How much "help" is too much????
When you help people how do you draw the line from helping to hindering? Especially when grand kids are involved 
. It makes it so difficult. But I have come to a crossroads with SD27, she is SO's middle child. Her and I started off a little rocky but have grown to be good friends and I truly love her. She works full time and makes a decent wage but she is always struggling. She makes enough money to cover her rent, car payment, insurance,gas and food. Doesn't have much left over for extras for herself or her kids. So we have helped her out many times buying the kids clothes, buying shoes, fun toys, paying for birthday parties pretty much anything the kids need.
Lately it seems like we have created more of a problem than helping. I know that she juggles bills around so that she can have fun money for herself because she never worries about the kids needs. I think we have to step back and let her struggle so that she can better manage her finances with the fact that she has two kids to raise. SO is torn because he doesn't want the grand kids to go without anything. Which I totally understand and I don't either but it kinda rubs me wrong when I spent 300.00 on clothes and shoes and she comes back from a no kid weekend with another tatoo :? :? Then starts in about how they have no food :? :?
I would do anything to help her but now I feel like we aren't helping her at all. I am just rambling trying to figure out how to handle this situation.
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How old of the grandkids?
How old of the grandkids?
Yes you are enabling her sorry but you are. If she can afford a tattoo (they are so expensive some hundreds of dollars) she can definitely to buy her kids some clothes.
She is taking advantage and honestly if you are doing all this for her kids and not the others it can create resentment.
Yes at first I felt we were
Yes at first I felt we were helping her and making sure our grand kids were taken care of. Now I see we are enabling. The grand kids are 5 and 1 two different fathers who don't pay any child support.
The resentment is a whole other issue, SO's oldest which is actually his SD that he raised is extremely jealous but she is bat shit crazy too so I don't have anything to do with her. Its just stuff we hear from other family members.
Sounds like she was
Sounds like she was struggling with one and she had another kid. Two different fathers??? She may cover the very basics because she needs that to live as well but she does not sound responsible at all.
I am a tough love person so I say stop helping and let her figure it out. Either she will curb her spending or she will go after the BD's for support. I honestly think that is worse case scenarios.
Exactly she couldn't even
Exactly she couldn't even keep up with one and she got pregnant again. It's 50/50 custody with both fathers and they make the same amount of money so no CS in the case of the youngest one she was going to have to pay 35.00/month to the baby's dad.
Me too I am very tough love usually I am getting soft in my old age and the grandbabies I just love them to pieces. I just had some harsh realizations that it was not being appreciated or that we are even helping her. So I just came on here to vent. Thanks for your input
I think it's time for dad to
I think it's time for dad to have a talk with her about how she is managing her money.
She sounds a bit like my husband's nephew and wife who are perpetually broke and living with his sister and late with their rent to her... yet have tattoos and buy things like custom fishing rods.
Perhaps dad should sit down and go over her budget.. what she makes and what she spends. Certainly, within reason, it's nice for people to have a splurge occasionally, but if she has gotten to rely on you guys stepping in to save her, maybe that needs to stop.
Or if she has debt, he can help her with a Dave Ramsey thing to get stuff paid off?
I have tried doing that too
I have tried doing that too in the past. I think that she has good intentions then makes poor decisions and then it is a snowball effect. She can't get past the paycheck to paycheck living. In hindsight we should have helped with guidelines to help her save money to have a emergency fund. Now we just have to pull the reins in and let her deal with life like everyone else does.
If you are able and willing,
If you are able and willing, it's not too late to help her do that. Perhaps it's not a rug pulled out situation? Maybe dad sits down and goes over her budget and lays out how much he has been helping. Perhaps he will continue to assist (with gradual reduction) if she can show she is making meaningful steps towards paying down debt and establishing her emergency fund?
In the budget, it would be important to hopefully be able to carve out a small amount of money that she CAN use on discretionary items both for her children and herself.
If you can afford to ease her down, the sting might not be so great and she may actually learn to budget and handle her money more effectively. It will of course, require someone (dad) to work with her on a regular.. at least monthly.. basis to map out her spending plans and help her keep on track. that's harder than just cutting a check, but in the long run will help her much more.
Like you, I don't think that
Like you, I don't think that poor people should never get to have a vacation or enjoy a good meal or a hobby if they are able. But if it becomes a pattern then I think it's a problem.
If she is truly struggling
If she is truly struggling there are programs for that - food stamps, food pantry's , shop at thrift stores for clothes, church groups .... Sounds like she is working and trying , but feels entitled to having fun money and extras she wants and she knows daddy will pick up her slack. Time to cut her off. The kids won't go without and if she cant take care of the kids - maybe their fathers should have full custody.
The line between helping and
The line between helping and hindering for me would obviously involve some things like: Is mom going without so that her children are not? In this situation, the need for a new tattoo, AND getting one, tells me no. It's very telling that she's taking advantage of the situation and that she has others in her life who will be a safety net for the children.
I agree with the other poster who stated that she could be utilizing some services that would help her with food costs, utilities, etcetera. If she has applied and been turned down for assistance - that's one thing. Has she even applied? Has she exhausted all of her options to offset her expenses? I'm a firm believer of helping those who go the extra mile to help themselves.
I get this is probably a sore spot, especially if there's a good relationship there, but sometimes the lines be can get blurred by love. Tough love would be taking a step back and asking yourself, and her, if other options haven't been exhausted.
