Woman Hides SIL's Hiking Shoes Because She "Walks Too Much", Shocked That She Won't Babysit Anymore

Where is that fine line between volunteering and duty? Apparently, many relatives from different families are similar in one thing – they purely mix these two things and then demand something from others, considering their kindness an obligation.

Well, the story we want to share today happened when our narrator volunteered to babysit their relative’s three kids and then encountered some truly unreasonable behavior from her. However, let’s just cut to the chase and read everything together.

More info: Reddit

Turns out, many of our relatives and friends actually consider our help as not a manifestation of our kindness, but as a duty

Image credits: alexeyzhilkin / Freepik (not the actual photo)

The author of the post recently volunteered to move in with their sister-in-law for a while, to help her with babysitting her 3 kids

Image credits: prostooleh / Freepik (not the actual photo)

Apparently, the mom considered this to be the author’s obligation, as she later started condemning their hobby

Image credits: wavebreak media / Freepik (not the actual photo)

The author is an avid walker, and they walk at least a few miles every day, but the sister-in-law dubbed it “an obsession”

Image credits: AStormInsideTeaCups

After the sister-in-law started hiding the author’s walking shoes, they decided they were fed up with this and walked out

The Original poster (OP) recently volunteered to move in with their sister-in-law, a mom of 3, when her husband was away on business. The author loves their niblings and was just happy to help their mom with babysitting and everything related to it. However, after just a couple of days, problems with the original poster’s hobby began to arise.

The author loves walking. Since October 2018, they have walked several miles every day, regardless of the weather or temperature outside. This usually takes them about an hour a day, but on the days the author planned to help the sister-in-law, they shortened the training time to about half an hour.

It turned out, however, that even this amount of time drove the mother mad. She repeatedly said that the OP “is obsessed” with walking and asked if they had considered therapy. The author, in turn, believed that 30 minutes was very little time and wouldn’t cause any problems with babysitting. But then the sister-in-law resorted to action…

The woman had simply hidden the author’s walking shoes several times, so after another attempt to “wean them off this obsession,” the original poster decided they were fed up and stopped the helping experiment. Yes, they just packed their belongings and moved home, despite another wave of criticism from the irate mom.

Image credits: stefamerpik / Freepik (not the actual photo)

“It’s a completely bizarre situation, but something similar sometimes happens when relatives help parents with babysitting,” notes Irina Matveeva, a psychologist and certified NLP specialist, whom Bored Panda asked for a comment here. “The thing is, parents, one way or another, have a perfectly reasonable kind of ‘egoism’ associated with their kids, who are the center of their universe.”

As a result, according to the expert, parents often transfer their attitude toward babysitting to others, thus leading to numerous misunderstandings and even outright fights. Even if relatives or friends volunteer to help with the children’s care.

“However, in the case described, it seems to me that the mother went too far. She had no right to criticize another person’s hobby, much less hide their things. Therefore, everything that happened seems a completely reasonable reaction. If someone is behaving strangely with you, it’s best to leave the situation,” Irina Matveeva summarizes.

People in the comments were also completely unanimous in their opinions – the sister-in-law was outright unreasonable and rude. If this mother wanted the relative to be completely involved in caring for her offspring, she should’ve just hired a professional babysitter, the responders wrote. So do you, our readers, also agree with this?

Most commenters gave the author their sincere support, claiming that their sister-in-law was just unreasonable and even rude

Follow us on Flipboard.com/@boredpanda!