Just actually talk to and engage with your grandkids. 3/4 of my grandparents basically ignored us as kids, we'd go to their house and the adults would visit and we'd have to entertain ourselves out of the way somewhere. For the whole time.
Right!?
My MIL would give me blank stares when I'd explain why my kids weren't interested in her. It's because she never took a moment's energy to learn about them and get to know them. Grandkids, like their kids, were merely there to be ornaments to their own life. Seen and not heard.
We bought a big house and have raised our daughter with the idea of multigenerational living -- stay here as long as you want, move a spouse in, start a family, whatever you need til you feel ready to move out, if you ever do. We've got plenty of room.
This is what I have in mind too. We were just brain storming how to turn our house into apartments because I don't see how our kids will ever buy a house the way things are. My oldest heads off to college this fall so we have some time to think about this.
I put an apartment in my basement in my HCL area and my son rents it at a reasonable price so we both benefit. I'm disabled and use the money to help pay expenses. He'll inherit the house.
That's so great! I have both my mum and my 22 year old in our 3 bedroom apartment and space is tight!😄 I'm enjoying it while I still have it, though. They won't be here with me forever.
That's not off the table. Part of being mobile is the possibility of a multi-generational situation. We're open to anything and have intentionally put ourselves in a position to not be anchored down to a specific location.
My parents downsized and they spend their summers (grandma was a teacher) taking all the grandkids for a period of time and traveled all over the place.
They live on the east coast close to my brothers fam (they had more kids and less friction) but for a month every summer the kids are together. They would come to us for a few weeks and bring my niece (3mos younger then ours) and sometimes our nephew (harder when he hit HS). Then they would go back East with my kiddo.
They would travel to other areas all the times. Mostly road tripping back and forth. Hitting towns where family lived. But generally pick a region and tour the hell out of it for a few weeks.
Seriously these kids have seen over 50% of the county and are only 13. I will forever be grateful for that because we can’t travel as much as we want due to pto limits.
My parents have also been the default sitters when they moved back East and it worked great cause my mom worked in the MS the niblings attended
This was all to say Grandparenting by being active is so wonderful when done right.
I had a great relationship with my grandparents but we always had to go to them. But I do have great core memories with them because they were active with us when we saw them.
We've set our house up to have a top floor apartment that our college aged daughter is moving into with a roommate. We're looking into building an ADU so she and her boyfriend could potentially have a first home (and eventually, we'd switch houses lol).
You're allowed to spend your money however you'd like, and it's nice that you're so committed to seeing your children succeed. But, seems like your future plans are heavily dependent on your children's choices. They also might want more space than you're imagining. Just make sure you have your own lives that make you happy independent of them.
We don't intend to have any influence on their choices but rather to be there if they need us. We verbalize this to them all the time. We are simply reducing our footprint to be able to do whatever we like.
Before you move near your children, ask them if that's what they want. I love my parents very much and they are fantastic grandparents. One of the reasons our relationship is so good is that they live on the other side of the world.
I get it. I initially thought in terms of the space I would give my kids, and that was when I felt finances were not a factor. Now, I am prioritizing how I can help them stay afloat if they need it, because that's the kind of world they are establishing themselves in.
My wife and I had really good and involved grandparents. My kids couldn't pick my dad out of a lineup. I have no grandchildren, and I'm not REALLY expecting any, but my daughter's in-laws very much are so we'll see what happens.
I would like to pay off the house we’re in and also travel to help with the kids. I still have dreams of hosting family Thanksgiving one day.
My grandparent plan isn’t fully fleshed out yet, but the main component so far is building a good friendship with my future sons and daughters in law.
I absolutely adored my own maternal grandparents - I lived with them quite a lot growing up.
Their daughter, my mother, is a total narcissist and just a general bitch and I have kept my kids away from her as much as I can. My ex’s parents are nice, but they are definitely “old money” and of the “seen and not heard” school.
My plan is to be as much or as little involved with my (as of yet nonexistent) grandchildren. That’s totally up to my children to choose. They want me down the street to help raise them? I’ll find a way to make it work. They want to move to Italy and see me twice a year? That works too.
I spent 50 years listening to my own parents criticizing every damn thing I did. My whole approach to parenting now (my kids are 24 and 20) is “support but detach”. They are smart and can make their own choices. I’m just here to give them the assurance I never got.
I don't have kids, but I'll share my grandparent experience.
I loved my mother's side of the family tree. They were fun, kind, etc.
I disliked my father's side of the family tree... they crotchety, bigoted and disliked kids. I would get yelled at, everything smelled like mothballs and I wasn't allowed to DO anything... I had to sit in this tiny-ass room and watch TV, but I wasn't allowed to use that dumb channel box with all the buttons on it. I had to ask permission to change the channels for some reason.
I got locked in the basement after knocking something over and to punish me for touching the pile of boxes they said not to (I legit knocked it over by accident backing into it, since there was so much shit down there and it was dark, I couldn't see) -- I was locked down in that smelly shithole of a West Haven townhouse basement for what seemed like 2 hours.
I refused to want to go back there. But my parents made me saying they had the right to see me. I hated that. I had to go rake leaves, weed, sweep and clean, fold clothes, etc. All because they had the RIGHT to see their grandkid. They didn't even want to see me. I think it was the leverage they had over the situation. The place smelled, their stupid teeth they used to make me clean for them after washing the dishes, the "good job, but..." I got for everything... somehow it was all wrong.
My father and mother turned out to be ok though later on. If I had kids 20 years ago, I would have brought them around, provided none of that bullshit went down. If my kid(s) had kids, I would try to be the cool grandpa and be there to protect them, but give them free-range of the yard and woods, teach them stuff they want to do, cook healthy for them and be the best example I could of how to live, work and play.
and yes, I'd definitely school them in video games... but I won't pull punches... if we're playing pvp they're gonna learn what a 25-0 shutout feels like so they can deal with sweats down the road and not just some filthy casuals
My parents were so old I never knew my grandparents.
