Quote From: strwbrryptch08 I have strong feelings about this topic. I'm 18 and have 4 brothers and 1 sister. I've always pretty much been the quiet kid who doesn't get into trouble. Well, when I was 15, my sister (who's 12 years older than me) was in jail for an extended time and pregnant. My mom had to go and get my nephew when he was a few days old. Well, my got tired and wore down, so when my nephew was about six months, I started helping watch and feed him a lot. Well, that was in the summer. When school started back, my mom decided to home school me. Well, what happened was, my mom got depressed and depended on me a lot to help care for my nephew. After a while, I became so depressed that I wouldn't even load the dishwasher. When it was time to go somewhere, I usually didn't go because I knew I'd be the one having to watch my nephew in the store or whereever. Plus, I didn't want people thinking he was mine, 'cause I'm so young. Well, I eventually got to the place where I didn't want to go anywhere. I developed baddd social anxiety. (I've always pretty much had social anxiety, just not where I wouldn't leave the house or lead my life). I still have it now and don't go anywhere. I have a lot of anger built up towards my mom and sister that I've gotten into many arguments with my mom and even with two of my brothers. Everyone thinks I'm being selfish. I really love my nephew and want him to live with us. I just wish my mom would have taken more responsibility. She was raised where if she didn't do what her parents wanted, she got whipped. So, she thinks that I'm just being a brat. She acts like she has no compassion for me because of the way she was raised. She has told me that she wants me to have a better life than she did, but she doesn't put those words into action. It seems almost like she gets jealous if she thinks I'm going to have anything better than she had. Believe me, I'm not a mean, hateful person. I just have so much built up anger that it's making me mean. I'm supposed to be graduating this year and going to college next year, but I've ended up just dropping out because I've been so depressed for the last 3 years. My mom doesn't want to take responsibility for me being so depressed. She jumps onto me like it's my fault. Yet she wants me to forget what she's done. I guess the point of this is, parents please take care of your own kids. You can affect more people than you realize. Plus, your own parents are older, and it's not easy for them. Also, my sister doesn't even know how much this has affected me. I just want to tell her how much she'll regret not caring for her son. It makes me sad to think about. Hope I didn't come off as bitter. I just have so much I need to get out and someone to listen.
I appreciate you making a point that I feel is often overlooked. My husband's parents are helping to raise my SIL's child. The parents are good decent people, just prefer to spend their time doing other things... so the grandparents have the kid every day and she stays overnight a few nights every week. The grandparents brought her to our kids birthday parties (without the parents). She is there (without the parents) whenever we go to visit. The result is, their attention is always on this child during visits becasue they are in the parent role. Also, they're all babied out, and TIRED. They basically have their own kid, our kids aren't so cute anymore. When they do visit w/o "their" kid, it's a rare break for them to not be caring for her so so they want our kids to be quiet, etc, so they can enjoy their adult time away! LOL!
So a side-effect of this is that our kids lost a set of grandparents. They basically now act as an aunt and uncle to our children. It stinks. And I don't think anybody notices nor cares.
I agree, it affects other family relationships as well not just those directly involved in caring for the child.
As for you, keep your chin up and start focusing on yourself and how you can get out on your own. You need to start your own life.
Thanks again for pointing out an often overlooked fact of parents not caring for their own children.
