Care and Feeding is Slate’s parenting advice column. Have a question for Care and Feeding? Submit it here.

Dear Care and Feeding,

I loved being a mom and have always looked forward to being a grandmother. For years, I’ve told my kids, who are now in their 30s, that I can’t wait, and that once they have kids I’d be happy to help with child care. My son and his wife had a son four months ago and asked me to do bridge care between her maternity leave and her summer vacation (she’s a teacher). But she is incredibly particular about her son’s care, and as a first-time mom she’s way too anxious about the small stuff. She’s too hard to work with, and my own daughter and son also sided with her about all kinds of parenting decisions—and my daughter doesn’t even have kids! Now that summer vacation is here, I have put a blanket ban on all grandma childcare. My daughter, who just announced her pregnancy, is furious. My son is mad because he and his wife apparently had been planning for once-weekly daycare with me without ever having asked! How do I get everyone to calm down?

—Grandma, Not Personalized Nanny

Dear Grandma,

A student of mine, in a long-ago undergraduate creative writing workshop, used to say, “This is a WW moment”—her own coinage, which I never forgot and made liberal use of myself in the years following. WW stands for “Wait—what?” and it’s invoked whenever a character in a story says or does something that contradicts what’s been established by the writer.

That’s what I thought when I read your question. Wait—what? You told your kids for years that they could count on you for child care—that you were so looking forward to grandparenthood, you couldn’t wait!—and now that the grandchildren have started appearing, you’ve announced that you have no intention on following through.

And you’re so self-righteous about it! Your daughter-in-law is too particular about her baby’s care! Your own kids take her side in “parenting decisions” (how dare they, when you’re the one who knows how things should be done)! Listen, Grandma, I don’t know why you imagined that the grandbabies you dreamed about would be yours to care for as you wished and that you would get to overrule their parents if you disagreed with them, but grandmothering isn’t mothering. You absolutely have the right to refuse to help out with your grandchildren, current or future. You have the right to renege on a promise (which you should never have made). But you don’t get to demand that your children “calm down.” If you’re interested in repairing your relationships with them after this debacle, consider being honest with them: Tell them you should not have promised to help with child care. Tell them you had no idea what that might actually entail.

And if you search your soul and discover that, somewhere deep inside, you know that it’s the children’s parents who are in charge of how they’re cared for—and that you can live with that—you might offer to try again. If not, your role in your grandchildren’s lives will be that of the loving visitor. There is no shame in that. But you won’t even have that if you don’t own up to your mistake.

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Dear Care and Feeding,

I have two boys, ages 8 and 12, who play one sport a season. We have local family—on my side, my mom and her husband (who typically have my children sleep over once a month); on my husband’s side, his sister and her husband, whose mother-in-law lives with them, and who have no children (so they also have my children spend the night once a month). All of these people used to come to a game a couple of times a season, which was fine. But they’ve all started coming to EVERY game, and it’s too much for me and my husband. Five people to entertain is a lot when I just want to watch my sons play! And my sister-in-law talks my ear off, so I can’t enjoy the game. But even beyond that, because we have to entertain/socialize with them, we are not getting to know other families in our community, which is very important to us.

It seems to me they see more than enough of my kids. They each get 24 uninterrupted hours per month with my boys, plus family holidays and birthdays. How do I set things up so we can go back to them only coming to one or two games each season without hurting their feelings? I tried leaving one weekend off the schedule I shared with them, and then just as they were leaving the week before it, they said, “No games next weekend?” and my kids said, “No, we’re playing!”  I just wanted some peace and quiet! Help!

—Too Much Talking on the Sidelines

Dear Too Much,

Well, I’ve got to say, right at the outset, that an awful lot of people will read this letter and think, OMG, I’d give anything if anyone in my extended family had any interest in coming to my kids’ games! Nobody cares! It’s just us, week after week, alone in the stands. I mention this not because I don’t think you have a problem—you do, I can see that. Anything that troubles anyone is by definition a problem. (It’s like the answer to the question of what makes a plant a weed: A weed is anything that grows where you don’t want it to.)

I mention this because I think it’s important to have perspective. Even as I offer you advice about how to solve this problem, I do want to point out that, while vexing, it is also an excellent problem to have: too much love and interest. I get that the grandparents and aunts and uncles are horning in on something you want to keep just for you. I also get that, to you, 24 uninterrupted hours every month, plus holiday gatherings, seems like plenty of time with your kids. Apparently, it’s not to them. This disconnect can be solved only by an honest conversation. To avoid hurting them (or at least to soften the blow—because it will feel like a blow to them), make it clear that you are glad and grateful that they care so much, that they want to be so involved, and that your children are lucky enough to have adults in their lives other than their parents whom they can count on. (Take a moment, please, to be glad and grateful and not just be saying it.) But as happy as you are about that, tell them, you need time to spend as a family on your own, too—and as a family among the other families in your community. Tell them you consider the kids’ games special time for you. Then let them know how many games they’re welcome to attend. Let them plan for those games (you decide whether you’re willing to have all five of them at once, once or twice a season, or whether you’d prefer to have your mother and her husband pick one game and your sister-in-law and her family pick another). If they pout or argue, stand your ground, but with kindness and love. You get to make the rules. (But they’re not rules if you keep your wishes to yourself and only think of them as rules. So speak up.)