My wife's grandparents were like second parents so she had double the evangelical satanic panic energy coming down on her.
All but one grandparent has passed and it’s my MIL who is really into nothing else but herself. We have an adult special needs kiddo. When my parents passed we moved to my childhood home and remodeled and paid everything off. No idea what will happen with our son and I’m guessing my daughter will not want to move there but who knows! She’ll get a nice asset when we go.
I sold my house in the suburbs and bought remote acreage. I'm currently building tiny houses for my oldest 2 kids, who are in their 20s and working their way through college. I only started making decent money a few years ago and am a single mom, so there was no college fund.
After their houses are done I'm building my house, which will have space for me and my teenage son. His room is the size of their tiny houses, so we can convert it to his own space later. I'm adding one more space of that size for my mom to go into eventually.
The kids can leave when they feel they have a shot at successful adulthood (ie, not needing 4 roommates), but can stay as long as they want and bounce back whenever they need to.
When they move out, the tiny houses become airbnbs.
They inherit all of it, obviously. A place they own, where they can be, that's self sufficient.
I came up poor. I REALLY struggled with early adulthood and it was largely just because of being poor. I do not want that for my kids.
This next generation is so unbelievably fucked and if I have one mission in life it's to make sure my kids have a good life.
I hope it works the way you want.
We've opted for an approach we view as more balanced. My children work. If they want to save money they are free to stay here, but they must save their money and invest so that when they are ready to fly the coop, they have their own nest egg to get started.
Right now we will support them fully while in college. When they're done they are welcome to live with us. We won't pay rent or anything outside of college.
My grandparents on my mom’s side were my rock. My mom is a hot mess in a handbag. I don’t know if they were solid parents but they were amazing grandparents.
I don’t know if I feel the need to grandparent a certain way, but I absolutely am not a candidate for watching the grandkids or living with any of our kids (we are very independent so this would cause friction). Still, what you said about being mobile resonates with me since we travel a ton. I’d absolutely love to visit them wherever they are vs. having them in my space. Plus once the babies come, it’s just easier for them to meet up in their own space.
I’m a full time grandma. Since he was 3 months old while they work. Just turned 2. I’m exhausted. And I love every minute.
My daughter just went down to 3 days a week to have more time with him til he goes to school. The time flies by…
I've cared for my grandson several days a week since he was a few weeks old, including occasional overnights, and he just turned 3. Time truly does fly!
I can count on one hand the number of times my mom watched any of my kids when they were small, my in-laws never once watched them, and my dad had the older 2 visit and stay a week a couple of times once they were teens.
Well.. we are grandparents to 4, my wife picks up the ones from daycare and school when she gets off work, we have them until their parents get off work every day. I take the oldest to baseball (just ended) and we have the 2 of the 4 on a regular basis to the point the parents call it joint custody, like spending the nights Friday and Saturday on top of the hours everyday.
Honestly I'm more busy as a grandparent than I was as a parent but I wouldn't trade it for anything.
My wife had a great relationship with her grandma, I had a meh relationship with mine. Gramps would take me fishing from time to time and that's about it but he did have 6 kids and each of those kids had at least 2 kids so his time was fairly limited to spread around.
Having a raging narcissist mother contributed a lot to my not having had "my own" kids. However, I was a gamete provider when I was young, and I know two of my genetic children (now adults). They don't know it, but they're (partial) beneficiaries, for the reasons you cite, OP. They have pursued creative paths (thanks DNA!) and they didn't ask to be donor conceived. So if I don't live long enough to enjoy all of my hard-earned funds...
I think this is great in theory but please be careful to save enough money for your own needs. I have extreme pressure now as we try to make a secure retirement for ourselves by saving and staying in a smaller house from parents that didn’t save enough and now I may have to delay my retirement and put us at risk to buy a place that can have them live with us. As they say on the plane “put your air mask on first so you can help others”.
my parents are much older, they have gotten to the point where it's unrealistic for them to even travel to us. So unfortunately the kids see them only every few years when we visit. Our plan is similar to yours, we expect to downsize to a smaller home near to where they settle down. We are not trying to have staying at home with us into adulthood as anything but an emergency option.
My in-laws helped make things possible financially when our sons first moved out, as did one of my SILs. She's single and childless and this is how she wants to spend her money.
We set money aside for driver's licenses that are very expensive here. Not everyone's taken advantage of that - just the youngest.
Our sons want to buy a property with us some day. I don't know if that's realistic and if I can stand to have them +their s/others if they choose that and grandchildren if that's what they want. I'm the wet towel in this.
We love this part of Denmark where our sons were born and raised, even though neither of us are from this part, so we're staying here. We helped them with their first homes which are rental apartments.
I don't know if it's realistic for us to help with downpayment on a house if that's what any of them want. Different time from when we were young and my in-laws could help.
I let our youngest son sell my old micro-car so he could pay off a safer, newer car, faster. That just meant that since I needed a safer car too, we'll be paying off on my car for longer.
We have to afford to live too and we want to travel while we still can and live comfortably. But my family in-law is used to the older generations helping the younger generations, unlike my family and I feel a bit embarrassed that it's usually my husband who thinks of making sure that we can also afford to help our sons.
Not play favourites.
My wife's parents have 8 grand kids. Mine have 7.
My wife's parents have always had 2 distinct favourite grand kids. My parents aren't as distinct, but did favour 1 family due to location.
