How much did you spend on your InLaws when they visited you last time in US.

Maybe? Of course it is.

But that's the whole thing! Your perspective as a grandmother is informed by the cultural milieu in which you were raised. A grandmother in India has quite different ideas about this than you do. If she went on a Finland forum and kept talking down to them about their habits and ideas it would not go down too well. Is that so difficult to understand?

 

elderly parents who go to help their newly delivered daughter or DIL enjoy being around their grandchildren and interacting with them. They like it to know they are still wanted by their family. That belongingness wont come from an hired person. They can hire a nanny as you say, but after all nanny is an outsider a paid helper, who wont know the traditions. so the grandparents play the role of overseeing or managing generally.

 

It can be culture, it can be a different development phase of the society or a combination of both.

For example if women are working full time they cannot take half a year of to "take care" of her pregnant daughter. This is happening in India too, more and more women are working.

 

Of course grandparents (and other relatives) help out. Taking care of the older children, supporting financially by getting those ridiculously expensive prams , filling up the fridge etc. But I have not seen cases where the grandparents would invade the young couples home for months.

If your relatives live far away you have to resort to hired help if needed. Regarding day care I do not see it as a good solution put that kind of responsibility on elderly parents except if they are quite young/not employed/live near enough that they do not have to live with the young couple. I love my grandchildren but do not think I would be capable of taking care of them on a daily basis 8-10 hours per day.

 

Culture and development are entities of the same ecosystem. And it is rather presumptuous to assume others' value systems should reflect your idea of "development".

As padmaja stated above, the value a grandmother's care brings versus a paid nanny is intangible but adds to the development of a strongly attached culture. This each one for themselves model you so like is simply not supported on an evolutionary basis. Because we strongly seek to create close knit tribes that provide the support structure that nourishes social, economical and spiritual values. It reminds me of an article that resonates https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/owning-pink/201209/the-health-benefits-finding-your-tribe

That is why I state that the new generation fed on a constant diet of fluff is too naive to understand the larger consequences of following this model.

 

Well said.

 

Even in India some parents are put off by the way their kids use them as baby sitters to progress their careers. I have heard it straight from the granny's mouth when she was sharing her problem some 25 years back regarding her elder daughter with her friend.The granny was working too with younger kids , job and also taking care of elder one's kid.Lets not presume.

 

You will always find outliers.

 

@sskgpaa,

You have heard a lot of women's perspective and I am going to provide man's perspective of how to handle the situation.

For better disclosure, let me mention that I am 61 years old. It is very normal for people coming to the US to be interested in visiting places and shop a lot. I am not sure whether this is their first trip or not.

Congratulations on the new baby. I clearly see that you are stressed out due to the current situation. If I were in the shoes of your in laws, I wouldn't be ignoring the situation on the ground and just plainly focus on site-seeing and shopping. I would first do whatever I can to help the DIL recover from post-surgery situation and spend time with the grandchildren as much as possible. Your in-laws need not baby sit but spend more time with the grandchildren as they came only for this purpose. They could have planned smaller trips towards the end of their trip or there is always another time to do that.

If they truly love their son, DIL and grandchildren, they should be spending time with the grandchildren during this trip. I see the argument that the adult children living here in the US should not calculate pennies to look after their visiting parents by showing them around places and help them do shopping. I believe neither of you are suggesting that you don't want to spend to look after them very well and just the timing is not good to do so. Frankly, I have read posts here about a DIL suggesting that the inlaws are eating too much, not keeping the kitchen clean, etc. In my view, your expectation is reasonable especially when you are still sending your in-laws on short trips and look after your babies yourself besides cooking food for them.

I believe you and your husband are trying to do something reasonable to meet their requirements and send them back without any ill feelings. I feel it is best if your husband could have a frank conversation to let them know that this is not a great time for them to be spending more time here in the US. He should not rebook them by changing the ticket and spend $1,500 more. In fact, it would result in increasing the difficulty you are facing to a few more days. Having bought the tickets, insurance and paid for smaller trips so far, your husband did everything he could especially considering your recovering health and infant at home. It is difficult to give a budget to you as a suggestion. However, you both can assign approximately $5,000 (including $1,500 you save by not changing the tickets) for both short trips and shopping to keep them happy and send them back on their original tickets.

As long as you keep your mind open to help them if they need some financial help, you are doing nothing wrong. From everything you have written so far, you have done everything possible to keep them happy and this discussion is between you and your husband besides discussion in this forum to validate your thoughts.

It is not right to put you in an emotional guilt that you are not doing enough for your in-laws as their love is invaluable beyond money. In fact, in true love, people should be able to understand each other well and reciprocate love unconditionally.

Viswa