My mother-in-law was supposed to be our live-in childcare — then she flaked

"I need a bus ticket home for tomorrow," my mom-in-law said to my wife. "I have a doctor’s appointment."

Instantly, a flush of frustration raged through my body. My mom-in-law was supposed to be our full-time childcare – but this wasn’t the first time that she’d bailed on us with little to no notice for a non-urgent "doctor’s appointment" that suddenly popped up. It wasn’t supposed to be this way. 

Days before welcoming our first baby boy, we bought a three-bedroom house in Albany, New York, with a finished basement for my mom-in-law, Jem, to call her own. Even before grandkids were in the picture, she wanted to be the one to take care of her baby’s babies while we both worked full time. Less than a week after we signed the deed, Jem arrived by bus from Brooklyn to make sure the place was spotless. 

But it turns out that our new neighborhood couldn’t compete with her hometown. She missed her Caribbean church back in the city. She missed her doctors. She felt people in Albany dressed raggedy, going to work in ratty jeans and tees. Worst of all, Albany's Macy's paled in comparison to the mammoth in Herald Square that she was used to shopping at. She wasn’t ready to commit to our neighborhood full-time. 

So she’d vanish to Brooklyn, leaving my wife, Annie, and I overwhelmed with kids and work, and taking our frustrations out on each other. We flirted with the idea of sending our son to daycare a couple mornings a week, which would have cost us nearly $3,000 per year. But since the pandemic, many care centers have closed and spots have dwindled, so that option was off the table. All we had was Jem, and that was the way it was always supposed to be. 

Our quasi-care scenario devolved over time

For a while, Jem shuttled to Albany from Brooklyn on a Greyhound bus every Monday and returned to the city on Friday. The day after we had moved into our house, our basement flooded and needed extensive repairs, so a part-time living arrangement for Jem made sense. Having her around on weekdays was a huge help. Jem cared for our baby during the day while we worked. Then my wife and I fed the baby, read to him, and put him to sleep. Jem also cooked and cleaned, which made life with a kid a lot more manageable. 

But after a couple months with this set-up, Jem began disappearing for weeks at a time with barely any notice. She never told us that she didn't want to move in full-time. She was an avid avoider of tough conversations – and the more we talked about fixing the basement so she could permanently relocate, the more she vanished. My wife is a full-time state employee with a strict schedule, so whenever Jem left, I was the one who'd drop everything and be the primary caretaker. 

As a per diem social worker, I fell behind on paperwork, working far into the night to file state-mandated treatment plans months after they were due. Often, my wife would use vacation time so she could watch the baby while I shuttled to clients' houses. It frequently felt like I worked too many hours, but then Jem would suddenly return – meaning I could have actually taken on more.

Annie and I welcomed our second child – a baby girl – in 2020, and whenever the kids got overwhelming, when the baby went through a sleep regression and bawled through the night, Jem would have urgent appointments back home. She'd come for weeks at a time, but then leave sometimes for entire seasons. There was no planning; everything was based on her whims. 

We never came up with an alternative arrangement because we kept telling ourselves the basement was steps away from being finished – Jem would move in soon. I transitioned from social work to freelance journalism so I could work from home and make my own schedule, but during Zoom calls, there would be babies cooing in the corner of the screen, clawing at the monitor, and mashing buttons. We welcomed a new baby girl this past March, adding a new attendee to my conference calls. 

This uncertainty is far too common among families

Finally, this past June, five years after the arrangement first began, the sump pump in the basement was fixed, new walls were put up, and Jem finally had her own space. 

"Can we talk?" I asked softly as she sat on the couch. "Are you ever really planning to move here for good?"

She paused and looked towards the front door. 

"Honestly," she said, and sighed. "I wouldn't count on me." 

I wanted to scream. All her promises. All the money wasted finishing the basement. We purchased this specific house because it was conveniently on the bus line and she didn't drive. We had three kids – an astronomical amount to care for without family support close by. 

Our childcare catastrophe is one that is far too common among U.S. families. On average, childcare issues impact working moms 3.6 days per month, according to a recent BabyCenter survey. The unreliability forces these parents to take time off work or have a partner do so. 

In our case, it was my job that took the hit. I could only take assignments with long lead times, and I often had to turn down work for fear we wouldn’t have childcare. I’d get overwhelmed, putting friction on my relationship with my wife. I appreciated not catching colds the kids brought home from daycare and enjoyed not spending money on full-time care, but the irregularity of my work put my family in five figures worth of debt. At times, I was turning down over a thousand dollars' worth of assignments a month, which could have easily paid off our debt within a year. 

Eventually, we accepted we would just live in financial chaos – enjoying our kids was more important than stressing out about debt. Our credit cards could be paid off when the kids were teenagers.

I'm a stronger parent now than before

By the time we finally confirmed that my mom-in-law did not intend to provide full-time childcare, my eldest son had entered Kindergarten and my daughter had begun full-time pre-K, which our city's early childhood program fully paid for. 

My wife and I now both work from home and take it one day at a time, sharing childcare duties for the baby. I hand her to my wife for most of my interviews, and I watch her during my wife’s meetings. The baby is still at the stage where she sleeps most of the day, so I’m finally able to take on a bit more work and dig my way out of the financial hole I created. But I’m not totally sure how we will handle things once the baby starts needing non-stop attention.

The truth is, it's been really tough navigating all of our uncertainty when it came to childcare – I wish I could have prepared more for Jem's absences to strike a better balance between work and family. But there are still silver-linings: I cherish all of the times when I got to be the one my children turned to for cuddles, kissing boo boos, and concocting wacky dances. 

Now, when Grandma visits, it's an unexpected breath of respite. Annie and I can go on much-needed date nights. I can catch up on reading. We can take naps – without children smooshing into our ribs in bed beside us. Despite the chaos of it all, my kids are blessed to have three caretakers to cherish them. When Jem visits, they wake her every morning with hugs and tuck her in with kisses. They rush home from school to show her their art masterpieces and update her on their latest hijinks. We are all so lucky to have her around. She's lucky too.