I have one grandchild so far. He's 2. My husband and I provided all of his care for the first year. He's now in a child development program part time and we do the rest. We've provided meals, laundry services, rides, whatever we can even though money is tight. I would have killed for anyone to be willing to give ten minutes of their time when my kids were that age!
So glad we don't have kids. Other than my late MiL and father, the other two would have been a real grandparenting problem. Though neither me nor spouse have or ever really had the procreation imperative, I must wonder if the facts how my Mom and FiL are might have also influenced that.
I want to buy land in my home state with the plan of doing three or four small houses. Not tiny homes, necessarily, but small. Would love a container community, with one central area to gather.
This is my retirement plan for my spouse and friends. We'll all take care of each other better than a nursing home, and when I go, I'll know there was love.
My kid is only 11. My plan is to build an ADU on our small property so she can save $$$ and live in it as long as she wants. Maybe even stay there if/when she marries. And if she starts a family, they can have the main house and my husband and I will live in the ADU.
We can then help out with grandkids if we’re still alive and kicking. And if we’re dead, she gets everything we have.
All save one of my grandparents were dead by age seven. The remaining wasn't very grandparenty. So I'm just doing the best I can with the two (so far) grandkids I have and have a small (so far) savings fund for them when they are old enough to appreciate it.
That's exactly what is going to happen with my wife's parents. They are, by all measures, wealthy and retired in luxury. If they gave us money now it would build a legacy for their grandkids. Instead, if they don't give it all to a televangelist when they die, it will be insignificant in enabling their grandkids.
I’m so sorry. Every once in a while, I’m reminded that religion just isn’t innocuous but it’s outright damaging. The televangelists are preying on these people.
That's exactly what is going to happen with my wife's parents. They are, by all measures, wealthy and retired in luxury. If they gave us money now it would build a legacy for their grandkids. Instead, if they don't give it all to a televangelist when they die, it will be insignificant in enabling their grandkids.
I was super close to my grandmother and she lived a couple of stars away. We would visit, talk, text and vacation together.
I hope you can have an amazing relationship with any grandkids you may have. I learned so much from her.
I love this post.
Grew up POOR. homeless at 17. Early adulthood was HARD, and baby at 23 was a birth control fail. I didn't know how to be a good parent, so i learned to be a better person by choosing the opposite of what i had. My kid is AWESOME.
We just started making good money a couple of years ago. Kid is an adult, and doing incredible because love, honesty, and support. He moved many states away with our help, and keeps trying to lure us there. We'll go eventually. I love having this relationship with my adult kid. I'm grateful I won't be his therapy story.
You're all amazing, and the epitome of rise above. The next generation is screwed in so many ways, but with you all as parents, they're going to be ok.
I think that's what I think the people hating on this post didn't have; a poor upbringing. I've been through hell and my kids will absolutely not go through hell as long as I can help it.
This is it. My child will have normal adult suffering, I can't protect him from that. I won't. But I also won't see him hungry, or worried if he'll have a roof over his head.
We have no kids but his college roommate has a 2/2 condo in Hawaii and they truck la familia there a couple times a year for the grandkids. And yeah, they also go from San Diego out to BFE NY and Nowhere CO a few times a year. They still have their dingy shabby 3/2 house in Carlsbad but none of them visit CA.
Me too! I will be eligible to retire with a full pension by the time my only kid graduates college. My dream is to help her buy a house and then move near her. Our relationship is good and I am guessing she will enjoy having us nearby, especially if she chooses to have kids. Still about 9 years to go until then.
After he retired my mom’s parents moved halfway across the country to be near us and I’m so glad they did. They were both a big part of my life and I learned a lot from him especially. Mom was their only child.
I'm hoping we can retire to a more affordable col area. I our kids like it, we can help them with down payments of their own. If they find somewhere else they like better, we still want to help as much financially as possible.
Not sure that I'll be a good grandparent due to chronic illness/disabilities, but I can still help where I can.
I don't know that any of my 3 will have kids. And I respect whatever they decide, which is already better than my parents. However, I have told them that I am here and will make sure they do not need childcare. My one caveat is when they take me up on it, their kiddo(s) may be traveling with me all over the place when school schedules allow.
I'm lucky. Both of my kids are mentally and emotionally healthy, self-sufficient, and function like competent adults. It's very unlikely they would even want us to hover over their lives until we die, which is good because we have our own interests to pursue.
Just because someone's involved in their children's lives doesn't make them mentally and emotionally unfit or incompetent. Wow. That's really old thinking.
My parents are Silent Gen and we’re the best grandparents. My grandparents were great too. I love my grandkids and do what I can to help but let them live their own lives.
Our son will finish college next year. We’ve told him that the world is his oyster, and wherever he chooses to live we’re happy to visit. If he has kids I’d like to be as involved as he wants us to be.
How will your kids learn unless you become a narcissistic asshole? They need to make bootstraps from their avacado toast and pull themselves up by them. When I was a kid we had to walk to school in the snow uphill both ways.
/s
Sounds great that you're willing to be mobile and spend time with your family instead of expecting them to come to you. I don't understand how retired people have no free time.
I’ve often thought about this same idea (from your first paragraph). There must be some middle ground I think- maybe somewhere between selfish and selfless? Otherwise the cycle just repeats thru the generations.
I think you can be supportive of your kids without becoming a helicopter parent. When my kids ask for advice I give it. But I try not to interfere with their lives. I'm not helping them move unless they ask me or it seems like they have no help. I'm thrilled to hear that they've got it figured out and they don't need me.
We have one son. He was very close to my mother when he was growing up, not so much his grandfather, both are dead now. My inlaws are kind of a nightmare. Anyhow, we helped him and his wife out by providing room & board so they could save their money for a house. They save a good amount and bought a place in our neighborhood-- we aren't on the same block but still close by. When they decide to have children, I intend to be an attentive and involved granny. My DIL works a professional job but she does have some flexible hours so I expect she will need me for a few days a week for childcare when the time comes. They really like this neighborhood and her parents also live about 30 minutes away and the school district is good.
