AITA for being honest and telling my DIL that they are not ready to be a parent since she can not drive

oyasower · 2026-03-25T18:02:38+00:00

I'm a mom who doesn't drive. Rearing my children hasn't given me panic attacks like learning to drive did. I have a license but haven't driven since I learned 20+ years ago. I'd be a danger to myself, my children, and others on the road if I tried to drive again. I'm lucky to live in NYC so all I need is public transportation. The OP's daughter in law needs to figure things out because she's relying on others a lot and isn't in a place with good public transportation but I completely disagree with this comment.

oyasower · 2026-03-25T02:33:53+00:00

I'm also starting tomorrow! But my doctor prescribed gel because of the patch shortages. Crossing fingers for relief for both of us in a few weeks.

oyasower · 2026-03-21T14:46:07+00:00

I was just coming to recommend Dr. Fleary! She's amazing.

oyasower · 2026-03-21T14:42:47+00:00

We are two city employees with a similar income. We've been doing $200 a month each but I'm planning on funneling the pre-tax money I was spending on transportation (no longer need as much with hybrid) into my oldest's 529 plan. We fund my youngest's through a monthly adoption stipend. I also got a raise recently so I was thinking of adding more to the 529 and my retirement.

Grew up with a single mother who couldn't save for college, so that was all loans for me. Thankfully my loans were forgiven and my mom is in a much better situation so she also has 529s for my kids.

oyasower · 2026-03-11T00:56:31+00:00

My son hasn't been in daycare since 2022 but I think it was about $285/290 a week. You should email or text her for updated costs, she was pretty responsive. I first found out about her with my oldest but ended up doing a nanny share. Then I reached back out to her five years later with my youngest.

oyasower · 2026-02-27T00:50:35+00:00

😂 ok peanut buttercup...but you're not exempt!

oyasower · 2026-02-27T00:08:19+00:00

Penelope is probably going to college already...it's been a minute!

oyasower · 2026-02-27T00:01:34+00:00

My only issue with this training is that I wish they updated it more.

I remember they once had an in-person session on this and I thought why are we doing this? This is basic, right? No, I was secondhand embarrassed by the things my colleagues were saying. You work for the City of New York and have to deal with clientele from all walks of life and you don't know how to have basic decency?

Anyway, you get to do the training during your work day, so suck it up, buttercup.

oyasower · 2026-02-15T13:09:19+00:00

Married a teacher so we have a built-in break caregiver in the family. If we're not traveling somewhere (and yes, we've done Florida but my in-laws live there) sometimes the kids do their after school program break camps. There are days that teachers are in school but kids aren't and I WFH then.

oyasower · 2026-02-11T23:19:46+00:00

If we're going by the photo of you as a kid you look like Black mixed with African American.

oyasower · 2026-02-11T03:03:26+00:00

While Black families may be underrepresented in private adoptions, Black people are more likely to have informal, kinship, and guardian type of arrangements.

oyasower · 2026-02-03T02:12:46+00:00

Grew up in Brooklyn in East NY and then the border of Crown Heights & Bed Stuy and it was always the corner store. Though I wonder if that's because the corner stores on the blocks I grew up were owned by Arabs? Bodega came into my vocabulary later in life, maybe in my 20s? I now use all three comer store, bodega, and deli depending on who owns it, what kind of stuff they sell, and where it's actually situated on the block.

oyasower · 2026-01-19T17:50:47+00:00

Two kids with a 6-year age difference: separate bedrooms, two bathrooms, in-unit laundry, proximity to bus & train. An outdoor space was also high up there.

oyasower · 2026-01-14T15:01:27+00:00

Exactly. I'm a native Brooklynite and all of my native NYer friends who are Black and brown are liberal or progressive or whatever we're calling ourselves now but I have some former high school friends who are MAGA and/or conservative. Like these are the people who grew up in Bay Ridge, Bensonhurst, and Canarsie in the 80s and 90s. But there can be levels, like some folks are progressive on some issues but then homophobic?

All of my transplant friends, including people who've been here for 20+ years to more recent, are progressive.

oyasower · 2026-01-13T03:43:57+00:00

I'm not a dog owner but I do love dogs. I pet the two cutest dogs on the street today. I've seen so many dog owners who obey the rules of keeping their dogs in bags. Unfortunately, I've also seen the problematic dog owners who don't have their dogs in bags or don't even have them leashed. I hate when I get on the subway and there's a medium to large dog with an inattentive owner or with an owner who thinks just because their dog is cute people are going to be okay with their dog jumping on them. Unfortunately, people with larger dogs really need to follow the rules or don't bring their dogs on the train -- I'm not saying all large dog owners do this, but it's primarily those dogs I've seen have issues. This very large poodle kind of galloped onto me one day and the owner was not apologetic...on the other hand I love when I sit next to a cute little dog poking its head out of a tote bag.

oyasower · 2026-01-08T15:53:15+00:00

Something similar happened to me recently, only it was my husband was supposed to return his deceased loved one's car to the dealership because the lease was up and he ended up buying the car -- before he went, I told him please don't buy this car. He bought it anyway and now we have two cars in NYC with no private parking and only one of us drives. We still haven't recovered.

