Aunt feeds nieces and nephews 'garbage' against uptight SIL's wishes. AITA?
When this woman is annoyed with her SIL's obsessive parenting, she asks Reddit:
'AITA for refusing to enforce my SIL's rules when she forces me to babysit?'
I (F27) live about a block from my parents. They helped me buy my house and they are awesome. They also babysit for my brother and his wife all the time. However when they are not available my SIL will bring her kids (10/8/6) to my house since I work from home.
I have tried explaining repeatedly that I'm working and she refuses to understand. My parents aren't her biggest fans either but they have begged me to humour her.
So I allow it. They are good kids and I love them. But I also don't enforce her rules on them.
Nope sorry I don't have organic fruit juice. I have Coke, Mountain Dew, and Red Bull. Or you can drink tap water. You want avocado with an egg on rye? Well I have potato skins from Costco. What is veggie tales? My tv has Netflix, Prime, and Disney. Watch whatever you want.
She gets mad at me for not following her rules for her kids but she keeps dropping them off. My brother says I'm being an AH for not just doing what they want so I told him I would if they A. paid me to watch their kids. And B. Supplied whatever their kids were supposed to eat drink and watch. AITA?
Let's see what readers had to say.
forwardsquirrel writes:
NTA - Buy an espresso machine and teach the kids to use it. That's a joke, mostly. But seriously - you are not hiding these things from your brother/SIL. They are choosing to continue dropping the kids off knowing what the situation is. They clearly care more about free childcare than they do about organic fruit juice.
captainkaiju writes:
NTA. Lots of AH behavior from SIL though. If she isn't going to provide the food, drinks, and, idk, maybe appropriate notice for you to care for her kids then she can just suck it up. You're already doing her an insurmountably large favor by watching her children free of charge, on little notice, and while you are working.
Side note: you are being a bit of an AH to yourself by not standing up to her and letting her know that you cannot always just take her kids. She needs to plan accordingly and either give you more notice/maybe actually ask first, or find alternate childcare when she really needs it and you can't help.
bullshithistorian00 writes:
YTA to yourself, and I’m not understanding why you continue to do this. No one can force you to watch children, be an adult and tell her no. If she continues then tell her you’ll call the police for abandonment. I hate when people complain about something that is easily within their power to change, so do it.