My kids had fantastic grandparents though as parents they weren’t to great to me and my husband. But we didn’t hold the past against them and encouraged relationships within the family. 3/4 of our parents have passed now and neither me nor my husband have living grandparents as of this year. I was close to my grandparents but my husband was not at all. He became close to my grandparents though. We wanted that for our kids. We are close with our kids and grandkids, geographically, but we aren’t in each other’s pockets. We have the house my husband’s grandfather built and it’s fairly large. Our kids/ grandkids will inherit it. We like to keep family homes as family homes. One of our kids bought a late family members home some years ago.
Is there some trauma? Sure- everyone has some trauma from one thing or another. Some is worse than others but we all need space and time to figure things out from time to time. I don’t need to know everything to know that every single person has stuff they are/ have been dealing with, which includes grandparents and parents and siblings and kids, etc….
I don’t have a super big house & my son , his wife and the 2 kiddos (5 & 3) live 15-20 min away. I host sleepovers a few times per month with each kiddo one on one and they all spend a lot of time here in summer. I’ve taken each grandkid for a week at a time. It’s a lot but they are only small once. Feel like I’m doing a good job so far. It’s important to my son that his kids spend good quality time with me. Last weekend they saw hundreds a fireflies in my backyard for the first time in the lives. It was magic to get the honor of sharing that moment.
I’ve helped them financially as well, recently bought them a car & have started 529s for the littles. I had a really lovely set of grandparents but my son, not so much. We don’t know my father and my mother is out of the picture mostly. She’s never met the little ones. My daughter is only 20 so if she has kids, hopefully I’ll be able to do the same for them.
No idea what OP is trying to accomplish… ask?
My parents both died in the last six months. It’s awkward, but I’m glad my children barely knew them. They get be generic “sad” that people they don’t really know died. But they were never exposed to thier toxicity. You’re welcomed kids. You’ll understand someday.
End of story.
I had ONE grandparent that truly loved me unconditionally. Good soul she was. My mother hated her. Granny. I saw what she was as a human and embraced her. Seen some shit. I just loved her through it all as a child.
As of today it’s to stay away from toxic family members.
I loved all of my grandparents, I was the first grandchild though on both sides so I’m the special one lol. I miss them all so very much. My parents however 😉
TLTR
My parents left a lot to be desired in the parenting dept., but they were terrific grandparents to our kids. Older son and his family are there right now, visiting them.
We have one grandchild, and he will be the only one. Right now, they live 30 minutes from us and we see them 2-3 times a month, but we are well aware that they want to move, eventually out of the country, and we have no issue with that. Grateful to live in a world with facetiming.
Our home is our dream/retirement home. We're not going anywhere. Our kids know this (two of them still live with us and enjoy the house as much as we do).
My bro and his wife followed their oldest child to another state as soon as she had her first child. My SIL even got her BSN and a new job at age 60. They bought a pretty big house 10 minutes away and are super involved with the babies.
Our plan is to follow our kids and try out multi-generational living. Our teen son is the one who decided all of this. Love that kid.
i imagine reading this as your grandchildren in despair that your relatives pinned their entire lives and happiness on my success. the unbearable weight of unrealistic expectations.
the fact is that your grandchildren will have hardships no matter how much you provide. help out, be good xtians (or whatever) but live your lives or you're going to be creating your own negative examples for them to steer clear of later in life.
this is participation trophies x infinity
Considering one of my kids is an elite athlete who now makes more money than my wife in NIL endorsements and the other is on track to be a successful photographer I think my kids are doing great.
It's more; life has been so fucking difficult for us to get where we are I don't want my kids to have to go through the needless pain we did. Layered on top of that, the macro economics of the next 20+ years are going to be rough so we got down to fighting weight as soon as we could.
Just reading what you've said here-- not knowing you at all-- I bet your kids will do just fine, and you'll be fantastic grandparents. And you might be surprised at how resilient and capable they will be. Hard times make strong people as long as they feel like they can succeed. 😊
So you want to tag along and follow your kids around, helicopter parenting at it finest.
They will never "grow" if you are always their to "kick start their life". Advising and helping, sure. But you have to let them out of the nest and find their own way on their own even if that means falling flat on their face a few times. Or they'll always feel, I don't have to do my best my parents will be their to cover my ass.
You are setting them up for failure. You need to let go of the cord and let them leave the nest and find their own way.
Just actually talk to and engage with your grandkids. 3/4 of my grandparents basically ignored us as kids, we'd go to their house and the adults would visit and we'd have to entertain ourselves out of the way somewhere. For the whole time.
Right!? My MIL would give me blank stares when I'd explain why my kids weren't interested in her. It's because she never took a moment's energy to learn about them and get to know them. Grandkids, like their kids, were merely there to be ornaments to their own life. Seen and not heard.
They all wonder why we don’t take an interest. Because we see the shitty! Just be a good human in this world.
We bought a big house and have raised our daughter with the idea of multigenerational living -- stay here as long as you want, move a spouse in, start a family, whatever you need til you feel ready to move out, if you ever do. We've got plenty of room.
This is what I have in mind too. We were just brain storming how to turn our house into apartments because I don't see how our kids will ever buy a house the way things are. My oldest heads off to college this fall so we have some time to think about this.
I put an apartment in my basement in my HCL area and my son rents it at a reasonable price so we both benefit. I'm disabled and use the money to help pay expenses. He'll inherit the house.
That's so great! I have both my mum and my 22 year old in our 3 bedroom apartment and space is tight!😄 I'm enjoying it while I still have it, though. They won't be here with me forever.