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Dear Care and Feeding,

My 14-year-old daughter, “Melissa,” has two very close friends, and no other friends. She is equally close to both of them; she doesn’t prefer one over the other. But her two friends do not get along. This is not because anything happened between them, but because they both have a need to be Melissa’s only and absolute best friend (despite the fact that both of them have lots of friends other than my daughter). Melissa’s friends will frequently tell her malicious lies about each other in an attempt to be her “best” or only friend, making her feel that she has to pick a side. She’s getting to the point where she doesn’t want to be friends with either of them anymore. I don’t know what advice to give her.

—Can’t Pick a Side

Dear Pick a Side,

Here’s what I’m wondering: Why doesn’t Melissa have any other friends? If you ask her and she says she doesn’t like anyone else—or tells you no one else likes her—wouldn’t it be worth pursuing why this is? You seem to know a lot about the dynamics of this friendship triangle, which suggests that your daughter is comfortable talking to you about it. I’d ask a lot more questions.

If all three of these kids were close, I wouldn’t be so concerned. (I remember being in an “us-against-the-world” trio in junior high.) If the other two girls didn’t have plenty of other friends and only Melissa is otherwise friendless, ditto. But this particular dynamic—your daughter in the middle as two people fight over which one “gets” her—raises questions for me. Is there something about this dynamic that she secretly likes? It seems to me that several things are going to have to happen for this push-and-pull to end. Melissa needs to understand her role in this. She needs to have frank conversations with both of her close friends about it. And she needs to make an effort to expand her social circle, just as her two best friends have already done.

Dear Care and Feeding,

In the next month, my husband and I have to decide whether to keep our daughter in her daycare or move her to a school-based preschool. The decision feels impossible. The daycare’s administration has been a mess (lots of teacher turnover), but it’s safe and convenient, our daughter has made great friends there, and—crucially—it closes only on federal holidays (which has been a godsend, because we don’t have family nearby who could help out with school breaks while we’re working). The school-based preschool is rated off the charts. Every teacher there has a master’s degree in early child education. Friends who send their kids there describe it as “a magical place.” We were shocked when we managed to lottery in. But it closes for Christmas break, spring break, several weeks in the summer, etc. Many of the families whose kids are there have a stay-at-home parent, so this isn’t a problem for them them, but it would require real sacrifice and organization on our part (alternating our vacation time, competing for slots in the rare summer camps that accommodate four-year-olds, etc.). If it weren’t for the many breaks, this wouldn’t even be a competition; the school would be an easy choice. But I’m worried that we can’t pull off the juggling. Can we? How do parents do this?

—Either Option Sounds Good, Right?

Dear Sounds Good,

Question: What are you going to do when she’s 5 and starts school? I ask because you’re going to have to be doing this juggling then. Parents who have full-time jobs handle this in a variety of ways (and often, in any one family, in a combination of ways). After-school programs, vacation childcare programs, part-time babysitters, parent co-ops, shifting to work with more flexible hours when possible, and, yes, alternating vacation time (not an inclusive list!) are all ways of balancing child care and work. If you already have a plan in place for next year, and the school-based preschool is that appealing, put the future plan in place now. If you have not begun to make a plan for next year, well, you need to start. Because this problem is not going to magically solve itself once your kid’s in school.

It’s not easy to figure out how to handle work and child care—no question about it. And as a society we’ve failed miserably in this area. That it’s every parent for themselves struggling to find a way to solve this problem is unfair, unreasonable, and infuriating. But one way or another, you’re going to have to find your own solution. If the thought of doing so now fills you with dread, then, sure, put it off a year. It sounds like the daycare is a good enough place to keep your child parked until kindergarten. As long as she’s safe and happy, don’t feel as if you have no choice but to make the switch. But don’t kid yourself, the juggling act eventually comes for us all.

—Michelle

More Advice From Slate

When I married my husband about a decade ago, he was a widower with a 13-year-old son, “Toby.” Toby was extremely precocious and intelligent, and my husband, raising him alone, quickly grew frustrated with the level of his math instruction at school. Having the means to do so, he had Toby educated at home by private tutors. Toby has grown up to be a really lovely young man and is now about to receive a math Ph.D. from a prestigious university.