2nd Time Around for Grandparents Often Can Be Trying

One woman needed time apart from a child but hesitated because “it’s very tough (to assert herself) when a child is hurting as badly as she is.”

A couple, anxious about an upcoming court date, wanted feedback on how to handle a child’s hostile parents.

Another woman, raising a learning-disabled child, admitted: “You’ve got to do what you’ve got to do. It feels like there is no relief in sight. Sometimes, I just want to rest.”

The people with these concerns gather at Mignon Scherer’s Point Loma home every week. They share a common bond--they are raising their grandchildren.

Scherer formed Grandparents Raising Grandchildren in October as a safe place to air concerns and solicit feedback. Like the others, Scherer and her husband, Robert, an attorney, are raising their grandson, now 7.

Led by Scherer, a licensed marriage, family and child therapist, these men and women gather in Scherer’s living room every Tuesday morning, warmed by coffee and mutual caring, to discuss raising young children and adolescents the second time around. They meet to buoy each others’ spirits, let off steam, express their fears and doubts, compare notes, exchange legal savvy and share resources for self-help.

“In this group,” Scherer said before one recent meeting, “many children were removed from the home because somebody phoned in about suspected child abuse, or abandonment, or because the parents were too immature to take care of the . . . children.”

San Diego County Department of Social Services reports that no statistics exist on the number of people raising their grandchildren, but the newly formed group suggests the number may be significant.

“We didn’t realize there were so many grandparents in San Diego taking care of one or more grandchildren,” said Bob Clark, 67, a retired Los Angeles fireman, who with his wife, Dorothy, cares for his 13-year-old granddaughter. “We thought we were the only ones.”

“The people in this room are just the tip of the iceberg,” said Marilyn Kennedy, who is raising three of her grandchildren.

“Most of these grandparents were already close to their grandchildren. They felt it the humane thing to do to take them in. There is a shortage of foster homes. If someone in the family is willing to take a child, there’s less chance the child will be returned home quickly with only minimal changes on the part of parents.”

Some grandparents arrived at the session with an urgent agenda. The grandmother who needed time apart from her grandchild got the group’s encouragement to muster the willpower to reserve one hour each day for herself.

As the discussion flows, comments like “I know what you mean,” “This worked for me,” “When I hear you talking, it sounds like me talking,” bond the group.

Humor broke the tension. Ruth Cummins 77, helping to raise a 16-year-old grandson, quipped, “I had a counselor tell me once that junior high boys should be put in cold storage.” Others pegged telephones as permanently grafted teen appendages and shopping as the favorite sport.

“We’ve learned patience, understanding and how to get along with a teen-ager all over again,” Bob Clark said.

Scherer led the group with nurturing warmth, never overly solicitous. She pulled the group back to its central purpose when the conversation became sidetracked. With a comforting hand on one speaker’s shoulder, she asked, “I’m hearing what you think, but what do you feel?”

“Many people look upon us as interfering grandparents, meddling in our children’s affairs,” Scherer said. “That definitely is not the situation with this group. Although we love our grandchildren and looked forward to their visits, we weren’t planning to raise a grandchild. These are children dropped off by their parents because they couldn’t manage them, or referred by the county because of child abuse.”

The group’s guidelines, read aloud at each session, emphasize confidentiality, listening, sharing, giving information (not advice), loving and non-judgmental feedback, and promptness.

While each grandparent’s situation is unique, all have had to make major adjustments.

“One of the biggest problems the grandparents have is with the natural parents,” Scherer said. Facing court battles with their own offspring, “many are fearful of their children. . . . They make threats.” Several group members were reluctant to have their names or pictures published. Beyond that, “they don’t feel it’s fair to publicize their children’s lives.”

As with first-time parents, time away and time alone with a spouse become scarce commodities. Instead of spontaneously trekking off to Fiji, lectures, concerts or movies, Scherer said, these grandparents find themselves back at the zoo, Sea World, Disneyland, PTA meetings and birthday parties.

“Most of their friends are retired and traveling . . . and here they are stuck,” she said.

One grandfather, 70, has had to return to work to offset steep legal fees.

“Personally, I am reluctant to go off too many evenings a week,” Scherer said. “I’m just not willing to push him aside all that much. It definitely interferes.”

“Boys 12 years old aren’t quiet, and they attract other boys,” one grandmother said with a smile.

Marilyn Kennedy, 56, who had seven children of her own, has never really stopped parenting. She assumed full responsibility for a daughter’s three children 10 years ago. With two teen-agers of her own still at home, Kennedy had to deal with their hostility toward the grandchildren, in addition to adjusting to the emotional and financial effects on her family. After a decade, “I have worked through most of the problems mentioned. . . . The whole thing is a challenge.”

Discipline can be a problem with many grandparents. “I haven’t the energy to keep at it,” one grandmother said.