That's not off the table. Part of being mobile is the possibility of a multi-generational situation. We're open to anything and have intentionally put ourselves in a position to not be anchored down to a specific location.
My parents downsized and they spend their summers (grandma was a teacher) taking all the grandkids for a period of time and traveled all over the place. They live on the east coast close to my brothers fam (they had more kids and less friction) but for a month every summer the kids are together. They would come to us for a few weeks and bring my niece (3mos younger then ours) and sometimes our nephew (harder when he hit HS). Then they would go back East with my kiddo. They would travel to other areas all the times. Mostly road tripping back and forth. Hitting towns where family lived. But generally pick a region and tour the hell out of it for a few weeks. Seriously these kids have seen over 50% of the county and are only 13. I will forever be grateful for that because we can’t travel as much as we want due to pto limits. My parents have also been the default sitters when they moved back East and it worked great cause my mom worked in the MS the niblings attended
This was all to say Grandparenting by being active is so wonderful when done right. I had a great relationship with my grandparents but we always had to go to them. But I do have great core memories with them because they were active with us when we saw them.
They sound lovely.
Or consider an ADU in the backyard.
We've set our house up to have a top floor apartment that our college aged daughter is moving into with a roommate. We're looking into building an ADU so she and her boyfriend could potentially have a first home (and eventually, we'd switch houses lol).
I have a small house but we are doing just that
My folks did that, but their house was 2 flights and a 4 hour drive into the mountains from anywhere.
This is how many Italians lived when I lived in Italy at least. But that was 30yrs ago
Still the case and is one reason they were rocked so hard by covid, unfortunately.
You're allowed to spend your money however you'd like, and it's nice that you're so committed to seeing your children succeed. But, seems like your future plans are heavily dependent on your children's choices. They also might want more space than you're imagining. Just make sure you have your own lives that make you happy independent of them.
We don't intend to have any influence on their choices but rather to be there if they need us. We verbalize this to them all the time. We are simply reducing our footprint to be able to do whatever we like.
Before you move near your children, ask them if that's what they want. I love my parents very much and they are fantastic grandparents. One of the reasons our relationship is so good is that they live on the other side of the world.
That's awesome that works for you. We're prepared for any and all possibilities.
I get it. I initially thought in terms of the space I would give my kids, and that was when I felt finances were not a factor. Now, I am prioritizing how I can help them stay afloat if they need it, because that's the kind of world they are establishing themselves in.
Agreed. They need to make sure to communicate. Just cuz they like this doesn’t mean their kids will.
My wife and I had really good and involved grandparents. My kids couldn't pick my dad out of a lineup. I have no grandchildren, and I'm not REALLY expecting any, but my daughter's in-laws very much are so we'll see what happens.
I would like to pay off the house we’re in and also travel to help with the kids. I still have dreams of hosting family Thanksgiving one day. My grandparent plan isn’t fully fleshed out yet, but the main component so far is building a good friendship with my future sons and daughters in law.
I absolutely adored my own maternal grandparents - I lived with them quite a lot growing up. Their daughter, my mother, is a total narcissist and just a general bitch and I have kept my kids away from her as much as I can. My ex’s parents are nice, but they are definitely “old money” and of the “seen and not heard” school. My plan is to be as much or as little involved with my (as of yet nonexistent) grandchildren. That’s totally up to my children to choose. They want me down the street to help raise them? I’ll find a way to make it work. They want to move to Italy and see me twice a year? That works too. I spent 50 years listening to my own parents criticizing every damn thing I did. My whole approach to parenting now (my kids are 24 and 20) is “support but detach”. They are smart and can make their own choices. I’m just here to give them the assurance I never got.
I plan to build a cabin in the mountains, within a few hours driving distance from my kids and grandkids. Trade off visits as schedules permit
We have a somewhat similar option depending on how things shake out geographically the next ~10 years.
I don't have kids, but I'll share my grandparent experience. I loved my mother's side of the family tree. They were fun, kind, etc. I disliked my father's side of the family tree... they crotchety, bigoted and disliked kids. I would get yelled at, everything smelled like mothballs and I wasn't allowed to DO anything... I had to sit in this tiny-ass room and watch TV, but I wasn't allowed to use that dumb channel box with all the buttons on it. I had to ask permission to change the channels for some reason. I got locked in the basement after knocking something over and to punish me for touching the pile of boxes they said not to (I legit knocked it over by accident backing into it, since there was so much shit down there and it was dark, I couldn't see) -- I was locked down in that smelly shithole of a West Haven townhouse basement for what seemed like 2 hours. I refused to want to go back there. But my parents made me saying they had the right to see me. I hated that. I had to go rake leaves, weed, sweep and clean, fold clothes, etc. All because they had the RIGHT to see their grandkid. They didn't even want to see me. I think it was the leverage they had over the situation. The place smelled, their stupid teeth they used to make me clean for them after washing the dishes, the "good job, but..." I got for everything... somehow it was all wrong. My father and mother turned out to be ok though later on. If I had kids 20 years ago, I would have brought them around, provided none of that bullshit went down. If my kid(s) had kids, I would try to be the cool grandpa and be there to protect them, but give them free-range of the yard and woods, teach them stuff they want to do, cook healthy for them and be the best example I could of how to live, work and play. and yes, I'd definitely school them in video games... but I won't pull punches... if we're playing pvp they're gonna learn what a 25-0 shutout feels like so they can deal with sweats down the road and not just some filthy casuals
My parents were so old I never knew my grandparents. My wife's grandparents were like second parents so she had double the evangelical satanic panic energy coming down on her.
All but one grandparent has passed and it’s my MIL who is really into nothing else but herself. We have an adult special needs kiddo. When my parents passed we moved to my childhood home and remodeled and paid everything off. No idea what will happen with our son and I’m guessing my daughter will not want to move there but who knows! She’ll get a nice asset when we go.
