hard place. The choice is very difficult. You will need to change yourself for either choice.
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I suggest you have power and could feel more in control if you set boundaries and allowed natural consequences to happen.

You are in charge of your children! Tell your mother and your ex that all plans go through you. You talk with both of them. Tell them you appreciate their help. Praise your ex for spending time with his kids. Tell your mom you appreciate her help. Tell them both that this isn't working for you. Use I statements. Do not blame them! Work with them. Involve a mediator or counselor if you aren't able to be firm and kind at the same time. Accept thst you are a part of the reason this has happened.

I suggest that you need professional help to learn how to be assertive and how to talk with people so that they're able to cooperate with you. I suggest you've developed a them against me attitude. You failed to maintain control. Perhaps because you were/are stressed out or perhaps because you lack experience/skills in developing ways to be assertive.

I suggest your experiences with mom or ex make it impossible to start over. I suggest that the way you're feeling/acting is caused by years of your experiences. This is not all their fault. All of you share responsibility in making your relationships work.

Sounds like your relationships have become polarized. Your mom has stepped into a vacuum left by you. You allowed this to happen. Over time, you felt helpless and didn't and still do not know how to take charge. Your mom treats you as a child. The two of you are still having an adult/child relationship. Nether one of you know how to change this dynamic.Both of you are doing the best that you can with what you know. Thus is not her fault or your fault.

Many adult children have difficulty breaking separating from parents and parents from children. I suggest you learn about co-dependancy. I suggest you and your mother are locked in a battle. She needs to be in charge to be happy. You need to push her away to be happy. She is in charge. You don't know how to be in charge so you're having an ongoing battle.

I suggest that it is important for her to live elsewhere. Kicking her out in anger will not be helpful for either one of you or your children. Get professional help to gain self esteem and self confidence. Tell your mom you appreciate her help, recognize that this is an issue for both of you and that sharing your home with her isn't working. Again don't blame her. She really is doing the best she can, just as you are.

Before pushing her out, find ways to care for yourself and children without her. This will be difficult. Make a list of what you need and your resources. Find out if you can get state assistance if she weren't living with you and what sort of assistance the state can orovide.

Perhaps you could get financial assistance, food stamps and help with child care while getting training for a higher paying job. My daughter was able to get this sort of help. Requirements have changed over the years. Find out what they are. You can get info over the Internet or by making an appoint with an Intake worker. You may also be able to get financial assistance elswhere. In Oregon, some community colleges provide daycare.

Making such plans for ways to change your life in such a major way is overwhelming and overwhelming is an understatement. Get help with a professional therapist or a life coach. Take changing your life one baby step at a time. I urge you to start with a counselor as you build a foundation for change. You need to know and feel that you have power to do this. You can take a stand, letting go of your anger; giving you more energy to make changes. You can do this.

I would make every effort to let go of my focus on my mom abd my ex and what they are or aren't doing. You cannot change them. I would focus on learning what I can do to change my life. I suggest you need your mother's help while you make plans and learn ways to effect change for yourself. Remind yourself over and over that you are in charge of your life and your children's lives.

Because the way your mom and ex arrange visiting times is very unsatisfactory to you, I suggest you work on changing that dynamic with the help of a counselor/therapist/life coach. You do have the authority to take over those plans. Now you need to learn how to do it.

Firstly, you need to put your foot down with your mom regarding who is the mom and who is the grandma. I realize you are in a tight spot, but she's handing your children over without even letting you say good bye? I'd be looking for a different roommate post haste. I realize that childcare is $$ but start looking - our school has financial aid for some families, especially those on free and reduced meals. The fact that you DO qualify for that suggests to me that you can get other assistance.

I think that you may also need a new job (even if this one pays OK for the type of job, you should see what else is out there if money is an issue) and to take your ex back to court for a defined parenting plan. I'd personally be terrified that one day my mother or ex would take the children and not bring them back. The kids probably wouldn't think much of it at first because it happens all the time for short durations. I think this is not healthy for the kids or you. Rather than just be afraid, get informed. Know your rights. Know your resources.

ETA: Here's the other part - if she decides to sue you for custody or visitation/grandparents rights, right now she has a whole lot more to show than if you put down boundaries and make other plans for care for your children. I have a friend whose sister was firmly convinced their parents didn't love her and moved out to live with her overbearing grandmother FT and for the rest of that woman's life, the grandkids were under her thumb. Please do not let that happen to your children. There is no reason, other than grandma, that a 4 yr old cannot sleep in her own room or that you can't be a mother to your children when you get off work. I suspect that this behavior has long roots in your own childhood, and perhaps you can get some emotional support from your sister in dealing with your mother.

