People love to say it takes a village to raise a child, but villages fall apart when one person sets impossible standards.

One grandmother did her best to keep her young grandson entertained while in her care.

But when her controlling daughter-in-law forbade them from doing any new things without her, it made the babysitting gig a whole lot harder.

Keep reading for the full story.

AITA for telling my DIL she needs to relax her rules if she wants me to keep babysitting

I have always been close with my son and daughter-in-law and think we have a really good relationship.

They live just a mile down the road so we are together quite a bit.

My son and DIL have a 3-year-old little boy that is as sweet as can be.

My son works M-F and my DIL is a SAHM.

This grandmother is quite active in her grandchild’s life and takes on a great deal of the child care.

I babysit my grandson two days during the week so my DIL can have a break and typically one evening/night on weekends for them to have a date night.

But her DIL sometimes makes her life more difficult than it needs to be.

My DIL has this rule that she wants to be there for any “firsts” that my grandson does. I get that, though her definition of “first” is very broad.

Not just like first trip to the zoo, but first time at a new park, first time seeing a new TV show, first time playing with a toy, etc.

She tries to honor her DIL’s wishes, but can’t help but grow a little resentful over them.

I personally think the restrictions are a tad over the top, but her kid, her rules, and I have no problem respecting that.

The issue happens in that she doesn’t do any of these firsts.

These restrictions make it exceedingly difficult to keep the three-year-old entertained.

I’m really not sure what they do all day when they are home, but everything I ask to take my grandson to do she says is a first, that she wants to be there for, but then she doesn’t do it.

It’s made it so babysitting is a lot of just sitting at my house with nothing to do, and my grandson is bored.

But when she calmly tried to reason with her DIL, it didn’t go well at all.

So the other day I told her that I think it would be a good idea for her to relax the first rule a bit so that I can take my grandson to do some things while I am babysitting.

She did not like that and said that I was trying to take memories and special moments away from her.

She doesn’t want to cause drama, but she knows she can’t just continue with the status quo.

I’m not trying to overstep, but a bored three-year-old with no way to burn off energy is a lot to handle, and so I told her I don’t know if I could babysit as frequently with the rules how they are.

She accused me of blackmailing her.

AITA here?

Sounds like this mom is worrying herself into a frenzy.

What did Reddit have to say?

Maybe the only way path forward for this grandma is to just ignore her DIL’s rules — within reason, of course.

Maybe her DIL should start being more grateful for all the free childcare and stop sweating the small stuff.

This commenter thinks this grandmother is already doing way more than her fair share.

Her DIL’s anxiety may be affecting her child more than she’s admitting to.

This grandmother wasn’t trying to steal any special moments — she was just trying to stop a bored three-year-old from climbing the wall.

Her daughter-in-law needs a reality check — and fast.

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