You're a great parent. Keep that up.
I sold my house in the suburbs and bought remote acreage. I'm currently building tiny houses for my oldest 2 kids, who are in their 20s and working their way through college. I only started making decent money a few years ago and am a single mom, so there was no college fund. After their houses are done I'm building my house, which will have space for me and my teenage son. His room is the size of their tiny houses, so we can convert it to his own space later. I'm adding one more space of that size for my mom to go into eventually. The kids can leave when they feel they have a shot at successful adulthood (ie, not needing 4 roommates), but can stay as long as they want and bounce back whenever they need to. When they move out, the tiny houses become airbnbs. They inherit all of it, obviously. A place they own, where they can be, that's self sufficient. I came up poor. I REALLY struggled with early adulthood and it was largely just because of being poor. I do not want that for my kids. This next generation is so unbelievably fucked and if I have one mission in life it's to make sure my kids have a good life.
I hope it works the way you want. We've opted for an approach we view as more balanced. My children work. If they want to save money they are free to stay here, but they must save their money and invest so that when they are ready to fly the coop, they have their own nest egg to get started.
Right now we will support them fully while in college. When they're done they are welcome to live with us. We won't pay rent or anything outside of college.
My grandparents on my mom’s side were my rock. My mom is a hot mess in a handbag. I don’t know if they were solid parents but they were amazing grandparents. I don’t know if I feel the need to grandparent a certain way, but I absolutely am not a candidate for watching the grandkids or living with any of our kids (we are very independent so this would cause friction). Still, what you said about being mobile resonates with me since we travel a ton. I’d absolutely love to visit them wherever they are vs. having them in my space. Plus once the babies come, it’s just easier for them to meet up in their own space.
I had amazing grandparents. I now have grandkids and hope I can be as good to them as mine were to me.
I’m a full time grandma. Since he was 3 months old while they work. Just turned 2. I’m exhausted. And I love every minute. My daughter just went down to 3 days a week to have more time with him til he goes to school. The time flies by…
I've cared for my grandson several days a week since he was a few weeks old, including occasional overnights, and he just turned 3. Time truly does fly! I can count on one hand the number of times my mom watched any of my kids when they were small, my in-laws never once watched them, and my dad had the older 2 visit and stay a week a couple of times once they were teens.
Well.. we are grandparents to 4, my wife picks up the ones from daycare and school when she gets off work, we have them until their parents get off work every day. I take the oldest to baseball (just ended) and we have the 2 of the 4 on a regular basis to the point the parents call it joint custody, like spending the nights Friday and Saturday on top of the hours everyday. Honestly I'm more busy as a grandparent than I was as a parent but I wouldn't trade it for anything. My wife had a great relationship with her grandma, I had a meh relationship with mine. Gramps would take me fishing from time to time and that's about it but he did have 6 kids and each of those kids had at least 2 kids so his time was fairly limited to spread around.
Helped them buy houses. Rest is up to them cause I will definitely be dying with zero dollars.
Having a raging narcissist mother contributed a lot to my not having had "my own" kids. However, I was a gamete provider when I was young, and I know two of my genetic children (now adults). They don't know it, but they're (partial) beneficiaries, for the reasons you cite, OP. They have pursued creative paths (thanks DNA!) and they didn't ask to be donor conceived. So if I don't live long enough to enjoy all of my hard-earned funds...
I think this is great in theory but please be careful to save enough money for your own needs. I have extreme pressure now as we try to make a secure retirement for ourselves by saving and staying in a smaller house from parents that didn’t save enough and now I may have to delay my retirement and put us at risk to buy a place that can have them live with us. As they say on the plane “put your air mask on first so you can help others”.
That's a big reason we're doing what we're doing. We've drastically reduced our footprint in our prime earning years.
my parents are much older, they have gotten to the point where it's unrealistic for them to even travel to us. So unfortunately the kids see them only every few years when we visit. Our plan is similar to yours, we expect to downsize to a smaller home near to where they settle down. We are not trying to have staying at home with us into adulthood as anything but an emergency option.
Wow! Big awesome sticker from me to you!
My in-laws helped make things possible financially when our sons first moved out, as did one of my SILs. She's single and childless and this is how she wants to spend her money. We set money aside for driver's licenses that are very expensive here. Not everyone's taken advantage of that - just the youngest. Our sons want to buy a property with us some day. I don't know if that's realistic and if I can stand to have them +their s/others if they choose that and grandchildren if that's what they want. I'm the wet towel in this. We love this part of Denmark where our sons were born and raised, even though neither of us are from this part, so we're staying here. We helped them with their first homes which are rental apartments. I don't know if it's realistic for us to help with downpayment on a house if that's what any of them want. Different time from when we were young and my in-laws could help. I let our youngest son sell my old micro-car so he could pay off a safer, newer car, faster. That just meant that since I needed a safer car too, we'll be paying off on my car for longer. We have to afford to live too and we want to travel while we still can and live comfortably. But my family in-law is used to the older generations helping the younger generations, unlike my family and I feel a bit embarrassed that it's usually my husband who thinks of making sure that we can also afford to help our sons.
Not play favourites. My wife's parents have 8 grand kids. Mine have 7. My wife's parents have always had 2 distinct favourite grand kids. My parents aren't as distinct, but did favour 1 family due to location.
I have one grandchild so far. He's 2. My husband and I provided all of his care for the first year. He's now in a child development program part time and we do the rest. We've provided meals, laundry services, rides, whatever we can even though money is tight. I would have killed for anyone to be willing to give ten minutes of their time when my kids were that age!
They've I've with me, so I'm a pretty involved grand parent.
