Why do grandparents play favorites?

King, I feel your pain. When my kids were little, my wife and here sisters both lived in the same town as their parents. We were the first to leave, though we didn't even go that far (2.5-3 hours depending on who's driving).

Since we've moved up here more than 6 years ago, I'm pretty sure I can count on both hands the number of times the grandparents have visited. They've missed my kids' school performances and such for various things involving the other sisters and their kids on several occasions. Over the last year, they've visited my sister-in-law first in California then in North Dakota while they've been here just once. My youngest is a couple of weeks from being out of elementary school and they've not come to a single school performance or ceremony for him at all.

My wife sees the fault with her; I see it as much with me. They like me OK, but I'm the only son-in-law that wasn't baptized into a Church of Christ before or shortly after marriage. I'm also the only liberal in a family of diehard conservatives, though I do my best not to talk politics with them and have bit my lip on more than one occasion to keep from getting into a fight. My wife is more moderate than her sisters, but voting Democrat is a sin to them, and she voted Obama like me. They also think I'm too smart at times, it seems, but whatever; I talk the way I talk and I can't help it.

Anyway, here's how we handle it:

1) We've stopped making the grandparents feel OK for not coming. We make the grandparents aware of anything we think our kids would appreciate them coming to. It's then up to the grandparents to decide if they care enough to come. If they decide not to come, we don't tell them, "Oh, it's OK. Little Jimmy won't mind."

2) Don't make excuses to the kids for the grandparents not being there. Just tell them that the grandparents decided they couldn't come, maybe include why, and then tell them that the people who are there love them very much and love seeing them play/perform/recite the Pledge of Allegiance backwards.

3) Once they get to be 12 or 13, if they want to know why grandma and grandpa can't make it, tell them they should ask their grandparents. I wouldn't do it at a younger age, but bottom line is if the grandparents are picking one set of grandkids over another, and it's hurting one set of kids, then the grandparents need to be ready to explain to those kids why they can't make it.

4) We've confronted the grandparents before, but it does no good. They either say, yes, we know we should visit more, but it's just so far, and maybe come once or twice then slip back to their old ways, or they make more excuses that they expect use to accept.

Bottom line, make sure you're kids know they're loved, even if the grandparents don't know how to show it.

 

I have a 15-year-old and an 11-year-old, and they'd probably both tell you I love the other one more. I love them both the same, and I like them both the same too, for different reasons. I can truly say I don't have a favorite. When it comes to certain things, I prefer one over the other, sure (like I prefer watching sports with the older one because he actually cares; the younger would rather be playing video games), but I'm ridiculously proud of both of my sons and don't like one more than the other.

 

My wife and I will be adopting a second child in about a year, and when I honestly told my wife they I don''t honestly think I could love another child that was not my own as much as I love Lil 93, she almost started crying. I told her I would love the child, but shit, my own flesh and blood is my own flesh and blood.

I think there are two distinct sides to this answer, and neither of them are wrong.

I also think people love each child in different ways.

 

I'm an only child without children, so I can't reasonably add to the specific conversation. But I am a compulsive prioritizer. I have preferences on everything from Prince albums and peanut butter to grandparents and friends. Should my sperm twice find an egg instead of a Kleenex, I can't imagine myself not having a preference.

 

Wait, how can your sperm find a Kleenex twice?

 

I love them equally but they're on totally opposite ends of the spectrum and I express that love in very different ways. As I've mentioned on here before, my son has Down syndrome and is just finishing school and my daughter is completing her first year at Yale. I remember taking extra time when they were toddlers to explain to her why sometimes my son got more attention.

 

I'll admit that I didn't read this entire thread, but here are my thoughts...

a) Is it possible your parents don't like your wife, or at least don't like spending time with her? It happens. Your wife probably doesn't like them either. When families mix, it's a fact of life. My mom never got along my dad's mom and vice versa.

b) Kids have favorite grandparents too. I adored one set of grandparents but saw the other as distant and weird. Familiarity breeds more familiarity. Distance breeds more distance. It works for both kids and grandparents.

c) It sucks, but I wouldn't throw the grandparents under the bus, no matter how much you'd like to. Kids are kids. I'd make excuses for the grandparents rather than make the kids feel like grandpa doesn't care about them.

 

Throwing the grandparents under the bus to me implies that the grandparents bear little or no responsibility for the fact that they aren't showing up for the kids. In a couple of instances, that could be the case and I could see making excuses. When it becomes a pattern, and blatantly so in this case if you ask me, then I think that's when you stop making excuses for them. They're grown-ups. If they can't take the heat for playing favorites, then they should figure out a way not to play favorites.

 

IJAG - Interesting post (not about the Kleenex). I don't think, as a parent to three, that I love one more than the other. But I do feel I have a unique relationship with each of my kids. I love them all, just as I'm sure my folks love my kids as much as my brothers'. Even within my brothers' kids, I'm sure my folks have a different and unique relationship with each of them. Doesn't mean necessarily that they love them any more or less.

But ... that doesn't mean I treat any one of my kids BETTER than another. I don't blow off the eldest princess' cheer games, even though middle school basketball/football bores me to death. This fall, for example, we could potentially have conflicts every Friday during football season, as the princess made varsity cheer. My son is in the youth soccer academy, which plays Mondays and Fridays. I refuse to miss every soccer Friday just because my daughter is cheering. Likewise, I'm not going to miss every Friday night football game she cheers in just because I'd rather be at soccer.

I have missed school plays, games, etc. through the years for all my kids because of work or other scheduling conflicts within the family. At the end, I do my best to make sure I'm represented as equally and as often as possible at all their events. To be honest, I would bet in the last year, I have seen more of the eldest princess cheering than I have the youngest princess playing soccer, and that's with me as an assistant coach!

All I ask from my parents is similar treatment for all their grandkids. Is it easier for them to make it to their other grandkids games? Yes. Do they probably feel more comfortable missing our kids' stuff? Yes. But still, what happened last weekend was terrible, and the more I think about it, the sadder I get. I'm past being angry. Now I'm just sad.

 

Square the account by sitting out their funerals in a few years.

In a similar situation in that my stepsiblings all live close to my parents. They see them all the time. However, my parents are extremely overbearing and I am thankful for the distance. Also why I have no plans to take a job within 400 miles of my parents.

 

93Devil--I think many parents feel they can't possibly love a second child as much as the first, until they have that second child and realize how instinctive and pure that kind of love is.

But if you truly feel that way about adoption, please think twice about adopting. I have a combination of adopted and biological kids; it is unthinkable to me to differentiate between them. The "flesh and blood" distinction is brutally unfair to adopted children, and you validate every insecurity and fear they have when you bring that mentality into their lives.

Sorry for the digression. As for the grandparents, I vote for telling them their granddaughter was disappointed, and leave it at that. Their loss.

 

King - A question: You've mentioned that they visit you 3-4 times a year, despite the 3-hour drive. How often do you load up the fam and drive to visit them? It was an issue with my family. An uncle and his brood lived 45 minutes away from my grandma, but rarely came to town to see her. They also got pissed when she stopped calling, though they rarely called her. I noticed once that they just weren't around (or mentioned) and asked about it. She said that she didn't want to bother them.

So, it's very much a two-way street.