GRANNIES WHO CAN’T BE BOTHERED

Joanne Kaufman’s article in the March 5 issue of The New York Times is headlined “When Grandma Can’t Be Bothered,” and starts off with what seems to me like a clear exaggeration: “For every Marian Robinson, who retired from her job to take full-time care of her grandchildren, Malia and Sasha Obama… there is a Judy Connors, who loves her two grandchildren but has no interest in Candy Land, peekaboo or bedtime stories.” The piece goes on to talk about grandmothers who are adamantly uninvolved.

This article feels like a man-bites-dog story, in which a writer discusses something so unusual that it’s of special interest. Sure, there are hands-off grandmothers, and I’ve heard of a few, but from my reading, experience, and contacts, they’re far fewer in number than the Marian Robinsons of this world. Of course, many of today’s grandmothers cannot leave their jobs to raise grandchildren full-time, but in the process of writing my book, SUPER GRANNY: GREAT STUFF TO DO WITH YOUR GRANDKIDS, I have met many working grannies who offer part-time care, or who manage to find time to pitch in when needed at odd hours and days.

As I was researching my book, I signed up for a free service offered by Google, called “Google Alerts.” To bring me news about grandparents and grandchildren, the robots at Google comb newspapers around the U.S. and abroad for stories about “grand” doings, and send a daily report. Reading these reports, I was impressed by how involved today’s grandmothers are with this younger generation. Despite the fact that a great many of today’s grannies have important jobs themselves, perform valuable community services, pursue time-consuming hobbies, and often live far away, the great majority of them are there for their children and grandchildren, and find many ways to have fun with them.

One of the women quoted by Ms. Kaufman said, “I raised two children whom I love dearly . . . I was a stay-at-home mom. Then I discovered when I started my own career that there was a whole other world out there.” Hello??? This woman seems to frame the issue as an all-or-nothing affair, which seems to be an extremely rare way of looking at it. I don’t judge hands-off grandmothers for their choices, but I do think that those who have this kind of attitude are depriving themselves of some glorious experiences. To read the New York Times article, go to:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/05/fashion/05grandparents-1.html?_r=1&scp=4&sq=Joanne%20Kaufman&st=cse

GRANNY CARE IS SAFEST CARE

It's a familiar refrain to many of us grannies who take care of our grandchildren from time to time -- or even most of the time. "Careful! Do it this way! Are you sure you'll be all right? Here's the [3-page, single-spaced] list of what to do. Mom!" And so on and so on.

Have they forgotten that we've raised at least one child to adulthood? Do they think that just because we became grandmothers we've lost every drop of smarts? Do they think we're hopelessly mired in the past and that we can't cope with today's children? That we don't read newspapers and learn new tricks of the child-caring trade? Plenty of times the answer is an emphatic YES.

Grandparenting workshops make the same assumption when they tell us how to put babies to sleep (on the back, not the tummy), how to strap them into car seats (very securely -- duh!), what temperature to make the bath water (not too hot, not too cold -- just right). Even academics have voiced the concern that older relatives like us are too incompetent to take care of kids. As one put it: "Recent growth in the number of grandparents providing childcare has some observers concerned they don't adhere to modern safety practices."

And yet -- and yet – these same academics have now told us that we do a great job! Children are safest when Granny watches them. Yes, safer than daycare, safer than other relatives, even safer than Mommy. Researchers from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health followed more than 5500 newborns in 15 U.S. cities until the children were 30 to 33 months old. They kept track of who took care of the children and of all the doctor and emergency room visits for causes ranging from "cut face," to "drank paint thinner," to "fall from shopping cart." Scary stuff -- especially since injury is the leading cause of childhood deaths in the U.S. After adding up all the data, grandmothers came out way ahead: children cared for by a granny have half the risk of injury than kids in those other situations.

Check it out. The article is in the November issue of "Pediatrics," the journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics. The lead author of the study is Professor David Bishai, M.D., Ph.D., M.P.H. of Johns Hopkins, and you can access a summary of the study findings at: http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/cgi/content/abstract/122/5/e980.

OBAMA’S GRANDMA

He called her “Toot” – short for “Tutu,” the Hawaiian word for grandmother. He often acknowledged Madelyn Dunham as the woman who helped to raise him in Hawaii while his single mother worked abroad. “Toot’s” last acknowledgment of him before her death this month at 88 was the absentee ballot she mailed in to add her vote to the millions that elected her grandson to become the 44th President of the United States. She died before the election, but she probably knew in her heart that he would prevail.

When Barack Obama heard how very ill his beloved grandmother was, he interrupted his presidential campaign to go to her side. Another, lesser man might have said, “The campaign has only a few more days to go – I’ll wait and go to see her then. She’ll understand.” But in a sign of smart and compassionate decision making, he knew that the time to go was now, he flew to her side, and he was able to see her one last time.

Like many other grandparents raising grandchildren, Madelyn Dunham exerted an important influence on the young Barack. He has acknowledged her as having had an impact that “was meaningful and enduring.” According to the blog “Hawaii Insider,” a relationship like theirs is described by the Hawaiian word “‘ohana,” which means “family,” and comes from “‘oha,” which means the offshoot of the taro root, the staple food of Hawaii. Family, then, is a place to feed each other and to be fed. As one Hawaiian proverb has it, “Ike aku, ‘ike mai, kokua aku, kokua mai; pela iho la ka nohana ‘ohana,” or “Recognize others, be recognized, help others, be helped; such is a family relationship.” I couldn’t think of a better explanation for the meaning of family.