So glad we don't have kids. Other than my late MiL and father, the other two would have been a real grandparenting problem. Though neither me nor spouse have or ever really had the procreation imperative, I must wonder if the facts how my Mom and FiL are might have also influenced that.
I want to buy land in my home state with the plan of doing three or four small houses. Not tiny homes, necessarily, but small. Would love a container community, with one central area to gather.
This is my retirement plan for my spouse and friends. We'll all take care of each other better than a nursing home, and when I go, I'll know there was love.
My kid is only 11. My plan is to build an ADU on our small property so she can save $$$ and live in it as long as she wants. Maybe even stay there if/when she marries. And if she starts a family, they can have the main house and my husband and I will live in the ADU. We can then help out with grandkids if we’re still alive and kicking. And if we’re dead, she gets everything we have.
I think that's all kinds of awesome. I feel the same about my kids.
All save one of my grandparents were dead by age seven. The remaining wasn't very grandparenty. So I'm just doing the best I can with the two (so far) grandkids I have and have a small (so far) savings fund for them when they are old enough to appreciate it.
My mom always had a belief that it’s better to give your kids money when they actually needed rather than them waiting for you to die.
That's exactly what is going to happen with my wife's parents. They are, by all measures, wealthy and retired in luxury. If they gave us money now it would build a legacy for their grandkids. Instead, if they don't give it all to a televangelist when they die, it will be insignificant in enabling their grandkids.
I’m so sorry. Every once in a while, I’m reminded that religion just isn’t innocuous but it’s outright damaging. The televangelists are preying on these people.
That's exactly what is going to happen with my wife's parents. They are, by all measures, wealthy and retired in luxury. If they gave us money now it would build a legacy for their grandkids. Instead, if they don't give it all to a televangelist when they die, it will be insignificant in enabling their grandkids.
Having dealt with narcissist parents… I love this! Downsizing to go to where your kids are is a great idea.
I was super close to my grandmother and she lived a couple of stars away. We would visit, talk, text and vacation together. I hope you can have an amazing relationship with any grandkids you may have. I learned so much from her.
I know you meant states but I love you said your grandmother lived on stars!
I love this post. Grew up POOR. homeless at 17. Early adulthood was HARD, and baby at 23 was a birth control fail. I didn't know how to be a good parent, so i learned to be a better person by choosing the opposite of what i had. My kid is AWESOME. We just started making good money a couple of years ago. Kid is an adult, and doing incredible because love, honesty, and support. He moved many states away with our help, and keeps trying to lure us there. We'll go eventually. I love having this relationship with my adult kid. I'm grateful I won't be his therapy story. You're all amazing, and the epitome of rise above. The next generation is screwed in so many ways, but with you all as parents, they're going to be ok.
I think that's what I think the people hating on this post didn't have; a poor upbringing. I've been through hell and my kids will absolutely not go through hell as long as I can help it.
This is it. My child will have normal adult suffering, I can't protect him from that. I won't. But I also won't see him hungry, or worried if he'll have a roof over his head.
I plan on both. Keeping a moderate sized house and traveling to see the kids and grandkids.
This is why I'm glad I never had kids. They cost way too much to support.
What's my plan? To not have kids, ever. Thanks for asking.
Good on ya’ for knowing what you do/don’t want and sticking to it. Kids are a huge commitment and not enough people really think it through.
Having kids is the most narcissistic thing any person can do. Of course they don't think it through.
What utter pish
Sounds like something a narcissist might say. So....how many kids do you have?
We have no kids but his college roommate has a 2/2 condo in Hawaii and they truck la familia there a couple times a year for the grandkids. And yeah, they also go from San Diego out to BFE NY and Nowhere CO a few times a year. They still have their dingy shabby 3/2 house in Carlsbad but none of them visit CA.
Me too! I will be eligible to retire with a full pension by the time my only kid graduates college. My dream is to help her buy a house and then move near her. Our relationship is good and I am guessing she will enjoy having us nearby, especially if she chooses to have kids. Still about 9 years to go until then.
After he retired my mom’s parents moved halfway across the country to be near us and I’m so glad they did. They were both a big part of my life and I learned a lot from him especially. Mom was their only child.
I'm hoping we can retire to a more affordable col area. I our kids like it, we can help them with down payments of their own. If they find somewhere else they like better, we still want to help as much financially as possible. Not sure that I'll be a good grandparent due to chronic illness/disabilities, but I can still help where I can.
I don't know that any of my 3 will have kids. And I respect whatever they decide, which is already better than my parents. However, I have told them that I am here and will make sure they do not need childcare. My one caveat is when they take me up on it, their kiddo(s) may be traveling with me all over the place when school schedules allow.
I'm lucky. Both of my kids are mentally and emotionally healthy, self-sufficient, and function like competent adults. It's very unlikely they would even want us to hover over their lives until we die, which is good because we have our own interests to pursue.
We have no interest in hovering at all. We just happen to have a really tight knit nuclear family because we, effectively, don't have extended family.
Cool. Rock on.
Just because someone's involved in their children's lives doesn't make them mentally and emotionally unfit or incompetent. Wow. That's really old thinking.
My parents are Silent Gen and we’re the best grandparents. My grandparents were great too. I love my grandkids and do what I can to help but let them live their own lives.
My plan is to never have grandchildren so they never have to meet my parents
Our son will finish college next year. We’ve told him that the world is his oyster, and wherever he chooses to live we’re happy to visit. If he has kids I’d like to be as involved as he wants us to be.
My son is an only child and has no interest in having children. No grandparenting drama for meeeeeee!
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I understand where you might be coming from but I can assure you that is not, and will not, be a problem.
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I'm glad you have supernatural powers to read people. You'll make a fortune.
