OA Roundtable: Grandparents

This month's OART is all about grandparents. My children have many grandparents in their lives, and, for my son, that includes his biological maternal grandparents.

I'll start with my own parents. I could not dream of better grandparents for my children. When I first became a mother, I came to know and understand my mother in a whole new way. This understanding continues to grow as my journey in motherhood continues. So having my parents turn into grandparents has been a really important experience for me personally. That said, my parents have a phenomenal relationship with both my children - most especially our daughter. She was the first grandchild for my parents, and my mom has committed to spending a lot of time with her. Their bond is palpable. My father as well is the typical doting grandfather who constantly shows pictures of his grandchildren to any and all that cross his path. Even our son who is just 7 months is bonded to both of them. It's amazing to watch.

My son's biological grandparents are very committed to maintaining a relationship with him, and I would say that that also extends to building a relationship with us. I have always felt extremely comfortable around them. I think the fact that we all speak Spanish helps things tremendously, but beyond just that, they strike me as very welcoming and warm people. They bought things for little G before he was born, and continue to bring things for him whenever we see each other. I feel so lucky to have that connection in our lives, and most especially in little G's life.

But life is not all roses in the grandparent category for us. When we first brought little A home, my dad spoke to his father (my grandfather) and told him the news. Apparently my grandfather made a snide comment about the fact that she was adopted - or maybe adoption more generally, I'm not sure - which really set my dad off. I don't know what it was that he said, but my mom said she could hear my dad going off on him from across the house. My dad hung up the phone and they never spoke again. My grandfather died one year ago. In fact, I didn't know the details of this story until he died. My father had never mentioned the conversation and while I knew that my father and his father weren't speaking, I didn't know the reason that had prompted the freeze. I'm not surprised at all by my grandfather's behavior. I had heard him in the past say horrible things related to adoption, such as, in relation to his wife's grandchildren - all of whom are adopted - "I also thought it was a shame that [his wife] never had any of her 'own' grandchildren." I never mentioned to him that we were even in the process of adoption because I knew how he felt about it. He only ever spoke to me once about little A, and it was a generic "congratulations". While I feel sad about the way the relationship between my dad and his father ended up, I also think of my dad as a bit of a hero to stand up to him like that, in defense of this little girl that he loves so fiercely.

It's the little things

Since I've last written we had our second visit with little G's birth family, this time at GM's family home. GM and GD were there, as well as GM's sisters (little G's aunts) and GM's parents. It was a lovely visit where we stared a lot at little G, ate delicious food, took some walks, and little A played a lot. I felt that having little A there - who is such a presence - was especially nice because she takes up a lot of our energies and so I felt that GM and GD (and the rest of the family) could chill with little G while we kept little A occupied.

I find myself obsessing over the details of each interaction we have with little G's family. I stress because I am worried about doing things "right", by which I mean I want to honor the feelings and wishes of little G's family. As I've mentioned before, our relationship thus far has felt very comfortable and I have no reason to believe that GM and GD want something different from this relationship. But... since we are just forming this relationship it's hard to really know what every wants from it. We are still very much getting to know each other. Because this relationship is so important to me and to my family, I tend to overanalyze things.

For instance, when little G's family first came to visit us in the city, I was so thrilled that GD rode in the same car with GM and her family. GD, I've been told, isn't the most favorite person of GM's parents. My assumption is that they see him as "the guy who got our daughter pregnant" and so they aren't big fans. In fact, GM and GD had told us that most likely we would need to keep visits separate - some with GD and GM and others with GM and her family. So I took the fact that GD came along not just on the visit, but in the same car, as a really great sign. Same thing with the fact that GD was there for our last visit at GM's house.

Then we made photo albums for GD and GM of little G for Christmas. We had them sent to GM since we don't have GD's address. I let GM know to expect them. When they were delivered, I didn't hear from either of them. And I obsessed. I read into it. My mind started racing with all that could mean. I worried that they didn't like the album, the pictures we chose, maybe it was too much to see, maybe they wanted to make the album themselves with pictures they choose.... You can see how my mind raced.

Then a few weeks later is was Christmas day, I texted, they responded. It was New Year's. GD texted, I responded. And she mentioned that she got the album, loved it, and thought it was adorable. I breathed a sigh of relief.

It's not really fair of me to put so much stress (even if just in my mind) on this budding, and ever-important, relationship. But that's what I do. I hang on every action/inter-action/non-interaction.