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| photo credit: neil reynolds |
Let’s face it, who doesn’t love the convenience of dropping
our kids at their grands for that rare Date Night? But when we come to pick
them up and they are literally bouncing off the walls, with chocolate stains on
their overalls, evidence of their sugar-high crimes, we might not be all that grateful.
With the year-end school holidays coming into full swing, we
foresee lots of family time. In light of this, I thought it might be useful to
write some of the lessons I’m learning about handling both my kid and her
grandparents. I must tell you though, that some of these remain completely
idealistic, but we are trying nonetheless.
1. FORM AN ALLIANCE
With your spouse that is.
Before going all hero-style and finding yourself in open
disagreement with your in-laws, run through the issues with your spouse first.
If you don’t like the way they are disciplining or spoiling your child, your
husband / wife should be your first line of communication. They of all people
would know best, since they might have been brought up in the same manner. And
even if they were not, they are their parents’ child.
Rather than losing favour as a daughter-in-law, or
causing them to withdraw their affections from the child, I make it a point to relate
my unhappiness to J.G. first. He then decides if it’s a matter worth bringing
up and then he brings it up when a similar situation arises. The downside is (1)
it might take him a (really) long time (2) that scenario might never repeat
itself (3) I might just have to let another ‘one’ slide. But hey, I intend to
be their family member for my entire lifetime, so we remind ourselves – if it’s not worth the relationship, don’t
fight about it.
2. YOU’RE ON THE SAME TEAM
Never forget even for a moment that they do what they do, no matter how
irksome, because they love your child nearly as much as you do. Except that
they show it in a vastly different way.
Especially true for first time parents like ourselves, where
we take meticulous care of every aspect of our child’s well-being. From
obsessively videoing their (every) significant milestones; to recording their food
intake and output to the ‘T’. In contrast, those non-organic, high sugar, low-nutrient trash they consume with their grands might appear to us like they want to
kill our kids.
It will take some time for them to set in, but the truth of
the matter is – they love them too.
Rather than drive yourself into the corner and out of favour
with your child, allow with limits the
amount of time and number of meals they spend together to a reasonable amount.
And because every parent’s tolerance level is different, I’ll leave you to
decide for yourself what reasonable
might be.
3. ENJOY BOTH WORLDS
Once you’ve decided to drop the kids off, enjoy yourself. Do
whatever you had planned to do with a heart full of gratitude, it’s no fun
going on a café date with a paranoid girlfriend who’s checking the baby monitor
every five minutes.
Enough said.
4. SOME FINAL THOUGHTS
When you become a grandparent, make sure you apply these rules
to yourself and not do to your child what your parents are doing to you right
now. Unless they are great of course, then, by all means.
RELAX.
Better quality time with their grands than yet another
learning enrichment or tuition session.
And I say again RELAX.
Even in the worst-case scenarios (e.g. Happy Meals all
through breakfast, lunch and dinner) your child will come back to you alive.
That is already a worthy achievement. Stay-home mums, you know what I mean.
--
As a toddler I had weekly meals with my grandparents. In my
primary school years, school took center-stage and so the time I spent with
them dwindled significantly. After that, they got older and I started carving
out individual time with each one of them. By the time we got really close,
they started dying one after the other. And before I knew it, I had no more
grandparents to speak of.
No matter how annoying and irresponsible you think your
child’s grandparents are, remember that they probably don’t have as such time
to spend with them as compared to you. And most importantly, that they love you best by loving your child.
How will you spend family time this festive season?
Grateful,
Amy
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