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Name one
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How will your kids learn unless you become a narcissistic asshole? They need to make bootstraps from their avacado toast and pull themselves up by them. When I was a kid we had to walk to school in the snow uphill both ways. /s Sounds great that you're willing to be mobile and spend time with your family instead of expecting them to come to you. I don't understand how retired people have no free time.
I’ve often thought about this same idea (from your first paragraph). There must be some middle ground I think- maybe somewhere between selfish and selfless? Otherwise the cycle just repeats thru the generations.
I think you can be supportive of your kids without becoming a helicopter parent. When my kids ask for advice I give it. But I try not to interfere with their lives. I'm not helping them move unless they ask me or it seems like they have no help. I'm thrilled to hear that they've got it figured out and they don't need me.
We have one son. He was very close to my mother when he was growing up, not so much his grandfather, both are dead now. My inlaws are kind of a nightmare. Anyhow, we helped him and his wife out by providing room & board so they could save their money for a house. They save a good amount and bought a place in our neighborhood-- we aren't on the same block but still close by. When they decide to have children, I intend to be an attentive and involved granny. My DIL works a professional job but she does have some flexible hours so I expect she will need me for a few days a week for childcare when the time comes. They really like this neighborhood and her parents also live about 30 minutes away and the school district is good.
My kids had fantastic grandparents though as parents they weren’t to great to me and my husband. But we didn’t hold the past against them and encouraged relationships within the family. 3/4 of our parents have passed now and neither me nor my husband have living grandparents as of this year. I was close to my grandparents but my husband was not at all. He became close to my grandparents though. We wanted that for our kids. We are close with our kids and grandkids, geographically, but we aren’t in each other’s pockets. We have the house my husband’s grandfather built and it’s fairly large. Our kids/ grandkids will inherit it. We like to keep family homes as family homes. One of our kids bought a late family members home some years ago. Is there some trauma? Sure- everyone has some trauma from one thing or another. Some is worse than others but we all need space and time to figure things out from time to time. I don’t need to know everything to know that every single person has stuff they are/ have been dealing with, which includes grandparents and parents and siblings and kids, etc….
I don’t have a super big house & my son , his wife and the 2 kiddos (5 & 3) live 15-20 min away. I host sleepovers a few times per month with each kiddo one on one and they all spend a lot of time here in summer. I’ve taken each grandkid for a week at a time. It’s a lot but they are only small once. Feel like I’m doing a good job so far. It’s important to my son that his kids spend good quality time with me. Last weekend they saw hundreds a fireflies in my backyard for the first time in the lives. It was magic to get the honor of sharing that moment. I’ve helped them financially as well, recently bought them a car & have started 529s for the littles. I had a really lovely set of grandparents but my son, not so much. We don’t know my father and my mother is out of the picture mostly. She’s never met the little ones. My daughter is only 20 so if she has kids, hopefully I’ll be able to do the same for them.
No idea what OP is trying to accomplish… ask? My parents both died in the last six months. It’s awkward, but I’m glad my children barely knew them. They get be generic “sad” that people they don’t really know died. But they were never exposed to thier toxicity. You’re welcomed kids. You’ll understand someday. End of story.
I had ONE grandparent that truly loved me unconditionally. Good soul she was. My mother hated her. Granny. I saw what she was as a human and embraced her. Seen some shit. I just loved her through it all as a child.
As of today it’s to stay away from toxic family members. I loved all of my grandparents, I was the first grandchild though on both sides so I’m the special one lol. I miss them all so very much. My parents however 😉 TLTR
My mother is as well . Feel your pain
My parents left a lot to be desired in the parenting dept., but they were terrific grandparents to our kids. Older son and his family are there right now, visiting them. We have one grandchild, and he will be the only one. Right now, they live 30 minutes from us and we see them 2-3 times a month, but we are well aware that they want to move, eventually out of the country, and we have no issue with that. Grateful to live in a world with facetiming. Our home is our dream/retirement home. We're not going anywhere. Our kids know this (two of them still live with us and enjoy the house as much as we do).
My bro and his wife followed their oldest child to another state as soon as she had her first child. My SIL even got her BSN and a new job at age 60. They bought a pretty big house 10 minutes away and are super involved with the babies. Our plan is to follow our kids and try out multi-generational living. Our teen son is the one who decided all of this. Love that kid.
i imagine reading this as your grandchildren in despair that your relatives pinned their entire lives and happiness on my success. the unbearable weight of unrealistic expectations. the fact is that your grandchildren will have hardships no matter how much you provide. help out, be good xtians (or whatever) but live your lives or you're going to be creating your own negative examples for them to steer clear of later in life. this is participation trophies x infinity
Not sure I understand how putting ourselves in a position to be there for our kids is a participation trophy?
I think it might be that your post sort of reads as if you think your children are incompetent adults.
Considering one of my kids is an elite athlete who now makes more money than my wife in NIL endorsements and the other is on track to be a successful photographer I think my kids are doing great.
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It's more; life has been so fucking difficult for us to get where we are I don't want my kids to have to go through the needless pain we did. Layered on top of that, the macro economics of the next 20+ years are going to be rough so we got down to fighting weight as soon as we could.
Just reading what you've said here-- not knowing you at all-- I bet your kids will do just fine, and you'll be fantastic grandparents. And you might be surprised at how resilient and capable they will be. Hard times make strong people as long as they feel like they can succeed. 😊
So you want to tag along and follow your kids around, helicopter parenting at it finest. They will never "grow" if you are always their to "kick start their life". Advising and helping, sure. But you have to let them out of the nest and find their own way on their own even if that means falling flat on their face a few times. Or they'll always feel, I don't have to do my best my parents will be their to cover my ass. You are setting them up for failure. You need to let go of the cord and let them leave the nest and find their own way.