Grandparent’s pandemonium at holiday time

Added: (Mon Aug 06 2007)

Pressbox (Press Release) - Grandparent’s pandemonium at holiday time.

This is holiday time. We have four different accents in our home; Scottish, Yorkshire, Liverpool, and West Country. Pandemonium has descended on our normally very quite house with usually just the two of us here. The family have come to visit, or should I say take over with dodgy the rabbit as well. The smell of baby’s nappies being changed, a five year old wanting to play at Dr Who and guess who the alien is? Teenagers are fighting over the TV remote and hiding it from each other. I lose my computer and my seat at the telly. The fridge is full of weird stuff like baby’s bottles, vitamin this and that and I feel like I’d be better off in the garden shed, poor me. Some are here for a week and some for four and the wife and I will be run off our feet during this time. What’s it all about? We’re grandparents! And we love it. When they go back down to England the peace and quiet is bliss, but we are so happy to have such a good family that care so much for us. At holiday time I learn more about Dinosaurs, Snakes, Dr who etc than anything else and the questions from the teenagers are constant. All the kids think it is just great for us to play with them. The precious moment for me was when our five year old grandson said to his mum “granddad is my hero”

My wife and I would like to pass on our personal experience of losing our daughter and the temporary loss of contact with our grandchildren and how we regained contact and our sanity. Our intentions are to help people through the same nightmare we have experienced and possibly prevent it happening to others. We will never forget how heartbroken we were at the time of the death of our daughter and then to lose contact with our grandchildren was devastating. “I’ll never lose contact with my grandchildren”, I used to think, but how wrong I was. Losing one of your children at age 25 cannot be predicted. The shock was life shattering. We started court proceedings to regain contact with the children, but a very kind court official offered us mediation and we agreed. It got quite heated at times, but an agreement was reached. It was a bit shaky at first but putting our pride aside because of the importance to the children, the agreement has lasted for nine years now. My wife and I consider ourselves very lucky and grateful for mediation. It can be done if you are sincere and want the best for the children.

After the holidays we start getting lots of calls from grandparents who do not have contact with their family and are heartbroken at their loneliness, but it is the children who are losing out the most on this experience when they hear at school the magic time their friends had with their grandparents, the boys boasting about their granddads exploits and the girls shopping trips with their gran.

No one has real training in family life and if we have not stopped to think about it, we stumble along thinking we are in the right all the time and can alienate and bully people round about us without realising, causing more bitterness. However with a little insight this can change and the rewards can be great when everyone works together. We need to have our own boundaries, our own space, and we need to respect others. This can only be achieved when we talk to each other and know what each other want or needs, including the children. If you find it difficult to communicate, counsellors are available from us and other organisations like The Family Mediation Service (in your local phone book) don’t wait until arguments get to the stage of real bitterness where everyone loses out especially the kids. Enter in to it with an open mind and you will be surprised at what can be achieved.

It is a fact, If children grow up with lies, deceit, alienation, don’t be surprised if you are the victim when they are adults. The guidelines for parents and grandparents in our book ‘Grandparents Speak out for Vulnerable Children’ http://www.grandparentsapart.co.uk can be used as a checklist for you to know if you are really acting in your children’s best interests or not.

Jimmy Deuchars
Grandparents Apart Self Help Group Scotland.
22 Alness Crescent
Glasgow G52 1PJ
0141 882 5658