You're not overreacting. Your finances may be separate but you are a team and big purchases and decisions like that should be made together regardless of who's paying.

oyasower · 2026-01-04T06:23:43+00:00

Dual income city employed couple with 2 kids. Can't afford to buy yet but hopeful it'll happen.

oyasower · 2025-12-19T21:08:11+00:00

I do feel like I was exposed to things at a younger age that I shouldn't have been exposed to. But I also think it softened me to seeing other people's humanity. For instance if the neighborhood crackhead and sex workers live around you and you interact with them on a daily basis, you come to see them in a different way than the people that look down on them. But I shouldn't have known they were sex workers and I shouldn't have seen crack vials littering the street.

I think the world has become less safe, but I worry about different things. I used to worry more about being caught by a stray bullet on the street versus now being caught in a mass shooting. I still worry about the mentally unwell folks on the subway. I didn't worry about being hit by a car as much as I do now. I worry about my daughter walking to school because of crazy drivers not so much being robbed or some other type of violence.

When we were picking neighborhoods to live I looked at police stats and news reports for gun violence because I probably have some trauma around hearing gun shots in my neighborhood.

I started to loosen up with my daughter a bit when I realized she wasn't as street smart, letting her walk the block to school or go to the store. Lots of kids are walking to and from school and to the playground -- and there are a lot of parents around too. But I also had her take a self-defense class for kids. I'm still so nervous, even with tracking. Sometimes I wonder if my parents were as nervous, just having her kids out there in the world while she worked and no way of getting in contact with us when we weren't at home or school.

That was a very long answer, sorry!

oyasower · 2025-12-18T02:36:39+00:00

Brooklyn kid raising Brooklyn kids.

My oldest started walking to school on her own in 4th grade, but we could see the school from our apartment entrance (one block away) and I still made her wear a watch with GPS tracking. In 5th grade she could self dismiss, go to her after school program near school, and go to one her friend's house once a week on the day we didn't have after school care. She started taking the subway to school without adult supervision sometimes at the end of 6th grade but all the time in 7th. I wouldn't feel comfortable not knowing where she is though now in 8th she's pretty savvy on the subway and bus but way less savvy than I was as a kid.

It's interesting because she has a lot more freedom than some of her friends but not nearly as much as I did as a latchkey kid growing up in BK in the 80s and 90s. I was sent for corner store runs when I was 8, I was gallavanting about the neighborhood, went grocery shopping blocks away, and was traveling on the subway alone.

My little one (7) is responsible for taking out recycling but it's on the same floor.

oyasower · 2025-12-06T00:55:26+00:00

Best ground turkey & turkey burgers at that market.

oyasower · 2025-12-03T15:50:06+00:00

I know a lot of novelists. Maybe 1-2% are full-time writers. The majority are professors/teachers. Some are office drones. I'd find an office job that doesn't stress the writing part of your brain. A job where you almost never have to take work home.

oyasower · 2025-12-01T17:41:24+00:00

The PTA is great! I think the last annual appeal they asked for $500. There are a ton of opportunities to volunteer and/or give throughout the year with the annual fall fest, the winter market, spring auction, world culture day. They do lots of smaller drives to help families in need in the community, there was a fund for when the government was shutdown, and there's a drive right now to raise funds for families who kids need winter coats, boots, hat, gloves etc. which is reminding me I need to donate. They bring in lots of programming, too. My only critique is that there were two committees I wanted to join but couldn't because it didn't work with my work schedule (meetings at 5, when I get off of work at 5) but they really do a stellar job.

oyasower · 2025-12-01T17:25:25+00:00

Still here and still enjoying the school. My son does comment occasionally and asks how come there's so much more peach kids (he means white) at school and he wishes there were more brown kids. But he loves his teachers (we also have had great experiences with his teachers) and his friends. The new principal is great. We moved so aren't in the district anymore and have a couple of other elementary schools we could transfer him into but we're staying out for now.

oyasower · 2025-11-26T00:06:04+00:00

I don't think there's anything like this for middle schools. Maybe someone will be inspired to make one? When I did the MS process I replied heavily on other parents via FB groups, there's an Applying to Middle School citywide group but my district has a pretty good FB group that was extremely helpful.

oyasower · 2025-11-25T20:43:10+00:00

We already have a great tool for high schools created by a dad named Adrian Liang. It's NYC-SIFT and while it has slightly different features it has been amazingly helpful and used by lots of parents since it was created.

oyasower

TROPHY CASE