Becoming Grandma

This issue of Guideposts (May 2016) has a great article by 60 Minutes reporter Lesley Stahl. She has just published her new book, Becoming Grandma, the name of the article is too (pages 26-30). Enjoy!

We get to reboot with our grandkids, fix the mistakes or make amends for what we did as parents. Of course, our grandchildren force us to confront our age. . . During parenthood, we’re burdened with responsibility and fear (not to mention lack of sleep). Grandparents’ love is unfettered, pure. . . The balance shifts when our children become parents. We grands begin holding our tongues (we try, anyway). We live by their rules now. And rule number one is: “Do it their way. . . .”

This role of grandmother inspired me to write a book, Becoming Grandma, asking all sorts of experts about “the joys and science of the new grandparenting,” as the book’s subtitle puts it. Of all the interviews, one conversation stands out. It was with a psychiatrist named Nancy Davis, of Bradenton, Florida. There is one question she always asks her patients: “Who loved you?”

“If nobody loved you in your first five or six years, you’re in trouble,” she said. “It’s like you can’t know what love is unless somebody loved you during that time.”

“Is it enough if the answer is, ‘My grandmother loved me’?” I asked.

“It’s enough,” she said.

Steve Leber, the CEO of grandparents.com, told me, “God gave us grandchildren to make up for aging.”

Ain’t it the truth.

Being a grandparent gives us lots of opportunities to do TOV!

Shalom,

Jim Myers