Why do grandparents play favorites?

Won't someone please think of the children?

 

that's why i originally said out of earshot of kids. he's an adult and should settle this with his adult parents, like adults.

the grandparents behave this way for whatever reason, but they seem not to have been presented with any reason to change. they do what they do without consequence. again, i don't see why they should be indulged in their behavior so that the children -- OH MY GOD!!! THE CHILDREN!!! -- have see themselves rejected over and over by those who are supposed to love them.

 

The grandparents behave this way because they are adults and get to choose how they behave.

The idea that if someone is doing something you don't like, there *must* be a way to change them, is a bit foreign to me.

 

So people should not adopt if they feel they will still love and care for a child, but slightly less than their own child?

I guess the foster home or the orphanage is a much nicer place to grow up.

 

No in capital letters! You can't start out with a bias.

If you feel that way you might be better off bringing in some foster kids that you care for on a temporary basis.

In fact maybe you could offer up your extra bedrooms to some displaced black kids from the riots that you have predicted when George Zimmerman is released.

 

It's fair to wonder, and I don't mind answering.

We spend the week between Christmas and New Year's every year at my parents' house. We always spend Thanksgiving with my side of the family. I would guess in the summer time, we are at my parents' house a minimum for one week, sometimes more. We occasionally take a spontaneous trip to go watch the Royals or Sporting KC and invite them to join us.

I don't want to make a mountain out of a molehill with what happened last weekend, but this isn't about someone getting more icing or two more balloons. This is about choices. My folks had the chance to spend an entire day with us, even half a day, at my daughter's tournament, which was an easy drive for them. They were going to, but then opted not to come in favor of their other grandkids' games, which they rarely (if ever) miss. When they did come up, I have suspicions that they did to watch another team my brother was interested in signing his daughter up for.

 

It could also be that your dad feels an obligation to your brother's team that he helps coach and was in "coach" mode over the weekend instead of "grandpa" mode and didn't really realize how it was being perceived.

 

So what some of you are arguing is that basically if your parents or in-laws are being douches toward your kids, you shouldn't bother to point out their douchiness? You should silently let your kids suffer? That when your kids ask about it, you should make excuses for said douchery?

This isn't a case of one set of kids getting more balloons than the other; this is the matter of one set of kids missing out on developing a closer relationship with their grandparents, a relationship that they could value through their entire lives. Minimizing it to whining about something less than that is insulting to those of us who have had to watch their kids suffer and wonder why they're treated like they're loved less. And I don't see why making the parents aware of it is a problem. They're adults. They should be responsible for the consequences of their decisions.

And let's not pretend "grandparents" automatically means they're fragile old folks like a lot of us had for grandparents when we were kids. Grandparents nowadays have plenty of living left to do. It's not unusual for grandparents to still be years from retiring. If they choose to have their golden years filled with resentment, then they're the ones who are making that call. If they don't want it, then they can make the effort to show all their grandkids that the care about them the same.

 

It's *meant* to be insulting.

 

I don't know if this board represents a cross-section of America on family issues, but every time one of these threads starts I'm made more aware of how idyllic my upbringing was -- even if I didn't notice it at the time -- and that all the relatives get along. Am I just really weird to have experienced that?

 

As usual, the equation works: "So" + statement = gross exaggeration.

The poster said "please think twice", as in "examine your feelings, how they will be perceived by your new child, how they already have affected your wife, and whether you believe adopting is the best decision after all factors have been considered and talked about."

The poster did not say, "put those adoption thoughts out of your mind."

It works again! Another gross exaggeration.

Since when is a grandparent not attending a game "being a douche" toward a kid? And did the kid really "suffer"? Seems to me it's the parents who are suffering. I doubt the kid is asking her friends about grandparents playing favorites. I stated before I was well aware of my cousins being closer to my grandparents than I was. And I UNDERSTOOD it. But I had great parents and great brothers and didn't give it two seconds of thought.

If "pointing out douchiness" would actually accomplish something, then maybe I can see doing it. But 51 years on this planet have taught me that when people are told they are being a douche, it rarely results in a behavioral change in the positive. It just creates more of a divide.

 

If it's one game, you're right. But when it becomes a pattern, when the kids start asking why they never come to their games but go to the cousins' games, then it's becomes being a douche. And when the kids start noticing it, yes, they suffer because some of those kids start wondering why their grandparents like the cousins more than them and if it's something they did to cause it. As king pointed out, his daughter asked. Read the first post.