Many of my past blogs have been of the more humorous type. This one, however, grapples with an issue that my family has been dealing with ever since we brought Child into the world; how do you deal with not having a family support system for the emotional, and physical, challenges of raising a child?
Husband and I have always been of the independent mind set. We paid for most of our own wedding, and even purchased two homes, without any family financial support, before Child was born. Family members seemed to be of the mind-set, "don't ask anything of us, and we won't ask anything of you", and this suited us as a couple of childless twenty-somethings just fine. Becoming parents, however, changed things quite a bit.
Having aced my childbirth class, I (like probably many other first time, naive mothers...) felt that I was truly ready for all of the changes that motherhood would bring. Wrong! Of course, labor and delivery didn't end up going as planned. Heck, childbirth class also neglected to totally prepare me for the mood swings which would occur, as a result of both sleeplessness, and post-partum depression (it should be noted that Child was born in the 90s, before there was a agressive emphasis on identifying/treating this relatively common condition).
So, you are probably wondering, where were the grandparents during this time of great change? Due to mental health issues, my Mother was not capable of helping. Husband's Mother lived 8 hours away, out-of-state. My Father lived across town, but pretty much kept to himself. My father-in-Law and Stepmother-in-law lived out-of- state, and prefered to be more "hands-off". Of all of the grandparents, the two who enjoyed being with Child the most (Husband's Mother and my Father) would both end up passing away from brain tumors, within a year of one another, all by the time Child would just turn three.
So, Husband and I muttled-through the difficult transition of going from a two-person family, to a three-person family. When it was convenient for the grandparents, we presented their grandaughter to them. As long as either Husband, or I, was present, this was cool; none of them really had any desire to totally immerse themselves in "grandparenting". This was just what our "normal" was, so we accepted it.
As I mentioned earlier, Husband's Mother passed away from a brain tumor when Child was 3. She was originally diagnosed, however, when Child was 2. Because she lived out-of-state, there was an emergency trip planned to be there for her surgery. Knowing that a week of disrupted schedule could be hard for such a young Child, I basically begged my Stepmother-in-Law to stay at our home and watch Child while we all left to deal with the unthinkable that was happening; in a nutshell, I was told "no". Thankfully, Husband's Aunt, who lived in the same city as Husband's Mother, graciously cared for her Great Niece for an entire 5 days while we were dealing with trying to figure out the "next steps" for a 56 year-old woman, just handed a fatal prognosis. We will never forget the kindess that she showed us that week...
As soon as Husband's Mother passed away, my Father was diagnosed with the same terminal brain tumor. He, as well, only lived 9 months after diagnosis. Yet again, our "independently-minded" family of three dealt with all of this stress alone.
Meanwhile, Child was starting in school. She started becoming aware that other kids were spending time with their grandparents. There were stories of adventures shared, and plenty of spoiling. The idea of "material gain" from grandparents never intrigued Child as much as the thought of spending time with another couple of adults who cared about her. What are you supposed to say to a child wanting to know why her grandparents never do anything like that with her?
See, here's the hardest part of not having active and involved grandparents in your child's life; you feel pressure to do it "all". Anyone who is a successful parent knows that the act of parenting is boot camp. You have to set limits. You have to say "no". You have to nudge them to achieve in school. You have to teach them the building blocks for becoming adults of good character. This is a lot of pressure if you want to do it right, folks. This is were grandparents come in; they can provide your child with lots of love and attention, without having to deal with all of those worries! Great for the grandparent, lovely for the child, sanity saver for the parents. When parents are left to "parent in a bubble", everyone loses.
Husband has a brother, who lives less than 90 minutes away with his wife. For awhile, we hoped that maybe they would be able to supply some of that "family feeling". Child is now almost 14 years old, and has never been invited by her Aunt and Uncle to spend any time with them. When she was in Second, or Third Grade, she actually penned a letter, asking for just that; her letter went ignored. For them, being an Aunt and Uncle comes down to sending a birthday card/gift card, and a Christmas card/gift card. Years back, Child figured out that her own Uncle and Aunt really didn't want to make any effort to spend time with her. Recently, Child had a gymnastics meet in their city. When asked if she would like me to invite them, her response was, "They probably won't want to come anyway!" Well, it turns out that she was right; being asked to sit through a 2-hour meet was just too much to handle, according to my sister-in-law (who is capable of "couching it" for 3-hour long football games). Oh, and did I mention that I told them that we would be in their city for part of the afternoon, exploring the campus, buying sweatshirts, and having coffee? If they really would have wanted to spend *some* time with their own Niece, they could have found an hour, or less, to spare at one of *those* activities. When later asked by my Sister-in-Law if I had any pictures of the meet, I replied, "You slack, you lack!" (snarkiness is a great coping method, when used liberally on members of Mensa)
Obviously, our families of origin had some serious shortcomings in being the "village" that we had hoped for. We've managed to get by with a little help from friends, and mostly our own wits. It gets pretty mentally-tiring to be constantly responsible for having to play "both sides of the child-raising net". Because of what we went through with our own family, I can guarantee that when it is our turn to wear the 'grandparent's hat', we'll do better.
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