Your kids have grown up and left
the nest. However, it probably will not be long till your role as parent begins
once more with the arrival of your grandkids. All parents look forward to
becoming grandparents. Grandparenting is a great opportunity to re-build those
special bonds and relationships in much the same way as those you built with
your own kids. You can rest assured that your role in their lives is a very
important one, one which has been supported with many studies by leading
universities and psychologists.
Humans are indeed very special!
After all how many mammals have a life expectancy which is long enough to
experience the joys of grandparenting.
Sayings and Idioms about grandparenting
Here are just some of the lovely
idioms about grandparenting:
“What children need most are the
essentials that grandparents provide in abundance. They give unconditional love, kindness,
patience, humor, comfort, lessons in life.
And, most importantly, cookies.”
~Rudolph Giuliani
“I like to do nice things for my
grandchildren - like buy them those toys I've always wanted to play with.”
~Gene Perret
“It's amazing how grandparents
seem so young once you become one.”
~Author Unknown
“A grandma's name is little less
in love than is the doting title of a mother.”
~William Shakespeare
The roles and opportunities of grandparenting
Do you remember what it was like
to see the world through the eyes of an innocent child? Do you recall those
innocent comments by your kids? Their way of perceiving the world which often
made you laugh or ponder? Do you remember the joy of seeing proud little
children showing you their latest drawings with that fascinating child-like representation
of world around? What about those hopeful or excited eyes during times of
celebration like birthdays and Christmas?
Well here is your chance to re-live this all over again but with the
added advantage of part-time, parental responsibilities because grandchildren
do not live with their grandparents but only spend given periods of time with
them.
Some issues you might want to discuss with your kids
Everyone in the family might get
carried away with the excitement of grandchildren and before you know it, your
grandchildren have moved in with you every weekend. This might indeed be
stressful - going back to cooking, cleaning, driving around and keeping up with
the added chores and with a slightly worn body too! Well, you might want make
things clear straight away: just how much time are you ready to allocate to
your kids’ kids and on what days?
You might be left in charge of a
little angel or a little menace, and let’s face it, most kids try your patience
from time to time. A major source of conflict between grandparents and their
own kids is discipline of their grandchildren. What are your limits? How are
you going to punish them for wrong behavior? What type of misdemeanor warrants
what punishment? Remember it is also sends conflicting messages to the child if
you are giving them a telling off for something that their parents would say
nothing about.
Grandparents DNA tests
Nowadays, there are a vast range
of DNA testing including siblings DNA tests, paternity testing in pregnancy,
ancestry tests and even grandparents DNA tests. Yes, there are instances in which grandparents might question whether
they are truly the biological relatives of their grandchild. A grandparentage test can confirm your
biological relationship to your grandchild and is often done in place of a
paternity test. If the result of such a test shows that you are unrelated to
your grandchild this could mean that the father of your grandchild (your son)
is not the biological father either. This is because your biological
grandchildren must have common genetic material with you; genetic material
which you would have passed on to your children and they would have passed on
to their children in turn.
Disclosure: This guest post has been compensated.
Disclosure: This guest post has been compensated.
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