WHEN GRANNY STANDS IN FOR MOMMY

When my friend and colleague Ruth Duskin Feldman of Highland Park, Illinois took two small grandsons and one granddaughter to “Moms and Tots” classes starting some nineteen years ago, she was the only grandmother in the class. At the time she didn’t realize what a trend-setter she was. This year, after finding nine out of ten children in one class accompanied by their grandmothers, the owner of one children’s gym on Long Island (New York) renamed its “Mommy and Me” classes “Anyone and Me.” Who are the “anyones”? Mostly grandmothers.

Grandma Ruth took over the care of Daniel, and then his younger brother, Emmett, two days a week so that her daughter, Laurie, could work part-time. From the time each of the boys was six months old, Ruth regularly picked them up and brought them to her home, an arrangement that worked out well for everyone. Mom and Dad went to work with an easy mind, knowing their children were being well cared for; Grandma built a close relationship with the children, while not sacrificing her own writing career; the children had loving, caring family around them all the time; and Grandpa got quality grandkid time too.

Even after Laurie’s daughter, Rita, was born and Laurie was home full-time, Ruth picked up the children at least one day a week and took them to classes. (When Ruth’s other five grandchildren were infants, they all lived too far away for Ruth to share parenting in the same way.)

Ruth expressed the value of shared parenting in an article she wrote for New Choices Magazine: “I’m not Daniel’s mother, but I am a partner in guiding his development. Because I’m his grandmother, what I do with him goes beyond babysitting – beyond keeping him fed, dry and out of danger. I wonder how many babysitters are willing to shop for just the right toy or seek out neighborhood playmates and compare notes with their parents. Daniel and I are not merely passing time together a few times a week: we’re building a relationship that’s important for both of us.”

This super granny says, “Grandparent care is an old idea whose time has come again.” She agrees with the observation by Amy Goyer, national coordinator for the AARP Grandparent Program, that as more grandparents these days assume this role, “they are becoming guiding forces in their grandchildren’s lives.”

Grandparents who care for grandchildren either part- or full-time can find a wealth of resources, including the Foundation for Grandparenting, www.grandparenting.org, and Generations United, www.GU.org. Also, you can find more help by searching the Internet for “grandparents raising grandchildren.”

Minimum Wage for Grandparents

Whenever I’m visiting another city, or another country, I pick up a local newspaper to see what’s on people’s minds there. Last month when Mark and I were in Greece with our daughter and grandson, I found an English edition of Kathimerini, published in Athens.

The October 4-5 issue ran a little story that gladdened my heart, headlined “Bulgarian government to pay pensioners to babysit grandchildren as of January 1.” The story went on to relate how, starting January 2009, pensioners (retired people) will be paid the minimum wage for looking after their grandchildren when they take over child care when the parents return to work.

The Bulgarian Parliament just passed this amendment to the country’s Employment Encouragement law “to help young parents better combine their professional and family engagements.” The amendment allows grandparents to look after a child during its first three years in return for a 240-leva (123 euros, or 156 dollars at current exchange rates) bonus to their pensions, which equals Bulgaria’s minimum wage.

In 2006, in an effort to raise the country’s falling birth rate, Bulgaria introduced measures allowing parents to take 315 days’ leave, the longest in Europe, while continuing to earn 90 percent of their salaries. Wouldn’t both these laws be a godsend here for parents and grandparents!

When Grandparents Get Sick

Two days ago I had a really upsetting experience. As I left a memorial service for a friend, which was held at NYU Medical Center in Manhattan, I was just outside the hospital when I saw two children, about 10 and 11, with an elderly man who looked as if he was about to keel over – he was lurching sideways. As I stopped to help, the younger child, a boy, asked me if I had a phone. I took out the phone with one hand and gave it to him. Meanwhile I reached out and held up the man to keep him from falling. The girl dialed a number but it didn’t go through. Neither of the children seemed to speak good English, and the man wasn’t speaking at all.

With the help of another passerby and an attendant we got the man, who turned out to be the children's grandfather, into a wheelchair, and the attendants said they would take him to the Emergency Room. The three had been visiting the grandmother, a patient in the hospital, and when they came out the grandfather got sick. The hospital attendant who eventually came over thought that he had had a stroke, which seemed likely. The man behind the desk spoke Spanish and was able to communicate with the children and to tell them they could go up to tell the grandmother what was happening. I offered to go up with them – I hated just leaving them there, but they waved me off and went on their way. I tried telling the grandfather where the children were going, but he didn’t seem to understand me, so I asked the wheelchair attendant to tell him in Spanish, which he did. It wasn’t clear whether he understood him either or whether the stroke, or whatever was happening with him, left him unable to grasp what was happening. I felt really bad for this family, wondering how the children would get home, who would be there to take care of them, and how they would deal with the trauma of seeing their grandfather get so sick while he was supposed to be taking care of them.

Then I thought about the implications for all of us who take care of our grandchildren. Although when we do this we're usually healthy and don't anticipate a problem like this, trouble can come from nowhere. I have been trying to figure out what we can do to be sure that if we are suddenly taken ill or are injured, our grandchildren will be cared for. One thing is that we should always have a phone with us at these times, and for children who are old enough to use one, we should teach him or her how to call for help. One precaution is to have 911 programmed into our phones at the top of the list. But what else? I would welcome any suggestions from other grandparents.