While on the surface it's not an issue for a young child to shower with a same-sex relative, you need to be sure what's going on in your own home. If you don't want the kid to shower with Grandma, then it needs to stop. If Grandma won't listen to you, then she just needs to go, as hard as that is. I love my mother dearly, but if she pulled this on me, she'd be living somewhere else.

I think you need to make some other child care arrangements.
Your Mom needs to move out.
It will be hard making the change to life without your Mom but you'll all adjust eventually.

You don't feel in control but there are steps you can take to feel more in control.
- One would be going to court and getting your ex to pay
- Setting a schedule for dad visits

It will not get better unless you do. It will likely get worse - as you say, they aren't even running it past you when he takes them for days at a time. It would send a clear message to your mother and your ex if you got a lawyer involved. You're the mom, an adult - act like it. Your mom is bossing you around like you're a kid. If she can't respect you, then she shouldn't be looking after your children.

My MIL offered to care for our kids. While the cost savings were great and she obviously loved our kids and cared for them with a grandma's care - which I appreciated - it came with many problems. In the end, it boils down to respect and boundaries.

You've tried it. It's not working. There are alternatives. If she had her own place even, and you pay her a reduced rate (less than daycare) to care for your kids - and then brought them home with just you at the end of the day - would that work? If you had child support? And dad had set times for visits - not from her house, but from yours so you had full control.

Good luck :) Keep us posted

kick her out!!! she is oversteping everywhere and until you stand up and tell her those are your kids and this is your life she is going to keep trying to take it and them over. make no mistake, that is exactly what she is doing. she may be lonely and depressed and might not even know that she is doing it, but she is making your life miserable to make herself feel better. i think you also need to remind her that she isnt the only one who lost someone and no matter what she lost she doesnt get to quit being a mother, and that means putting your kids before yourself and helping to make their lives easier. she sure isnt doing any of that is she.

Your mom is using you. She's disguising it as "helping you", but it sounds like she'd doing more harm than good. Could you downsize your housing and therefore not rely on her financial help? It sucks that you're a single mom and now stuck with her, too! Good Luck!

Would you qualify for assistance without your mom's income? If so, you could use that and then maybe get a roommate to help with rent. Your mom has to go. Seriously. It'll only get worse. Only YOU can protect your relationship with your kids.

First, it just makes me angry that so many men have children but then do not pay any child support or help financially. These are his kids. He needs to help financially with their upbringing. I know you know this...it just makes me so mad. He gets to bow out and live on his own, do what he likes, not do any of the hard day to day parenting, and see the kids when it suits him at a moment's notice? No. Argh. Sorry. I had to vent there.

I think you need to sit your mom down for a very serious talk. Have a list of rules made out for her regarding your home rules as your kid's mom. In the evenings grandma needs to be a team with you ALWAYS. 100%. If your daughter is mad and upset bc she got in trouble with you then grandma has to always take your side and tell her to do what her mom says and mom is right and she agrees with mom. There needs to be a very black and white rule with your mom (and ex-husband) about visitation. No more handing the kids over to him. It needs to be scheduled or approved by you first. List out your rules on a piece of posterboard or something. Have a very serious talk with your mom about how she has to follow your rules...you appreciate how much she does for you, but tell her she is undermining you as a parent. And it has to stop.

If your mom is just too impossible to live with you are going to have to figure out how you can do this on your own. I personally could never live with my mom...it would be hell.

Talk to an accountant or ?. I am not sure that you cannot apply for assistance. It is worth taking the time to find out. I would ALSO find out legally how you set up visitation and child support so that everything is done above board. My mom never did this with my dad and he always took advantage of her...paying too little or nothing as it suited him. Then he remarried and payed for everything for my two stepsisters and continued to give no financial help or parenting to my brother and I. I wish you lots of luck getting this all figured out.

Well I think you should talk to your children's dad and agree on a current schedule. Since he's not working can he be the one to watch the kids more while you're at work (that would give him time, without taking away from you, and help alleviate your daughter's attachment to grandma from being with her all day, AND hopefully eliminate the urge for them to "go behind your back"). Also come to an agreement with him that he needs to discuss thing with you, not your mom, regarding the kids. It's one thing that once you've agreed that he is getting them for him to coordinate the pick up if he's picking up from her but not the agreed on times. Regarding child support, he needs to step up.

I would also discuss this with your mom..."mom, their dad and I have got to communicate and agree on their time. If he contacts you to see if it's ok, please direct him to me before allowing it". Establish some boundaries (co-sleeping, showering, etc.). They are never to go with him (or anyone else) without your advance knowledge/consent. Let her know you appreciate all she does but you want and need to be the parent so when you are home you will be the go-to for the kids.