– I was prepared for my daughter to be sick a lot at first when she goes to kindergarten, but not to the point where one sick day goes seamlessly into another. We just got discharged and went back on sick leave. The doctor advises that we take our daughter to the sea, at least for a couple of months.
Kate has the most normal family. The couple does not shoot for the stars. A year ago their baby girl was three years old and she went to work.
– We could say that we were on sick leave for the whole year. I am lucky that the mother and her daughter are on sick leave, or else I would have been fired from my job. But I can’t leave my job, my husband and I have very difficult finances.
When Kate and her husband bought an apartment with a mortgage, her husband had a good job. However, after the baby was born and the pandemic started and Kate’s family had a crisis. Her spouse’s firm went bankrupt and he had to look for a new job.
At this time, Kate’s maternity leave ended and she was also able to go back to work. Then it turned out that her husband found a bad job, so he had to run around for interviews again. Now Kate’s spouse has been hired, but he’s still on probation.
– Not only was this year financially very hard for us, but for many of our friends as well. Right now we are in severe austerity mode. But because of my frequent sick days, the doctor keeps telling me that my husband and I have to take our daughter to the sea. I even began to have a hard time with this kind of talk. My mother advised me to talk to Helena, because she and her husband have a studio near the sea. My mother even said that if I do not work out, then she can go to the sea with my daughter, maybe the baby really immune system will work more correctly.
Helena is Kate’s older sister . Almost ten years ago she and her husband bought their own place near the sea. Helena’s adult son and his friends vacationed there several times. One year they even tried to rent out the flat, but after the renters had shit the place and left without paying, Helena flatly refused to let the guests in, because she did not want to wash her flat after someone else. The owners themselves live in their apartment when they vacation in the south.
-Mother shared that her nephew’s vacation doesn’t start until August, since he only takes a session at the end of July. Helena and her husband only go on vacation in mid-autumn, as the spouse does not tolerate the summer heat well, so if mother and daughter went on vacation in early summer, it would not disrupt the plans of her sister or her family members in any way. The only disadvantage of this accommodation is that it would be necessary to get to the sea by shuttle bus. If my sister agreed, it would be a great help.
– And what did my sister say?
– I called Helena and told her about our problem. I asked her to help us, because we will not be able to get out of the disease that way. I told her that if they can, they can let my mother and daughter stay with them. The nurse said that she would talk to her husband and then give her an answer. Then she called the next day and said that her spouse said that her mother-in-law and her niece could move in if we were willing to pay.
In principle, the price is not exorbitant, but at the moment Kate has nothing to pay her sister, because she needs money for tickets, and to feed her mother and daughter need to give something. Helena knows very well that her sister’s finances are very tight right now, and they have to count every penny, so it’s at least mean to take that kind of money from her relatives. Okay, relatives would lose money because they were renting, but the apartment is standing idle, as neither her sister, nor her husband, nor her son going on vacation before August.
Kate took great offense to Helena and hung up on her. The girl agreed with her mother that she would walk in the park and go to the lake with her baby as much as possible in the summer. Do you think Helena was right not to let her sister stay with her? Couldn’t she get into Kate’s position and let her niece and her mother live in their apartment, because the girl’s health depends on it? Or maybe it was quite normal for Helena to turn her sister away?
