Parenting advice: Sister demands free babysitting all the time.

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

Dear Care and Feeding,

I am 24. I work full-time and am struggling to finish my degree. My days off work are always random ones in the middle of the week, so it is hard to get together and make plans with people.My sister is a year younger than me with two toddlers. She married a guy ten years older than her when she was 19 (and everyone told her it was a bad idea but she was determined to go ahead). Our parents moved overseas two years ago, so it is just her and me in the local area.

Whenever she calls me, she wants to know when my days off are so I can do X, Y, and Z for her. She never asks about my life in any way. All she does is complain about her husband not helping out and how she needs a break—a break that resolves around me taking both her kids while I do a month’s worth of laundry at the laundromat or other chores. It is constant. I have started ducking her calls and lying about not knowing when I am off due to short staffing. The last straw was her waking me up at 6 a.m. demanding I watch her kids since I hadn’t seen them in a week and a half. I told her I just got off a 14-hour shift and nearly bombed a big test. I was dead on my feet and going to bed. She told me I didn’t know what tired was. I hung up on her and turned my phone off. I slept for 12 hours straight.

My sister is livid with me and I am not apologizing. Her mother-in-law volunteers to babysit all the time but my sister hates her. Her husband goes out with his friends all the time and for all her complaints, she has never taken him to task at all. Our parents have offered to fly her and the kids to their country and let her file for divorce as a last-ditch effort. She was affronted by the offer. I love my sister. I love her kids. But I am barely keeping my head above water as it is. I need help. Please.

—Not the Mama

Dear Not the Mama,

You have to keep telling your sister “no.” Try and have a talk with her about what’s going on in your world and how much work you have to do. It doesn’t matter if she understands or not. When she asks you to watch her kids, the answer is simply “no.” Let her know when and if you are available for child care—not doing her laundry, but child care–if you feel like occasionally helping her out with the kids. If not, simply tell her that you’re too stressed to be of any assistance these days. She will have to learn to make other arrangements. The reason she keeps turning to you is because you’ve stepped up and shown up for her in the past. You can’t keep doing that. If you want to offer her a day of babysitting per month, you can offer her a time that works for you. If not, don’t do it at all. Tell her “no” and mean it. You have nothing to apologize for. You don’t have time to watch her kids (much less fix the rest of her life), and she is going to have to find someone who does.

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Dear Care and Feeding,

My wife and I have an 18-month-old daughter. We have been arguing about piercing her ears, which I oppose. I even said that if you make her get a piercing, I will pay for a tattoo for her. I feel if we get her ears pierced, it would only be to satisfy ourselves, as she hasn’t asked for that. I would rather wait until she is old enough to want it done herself. Am I being unreasonable?

—No Piercing (Yet)

Dear No Piercing,

You aren’t being unreasonable, but it is worth considering that across the world, people of many cultures pierce their daughter’s ears as young as infancy. Earrings are a beautiful way to adorn a little girl (or boy!) and are often a child’s first introduction to jewelry. I had my own ears pierced by my pediatrician as a baby and took my daughter to get hers done when she was 3 months old. I’ve often heard the concern about getting a child’s consent before getting their ears pierced, but I’ve never heard of a person who had it done and resented that. I’m tempted to tell you to defer to your wife as a woman in this situation, but I don’t think it’s fair for fathers to go without a voice on matters of parenting. You can continue your anti-piercing stance and wait for your kid to get old enough to ask, but consider that it is a low-stakes decision that will more likely than not please your child when she’s old enough to appreciate it. It’s also worth noting that it can be scarier for a young kid to face a piercing needle than a toddler who wouldn’t realize what’s happening, and your daughter may later want to wear earrings while being afraid of getting pierced. Finally, if your little one gets older and decides she doesn’t want to wear earrings anymore, you can just stop putting them on her. Again, you have a valid vote, but I lean toward letting your wife lead here—there just isn’t much of a downside.

