My wife and I have twins (almost 4 months old.) My BIL was in an accident and will be hospitalized and then have to go to rehab. This recovery will take months and he’s not able to care for his children. My BIL 2 kids, 4&6 who are currently with us due to his request.
My wife is not currently working, and I’ve cut my hours shorter to be home with my family. I can see my wife is extremely stressed out. One of our twins specifically is a terrible sleeper and it’s been hard. Especially with two loud young boys in the house, I can see my wife trying to balance them and the babies and the house and I do as much as I can when I’m home but unfortunately it falls on her a lot because I work. I can see my wife is stressed out, and I can only shorten my hours so much. Along with that the stress she has about her brother. I had mentioned to her, her mother possibly taking them in and helping us. She said no. I asked her if she was sure she wanted to take this all on, especially with the babies. She got upset and asked me what she was suppose to do, and said that this isn’t a choice, this is just what you do. I tried to explain my concern and she got angry and it caused a very big argument. She basically accused me of being selfish and said I had only child syndrome.
You’re NTA for checking in to see if she was okay
Why did the grandmother say no? Where is the children’s mother? At the least grandmother could come stay there and watch kids to give your wife a break. You are only trying to look out for your wife as you can see she is already overwhelmed with so many small children.
NAH – You’re both in an unfortunate situation and it’s logical that emotions span a little bit of everything. Give yourselves some grace and when you’ve each had opportunities to process, talk things out. Emotions and logical things. You and your wife are in this together.
My husband and I fostered youth and one of the things we made every effort to avoid was triangulation.
Good luck and blessings to you both. You’re doing a good thing, hard as it may be – don’t let it come between you. You are a TEAM!
NAH. Having twins is a lot for anyone, add two other young kids, that’s super(wo)man level work. You’re trying to take care of her. I don’t think either of you are AHs.
If you want to help, maybe suggest a date for you both. A time to unwind and relax without kids. Or if you can afford it, someone to take on some chores. Laundry can be a lot. Some laundry facilities do your laundry for you. Meal prep services. Just something that might lighten the load a bit.
I don’t think YTA but I do think you need to understand this. You asked the question and she answered. Continuing to badger her is saying you don’t trust her decision making. Yes your fears are valid but you have to respect her as an adult
Can MIL at least come and do some chores? Cooking, cleaning, laundry. Take the boys to the park for a few hours. Anything to help give your wife a break.
NTA
Tell your wife there’s nothing wrong with having multiple members of the family help, and suggest that the boys stay with their grandmother on the weekends.
That way they still get to have that relationship in their lives as a support system, and you and your wife get a break each weekend.
If she’s fighting that then you’ve got a serious problem.
Can MIL come over during the day to help out? An extra person during the day may be a stress reliever to your wife and you.
Definitely NTA
You’re both right? You’re being realistic about what this will cost your family, and realizing the burden could break all of you. She’s saying that doesn’t matter because even if it does, that’s what you do for family.
I’ve tried to do things for family before – sacrificing to care for someone – thinking that because I love my family and value caring for kin, I would make it work. And then you actually live with the burden, and love doesn’t make it easier, and sometimes you realize that you just can’t carry it anymore – there’s not enough hours in the day or money in the bank or energy in your body.
Life is not a movie, and love doesn’t actually give you endless reserves of strength. But living for what you value and the people you love is the one thing you shouldn’t ever throw away.
The solution is other people. You’re going to have to lean on your whole network to get through this. Ask for help from everyone you know.
NAH. I understand you want to alleviate any stress your wife is feeling, but this situation is stressful in many different ways. However, your wife has told you no and wants to help her nephews while their father (her own brother) recovers. Stop trying to fix what she doesn’t want fixed. If you do, then you head into AH territory.
NTA for being worried. But your wife is right, this is what you do for family in a crisis/emergency situation. Your conversation with her shouldn’t be “should we do this/we can’t handle this”, it should be about approaching the problem as a team – to find ways to make it work. Right now you’ve both been thrown into the deep end and haven’t had time to figure out how to manage it. They say it takes a village and now’s the time to rally that village to help. Make sure she knows it’s not “failing” to asking for help, it’s smart, she can’t do it all on her own.
For example, does your BIL have insurance that could pay for any assistance with the kids, whether that’s monetary or a paid number of hours for carers etc. Have you looked into if there’s any govt assistance available in this situation? Any money assistance you get could be used to relieve the burden on her eg get the boys in afterschool/daycare for a few hours a day, a housecleaner or babysitter to have someone extra at the house to help etc.
Could her mother help out, not by taking in the boys full time but by coming over and helping out sometimes? Any other family/friends around that could do this too? Or could the boys spend weekends at her mother’s house to give everyone a break? You didn’t mention the boys mother – Is she not an option?
Gentle YTA
Your wife gave birth a few months ago and just experienced a terrible tragedy in her family that resulted in her going from 0 kids to 4 in a few months while coping with her injured brother.
It sounds like your intentions are good and its great that you’ve cut your hours in order to “be home with the family”, but it doesn’t sound like you’re taking the load off of her.
>I had mentioned to her, her mother possibly taking them in and helping us. She said no. I asked her if she was sure she wanted to take this all on, especially with the babies. She got upset and asked me what she was suppose to do, and said that this isn’t a choice, this is just what you do. I tried to explain my concern and she got angry and it caused a very big argument.
She’s going to take care of her family. She’s already made that decision. Instead of arguing with her about it, are you able to do all of the laundry? Can you cook dinner every night? Can you do the dishes before bed, take out the trash in the morning, handle all of the grocery shopping so that she can focus on the needs of the four kids and healing? This isn’t you “helping her”, this is just you taking care of your own household as the only member of the household that isn’t physically and emotionally incapacitated. I get that you have a job, but most of us have jobs and we still go home and cook and clean afterwards. Your wife has enough on her plate- you should be doing 100% of the cooking and cleaning.
What is wife is doing is noble, but also, I think its what most people SHOULD do. Your nieces/ nephews are traumatized. Your wife is postpartum. YOU need to step up. This is the other side of marriage and family obligations and, yeah, it DOES sound like maybe you are a little bit selfish based on how you are framing things.
Can you commit to caring for the kids every Saturday from 12-5 so that she can also get out of the house and focus on her own needs for a bit each week? Can make a huge lasagne and freeze it so that there’s a meal on hand and ready that she can just heat up for lunches sometime? You need to lock in. You guys are a team during a tragedy and you’re kinda supposed to be carrying the brunt of this right now but I get the feeling that you are approaching this tragedy very passively (lots of you “suggesting” and “explaining”).
I do the dishes, cook dinner every night and get the children to bed. I’m off at 4. She’ll go upstairs and be wjth the twins, but if the twins are already sleeping she’ll either try to catch up on something else or have some her time. On my days off I try to do everything I can without her help, but it can be hard since the drastic age difference.
By asking her this question, all you are doing is adding to her burden. Not only is she doing all this extra work, but now she feels like she has to defend it to you. If you want to support her, observe what needs to be done and do it. Dont ask her questions, answering them is just more work for her. I dont think you are an AH, but yif you want to support her, you really need to step up and just quietly take on more tasks, organize activities with the boys out of the house, make sure she gets an afternoon to herself so she can rest (again, without asking her how to make it happen). Etc.