Very true and she has applied
Very true and she has applied for help but makes too much money. She does get a subsidy for day care costs which are about 1000.00/mo and she pays 220.00 so that is a huge help. If she didn't get that she literally would not be able to work. The tattoo is what pushed me over the edge that was money she did not need to spend. That and another incident is when I realized we aren't helping her now.
The other incident is kind of disheartening I am not even sure if that is correct word to describe my feeling on it. I had my grandson 5 over and we were playing and he told me he was tired of his birthday present and me and grandpa needed to go pick it up. Now I get kids are fickle and get bored with things but this was a high dollar jungle gym for the yard that he can play on for years. But he was very nonchalant saying nope I don't want it pick it up. So I had a talk with him about gratitude and appreciation and it seemed to not even register. He is young but to me he should have manners and start to be exposed to learning what gratitude and appreciation are. It just made me think his mom isn't showing him because she doesn't get it either. She is different in many ways from her sisters but she just expects that we do things for her because that is the pattern we created.
So hopefully if we can be a part of making her more responsible it will reflect on the grand kids as well. Thanks everyone for your input it is much appreciated
As you are learning, this
As you are learning, this sort of behavior is passed down from generation to generation. To answer your question, it is a problem when you are doing things for her that she should be capable of doing for herself. Look up "codependency" sometime. You may find attending a support group for Codependents helpful.
It used to drive me crazy when I worked for a government health agency and people couldn't pay even our low fees for preventive health services (most $50 or less) and had all kinds of tattoos and piercings. Not that I have anything against tattoos and piercings, but these are luxuries. Its about priorities. Salvation army/Goodwill is a great place to buy stuff. I shop there all the time. Don't be surprised if the grandkids turn up their noses at the idea though. It does sound like a good thing you are in their lives. Maybe it is not too late to start educating them about needs vs wants and living frugally.
Hmmmm. I'll respond to this
Hmmmm. I'll respond to this as the SM to the non-favored gkids in my DH's family.
For about 18 months now, DH's sister has been in a will-they-or-won't-they situation with her husband...as in "will the or won't they divorce??"
DH's parents have always VERY clearly favored his sister and her kids (I can give dozens of examples from our 7 years together...and DH says it was going on long before I showed up on the scene) Now, they've really ramped up the support to his sister and her kids over and above what they normally do -- in order to "help" her...decrease her "stress" and hopefully "save the marriage" for their grandchildren. Uh huh.
In addition to the regular support they give her, they've helped her furnish an entire second house, they've taken her and her entire family on multiple vacations with them in the last 18 months (including TWO trips to Disney and a trip to Hawaii), and they drop everything and fly halfway across the country to see her and her family for any and every reason...they've even gone to counseling with her and her husband. Meanwhile, despite all of this supposed "support" - the marriage still isn't solid and she has essentially gotten let go from a very cush, lucrative position...basically because she's not a good team player / isn't collegial. Imagine that. And...meanwhile, they've been to OUR home a fewer number of times in the past 7 years of our marriage than they've been to her home in the past year...by a lot...even though we live under 2 hours away.
My DH and I have started to joke that we should pretend like our marriage is on the rocks and see if any of this largesse starts flowing our direction...lol. Seriously, though...it sucks for DH because his parents are very generous with us and his kids...but it truly PALES in comparison. So...you're left feeling second-best in every way...but also like you can't really complain about it or else you seem ungrateful. And, just to be clear...this isn't only more financial support and gifts...it's extra time, extra focus...extra care & concern.
I think people naturally have a desire to help "the underdog" in any given situation. And I think certain kinds of self-centered, narcissistic people know just how to manipulate others so that they are always the underdog in any given situation. My DH's sister is like this.
Say all this to say...you likely are unintentionally alienating and causing resentment among other members of your family. I feel sorry for my DH's parents, because I think they genuinely want to have a close relationship with him and his kids...but they've allowed their lives to become so one-sided and skewed and the resentment has built up so that I'm not sure it's possible at this point...not without a major overhaul. Recently, they commented to me that they wish his kids reached out to them more, asked them for more...came to see them more. But I'm just kind of sitting here thinking...THIS is the relationship YOU established with them over the past 10 years.
Well, in our case...she'd be
Well, in our case...she'd be the one who could get the kids through college without breaking a sweat, and we're the ones who could use some help. Not sure how that didn't come across in my post?
My point's not really about financial equity, though. It is more about how much help is too much...when it becomes a hindrance to the development of the recipient and hurts the giver's relationship with others in favor of one who demands focus and makes every situation all about her - playing on her parents' concern and care for her children to get more out of them while doing whatever she darn well pleases...really not about who "needs" it more. Which, again, would also be us.
And...just as a sidenote. In my family, my brother (kid #3), me, and my sister (kid #5) are probably the ones who need and will need the least financial assistance...we have the fewest financial pressures and the highest income. I have no problem with my mom helping my baby sister who is just 24 and not helping me. We don't really keep tabs in my family...it's more about who needs it and who has it, which works well for us. In my DH's family, though (and, admittedly, his parents are far wealthier than my mom) there is this BIG show and To-Do about everything being fair and equal among their kids and grandkids...but that is just...VERY clearly not the case. So it's kind of insulting...we're not idiots. But we have to go to these events and assent to it...pretend we don't notice the disparity? It's tough. If it was a matter of his sister struggling and genuinely needing help, I wouldn't think twice or let it bother me. The issue, for us, is that it feels that she's always "struggling" in a way that seems manipulative...like she's doing it in order to control her parents.
Why not simply sit her down
Why not simply sit her down and work out a budget for her, ?
Instead of simply buying things for the kids and her....