Do you want me to tell you what the highest degree of professional recognition actually is? Yes, of course, crowds of clients, promotions at work, respect among colleagues - these are all signs, but the main thing is when your relatives insistently demand that you urgently help them by your trade. Of course, completely free of charge.
A similar situation once happened to the user u/anon0067, the narrator of today’s story, who even moved in with her brother and his wife to help with babysitting for free, but in the end, faced some serious problems. However, let's not get ahead of ourselves...
More info: Reddit
The author of the post is a professional babysitter who has been helping her brother and his wife with their triplets for some time
Image credits: Getty Images / Unsplash (not the actual photo)
The family already has 3 elder kids, so the auntie's help was actually of great need - and she even moved in with them
Image credits: anon0067
Image credits: Brooke Cagle / Unsplash (not the actual photo)
But then the new mom started nagging at the author's alleged "faults" - probably out of postpartum depression
Image credits: anon0067
Image credits: Frank Flores / Unsplash (not the actual photo)
This mistreatment regarded numerous petty things, and the last straw for the author was the SIL's dig over her tank top while feeding the triplets
Image credits: anon0067
The aunt announced she wanted to leave - and immediately took heat from the bro and his wife for being "selfish" and "a betrayer"
So, the Original Poster (OP) tells us that shortly before the events described, her sister-in-law gave birth to triplets, so there were six kids in the bro's family. Previously, they already had children of 4, 7 and 9 years old. Our heroine worked as a babysitter and had previously helped her brother and his wife, so now she accepted their offer to simply move in with them.
At first, everything was going well, but then, apparently, the author’s sister-in-law had postpartum depression, and she chose the volunteer nanny as one of the main targets for her criticism. There wasn’t a day that the mother didn’t find fault with something that the OP did. Feeding the younger kids, brushing the older children’s hair, doing the chores…
It got to the point that the SIL found fault with our heroine for just wearing a tank top while feeding one of the triplets - "because she didn’t want them to get used to the aunt’s smell.” The original poster tolerated this for a long time and honestly tried to suck it up, but sooner or later, everything comes to an end. The story with her tank top was the last straw.
She told the bro and his spouse that she was moving out and planned to return to babysitting - but this time as a job, for money. It immediately turned out that the SIL allegedly couldn’t trust anyone else with her children except the author - and she, as it turns out, wasn’t so bad... The OP was dumped with a whole bunch of accusations of ingratitude and “betrayal,” and she simply decided to seek support online.
Image credits: Blake Cheek / Unsplash (not the actual photo)
In fact, postpartum depression is actually quite a widespread issue that new moms have to deal with. For example, the Cleveland Clinic website claims that out of 100 mothers, about 75 experience the so-called baby blues (long and frequent bouts of tearfulness, sadness and anxiety for no apparent reason), and of these, 15 actually have postpartum depression.
In such cases, as the NHS of the UK official website notes, there are various ways to help a new mother - from self-help and talk therapy with a specialist, to taking antidepressants. "The best thing you can do is find support and ask for help from friends, family or your partner,” the Cleveland Clinic website sums up reasonably.
People in the comments also noted that six kids in a family, three of whom are babies, is really a lot, and the parents really need help. But at the same time, this is not a reason to criticize a free volunteer assistant for literally little things and trifles. "You offered to help and did not deserve to be treated that way,” someone wisely noted.
In any case, according to the responders, our heroine tried for too long not to take this blatant mistreatment to heart, so now it’s worth just walking out and, perhaps, recommending a decent professional caregiver. For money, of course. So what’s your opinion on this case? Please feel free to drop your ideas in the comments below.
Most commenters agreed that this family actually needed help - but not at the cost of the author's mental health
