I have a friend - 52 yo - who is raising her 4 yo grandchild. Long story short, my friend has full custody as the father (her son) and the mother are not capable of taking care of themselves, much less a child. To add to the fun, the child has some special needs (potentially related to drugs during the pregnancy) and really, my friend / her husband are the only people in this child’s life who can and will provide a safe and stimulating environment, ensure he attends school regularly, work with him on his areas of developmental weakness, etc.
Right now he lives with her/her husband Monday - Friday and the other grandparents (who are OK, but not fully reliable) have him on weekends. The mother lives with the other grandparents but she was declared unfit by the state so she cannot be left alone with her son unless there’s another adult around. The father (her son) is still on drugs so he cannot be around – because if the state comes and drug-tests him and he’s positive, then she will lose custody and the boy will go to foster care. So in essence she has to kick her son out to save her grandson. Nice, huh?
It’s an awful, awful situation and my heart bleeds for her.
Anyway, she would love to find some kind of support forum for grandparents raising grandchildren and I promised her I’d ask. Does anyone know of any such forum? She’s not particularly active on Facebook but would consider changing that if needed.
I think a lot of the support she needs is just the unfairness of the whole thing – they were “good parents,” educated, affluent, provided a nice upbringing, did everything right and this happened – as well as having to deal with the stress on her marriage because of this whole situation – because, as one can imagine, people of good faith can reasonably disagree on how much support they continue to provide their son who is not showing any signs of shaping up.
Thank goodness for the grandparents–they are awesome and it is wonderful for the little one! Sadly, this situation is more common than one would wish. I have a friend raising their oldest grandson as well because their D was a mess and they stepped up
My parents had a neighbor who took in their two grandkids when their DD died. It seemed everyone in the neighborhood was supportive. Such a difficult situation
Have the grandparents looked for a support group for families of drug users? That might ease some of the stress in the marriage and they probably can direct her to other support groups too. Couples counseling may also help. I think they need to reach some sort of agreement about how they intend to deal with their son and stick to it. She might also want to look for support groups for families of children with disabilities because that presents a whole new set of challenges that other support groups may not know how to address.
I have a friend who’s going through this with her brother. Their mother recently got custody of the grandchildren. She said that they were advised to quit bailing him out of problems – don’t give him money or pay his bills, etc. – because the only way for a user to quit is because they want to, and the reason they want to is generally because it’s negatively impacting their life in a way they don’t like. Basically, they have to hit rock bottom and they can’t when they have a safety net. When OP and her husband are gone, the only safety net their son will have will be their grandson. Better to let him fail now, when they’re around to protect their grandson and model coping strategies for him.
What a good person your friend is. The administrator at my work is raising her grandson due to her daughters drug use. I see her undergoing all the issues I did when my kids where little (getting to day care on time, every little errand taking longer when you have to bring a young child, sick days, etc) and she is a single grandparent, so she has no help. Every time her daughter enters yet another treatment, her Mother is so hopeful, and every time (so far anyway) it has not worked out. I wish your friend the best.
Andy Borowitz, the New Yorker writer, has been promoting this website his wife started about grandparents stepping in. I haven’t read it, but I’ve heard good things: http://grandparenteffect.com/
To add to what others have said, my internist is also raising her grandson because of drug issues, and her husband left the family, so she’s on her own. truly heroic.