Child-rearing demands physical stamina, which poses its own challenges. “People say it keeps you young. Mentally, yes; physically, no,” said Scherer, 62, who teaches workshops on the fear of getting old. “I don’t feel old, and I don’t think old, mentally.”

But all members of the group, including a grandmother who had just spent three days helping a child build a social studies project, agreed that, with increasing health problems of their own, the energy level is difficult to maintain.

According to Scherer, grandparents assume control over their grandchildren because of their own children’s inability to raise their children for reasons such as drugs, divorce, abandonment, illness, sexual and physical abuse, or neglect. So, along with a second round of the jelly-smudged walls, school worries and financial pressures of typical parents, the grandparents also experience conflicting emotions--grief, depression, anger, guilt, confusion and anxiety.

But even when most discouraged, these grandparents recognize that the child may be more needy than they are. In their absolute determination to do the best they can for their often-fragile grandchildren, many in the group evidenced an iron core of resolve.

Though each situation is unique, Scherer believes that affluence may be one root cause in a child’s removal from the parent. “Our generation was the first generation with this huge middle class,” she said. “We were able to give children lessons, all the good things in life. Now, as parents, they (our children) don’t want to give these things up. You have to give up some things when you have children.”

For the children, shuttling between grandparents and parents--often divorced--can be confusing, even frightening.

“If the children are very young, and there isn’t visitation with the parents, then it’s not complicated,” said Scherer. “But if there’s visitation, for the child, it’s like living in two worlds. Children find it difficult to exhibit one behavior in one home and another behavior in another home. Different things are expected in each place, and the children don’t know how to turn it off from one place to another.”

With older children, difficulties increase. “Studies have shown that divorce and disruption of the family affect teen-agers more than young children,” Scherer said.

Children often feel insecure, leaving grandparents to deal with a shattered self-image. One child dogs her grandmother’s footsteps, never wanting to be alone. An adolescent boy is confused by the disparity between what his father says and what he does.

“In many cases, children feel they have lost both parents,” Scherer said. “It’s very difficult for the children when they are abandoned.”

“You have to emphasize to the child that your primary motivation is love,” interjected Ruth Cummins. “Say, ‘We’re taking care of you because we love you.’ ”

Many children worry about the health and ages of their grandparents.

“They think, ‘What’s going to happen to me if they die?’ ” one grandmother said. “They know they’re not old enough to take care of themselves.”

Unless they have permanent custody, most grandparents are acting as temporary parents, adding to the child’s uncertainty and sense of upheaval.

“Permanent custody is complicated,” said a participant who has custody, “but it’s easier for the child, because they do not feel threatened.” The legal wrangling can take years, she added.

Scherer feels that a new direction in handling such cases is vital for the children.

“There needs to be more emphasis on not giving the natural parent so many years to shape up and then get the child back,” she said. “If a child is removed from the home, the parent is entitled to psychotherapy, parenting classes, whatever is needed.

“But it isn’t fair to the child to keep going back and forth like a yo-yo. Children need permanency. After a certain number of years, even if the parent makes some good changes, the current direction is not to return the child to the parent.”

With this second chance, do these grandparents approach parenting differently? All agree that grandparents must offer love, affection, praise, firm limits and--top priority--a united front. Talks about drugs and sex are specific, frank and ongoing.

“I discussed sex and drugs a little with my own children,” Scherer said. “But now I make a determined effort with my grandchild. We’ve talked about AIDS, ‘Say No to Drugs,’ and I answer any questions he asks. Back then, we thought only kids on the wrong side of the tracks got into drugs. I’m so aware of it now. It’s no longer hit and miss.”

“The sexuality is a totally different thing,” said another grandmother whose granddaughter had been molested. Not only are there increased sexual dimensions to movies, ads, TV, even toys, but when a child has been molested, a visit to a friend’s home where there might be a boyfriend or stepfather can be traumatic.

Scherer feels that grandparents’ age and experience can be an advantage: “By now, you’ve seen it all, you know the ages and stages. I know the teen ages are coming. I know what to expect.

“Who’s perfect? Every parent makes mistakes. With our own children, we may have had them in too many activities, wavered a lot about what we expected from them . . . been too soft. Now, I think ahead, I ask myself what are the rules here, what do we expect? Before, I had a tendency to make decisions without asking my husband. Now, I talk things over more with him. . . . the relationship of the parents is very important.”

“Children pick up on tension. You don’t want to give them a double message,” agreed one grandmother. “They need to know you can quarrel with a spouse, settle your differences, and get through it.”

Despite the heartaches, “all of us say we wouldn’t have it any other way,” Scherer said. “Our grandchildren bring joy to our lives just as our own children did, maybe more so, because we’re mellower and we know what we’re doing.

“We may have other problems, health problems, not as much money, a loss of freedom. Still, it’s like a gift. You can’t feel too sad with little kids around.”

(To contact Grandparents Raising Grandchildren, call Mignon Scherer, 223-0344.)