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Dear Care and Feeding,

My older child is about to turn 3, and I also have a 10-month-old. We are having a family party for the eldest and invited a few family members (aunt and uncle, two cousins) that live out of town, knowing they would appreciate the invite and generally enjoy making the trip when they can visit with the extended family. We also made it clear we didn’t want them to feel any obligation to come or bring a gift; if they did choose to come it could be solely for the purpose of getting together with everyone.

Well, my in-laws asked who had RSVP’d to the party the other day, and we shared who is/isn’t coming and who we have yet to hear from. They were surprised when we said aunt and uncle would be coming as well, as one of the cousins and their husband had asked where they would be staying since we turned our previously extra guest bedroom into the baby’s room. I said I didn’t know for sure, I was assuming one of the three affordable local hotels. They were disgusted we hadn’t set up accommodations for them and said since we were inviting them to come, that it was our responsibility to make sure they had a place to stay, especially since they have each stayed at our house when visiting before (this was pre-kids and literally one time out of many visits).

I just don’t think this is true. They’re adults and can take care of making sure they have a place to stay just fine, and I would think leaving it to be their decision so they can pick the place they are most comfortable with is much more kind. If it were someone visiting for the very first time that didn’t know the area and what it had to offer, I would most likely offer to help, but these people used to live in this same area and visit at least once a year. Is this a thing or are they just being over dramatic?

—Book Your Own Room, Please!

Dear Book Your Own Room,

It sounds like it’s your in-laws having this reaction and not the family members who are visiting. Check in with your visitors and make sure they are prepared to find their own accommodations, offering suggestions for nearby hotels. Let your in-laws know that you appreciate their concern but that you simply do not have the space to accommodate your relatives these days. And let that be that.

You don’t have to host people in your home just because they are coming to town to see you. If any of your family members balk at being sent to a hotel, they can skip the trip. You can’t come up with living space that you don’t have just because you have visitors. There’s nothing for you to feel guilty or apologetic about. If they can come, great. If not, that’s too bad. And of course, if your in-laws are so concerned about where these folks are staying, they can put them up in their home.

Dear Care and Feeding,

My mother remarried when I was 17. When she died, I asked her husband for items that she had owned long before she ever married him, things that have absolute zero monetary value. For example, I wanted a bread tray I made her in Sunday school when I was in 5th grade. He didn’t get them to me then, but promised me he would never let anything happen to any of my mother’s things. Fast forward 12 years. He remarries and moves away from “the farm,” leaving all my mother’s personal items to rot in that dilapidated old house. Fast forward five more years and he and his new bride move out of state to pursue his career. He visited me before he left but never mentioned anything about the farm or my mother’s belongings. Several months later, he casually mentions in a call that he sold “the farm” to pay for his move. “Well I told you that didn’t I?” OMG No! What about Mom’s things? I knew better than to ask. But he promised he would never let anything happen to them, that someday they would be mine. I ended the conversation cordially and my head exploded. Am I being selfish thinking anything she had prior to his entrance into her life is not his? Did he sell the house with all its contents? I can’t imagine him actually emptying it first. Does this warrant an actual conversation or should I just let it go and walk away?

—Sentimentally Yours

Dear Sentimentally Yours,

You aren’t selfish for feeling entitled to items that belonged to your mother before she married your stepfather, but it wasn’t wise for you to let 17 years pass without getting them back from him. It’s likely that he didn’t think about how important they were to you because it’s been so long since you’ve brought them up. You can, and should, ask him what happened to these things, but you should brace yourself for the possibility that he didn’t keep them when he moved. He should have kept his promise to you and made arrangements for you to get them when he first left “the farm,” but you also had a responsibility to check in with him about them as well. Perhaps he has a storage unit, or has kept some of these things with him as he’s moved over the years. I hope that he has. But if not, you’ll have to make peace with the fact that you waited far too long to follow up about getting them.

—Jamilah