Navigating Long-Distance Relationships with Grandchildren

It's a typical Sunday morning.

I've had my coffee, I've had my breakfast, I've done a couple of chores and it's now about 9:30 and it's time that I normally make my calls to my children.

Not calling the grandchildren yet, because you know how that is when they're teens, they're still in bed.

So later in the afternoon is when I decide I'm going to try and reach my grandchildren.

So I try my oldest granddaughter first.

She's the one that's away at college.

It goes straight to her voicemail.

So I think, okay, well I'll try her brother.

He's also away at school.

Same result, straight to voicemail.

Well, maybe I'll get lucky on my third try.

So I call my 17 year old granddaughter and she picks up.

Oh my gosh, I'm so excited.

Hi, how are you?

I'm great, grandma, but I gotta go.

I'm going out to meet a friend.

Okay.

What about your brother, is he around?

No, he's at a scout meeting.

Okay, well, one out of four is not bad, so.

But when did staying connected with grandchildren become so difficult?

I just.

It's changed.

And if you've ever felt this way, trust me, you're not alone.

So let's talk about today, how we can bridge the gap and keep our relationship strong, no matter the miles between us.

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So let's go and talk about long distance grandparents.

I know that longdistant grandparents struggle because I reached out to you, my listeners, and you shared some of your stories with me.

I know it's been a struggle because it's been a struggle for me also.

And since I started putting this episode together, I have seen several articles about long distance grandparenting.

You know, sometimes when you are looking for something more stuff becomes into your awareness.

I think that's what's happened this past couple of weeks.

And I know that the challenges we feel are real and they can be frustrating.

So My goal today is to share some of my experiences, weave in some of what I heard from you and what I've learned from other sources, and offer some ideas of how we can stay connected.

But before we get to solutions, I think it's important to take a step back and look at how grandparenting, in my opinion, has changed over time.

I remember three of my grandparents, my father's parents lived fairly close by, and we saw them pretty regularly.

And in addition, at least once a week, we'd gather around the house phone and take turns talking to them.

It was a ritual, kind of a routine part of family life.

My mother's mother passed away before I met her, but I remember my maternal grandfather very well.

He lived in New Jersey.

I don't remember speaking with him on the phone, but I do remember his visits to us in Florida.

He loved taking us to the toy store and letting each of us, my brother, my sister, and me, pick out one toy.

So exciting.

He also was a great storyteller.

He had this heavy Latvian kind of Russian accent, so it was particularly fun to hear him tell the story of the Billy Goats gruff and the ugly, mean troll who lived under the bridge.

I have very fond memories of him making the sound of the troll and how mean he was.

So that was a good memory.

And thinking back to my own childhood, I realized that my expectations of grandparenting were shaped by a different era.

Grandparents were to be respected.

Families generally lived in the same city or town and were together regularly, not just for holidays like so many of us are now.

I remember my grandmother would come to my piano recitals.

She had been a concert violinist, and she loved that I played music.

I also remember that as a teenager, she used to want to hold my hand when we'd walk down the street.

And I was so embarrassed.

I thought my grandparents were so old and uncool.

But I would never have pulled my hand away because she was my grandmother, you know, and you just respected them.

And also, I think we wanted them to be proud of us, even if we thought they weren't cool.

And I.

And I do believe that our grandchildren still want us to be proud of them and they want us to love them.

It just feels more difficult when we do not live nearby.

Do you agree?

As has been the case with so many things, boomers started to change the dynamics of families.

We were the generation that left home for college, moved for jobs, and often settled far away from our families.

I moved to North Carolina after my kids were born.

My parents were still in Florida.

Every Week we would call them or they would call us and we would all take turns talking with them on the home phone.

There were no cell phones then, no video visits.

So it was all of us around passing around the phone right as we were talking to the grandparents.

And then we visited a few times during the year.

Once a year I would go to Florida.

A couple of times a year, my parents would come to see us.

And somehow, even though we did not live close, it seemed easier to maintain the connection between grandparents and grandchildren when my children were young.

Again, my perception, I think that happened for a few reasons though I know I felt a sense of obligation to stay connected to my parents and to facilitate connection for them with my children.

It was just the right thing to do.

As I said, we didn't have cell phones or video chat, so it took one phone call to reach everyone on the house phone.

In fact, I remember the house phone ringing and the kids would always like make this mad dash to see who would get to the phone first.

You know that doesn't happen anymore.

Everybody's got a cell phone.

And my parents, I give them a lot of credit, they made a big effort to stay connected, calling regularly and making sure that we had regular visits.

When I was a parent, I felt like maintaining connections between my children and my parents was a joint effort in my experience as a grandparent.

Now staying connected takes more effort on the part of the grandparents because the, the parents, the parents of our grandchildren have all gotten so busy and everybody has their cell phone.

Now my grandchildren are no longer little.

The oldest can't even believe this.

The oldest grandchild is 20 and the youngest is almost 15.

When they were young, I was living in Northern Virginia.

My daughter and her family started out in Beckley, West Virginia and they later moved to Asheville.

My son and his family started in D.C.

which wasn't too far from Northern Virginia.

But they soon moved to Philadelphia when he enrolled in graduate school and eventually they also moved to Asheville.

So for most of their early years, my grandchildren all lived a distance away.

My daughter has the two older children, the 18 year old and the 20 year old.

When they were babies and toddlers, she would call me every time her husband was getting ready to go out of town for work and asking me to come down and help her if I was able to get there.

It was about an eight hour drive.

If I was able to get there, I would drive down for the week.

I loved those times, holding those babies as they fell asleep against my shoulder.

Bath time where you could hardly Find them right for all the bath toys they had.

And then once they could walk, we would dance and sing songs, read books and play with blocks.

Those were the best times.

And the kids were also excited when I would come to visit, which also made me feel even more happy and excited about being with them.

When they got a little bit older and my daughter got more comfortable with being a parent, the calls for help became less and less.

So once a week I would call on my daughter's cell phone because there was no longer a house phone.

And after she and I talked, I would ask to speak to the little ones.

Some of the time she would say they're watching cartoons and she did not want to interrupt them.

As the grandparent, I had no control over whether I could talk to them or not.

I could have made a scene and that wouldn't have been a good thing to, you know, come on, let me talk.

But I just had to accept that that was her, her decision.

It was surprising to me.

I don't think I would have ever denied my parents access to my kids, even if they were watching cartoons.

But who knows?

So I moved from Northern Virginia to Greenville, South Carolina, which is an hour from Asheville, where both of my children, children have settled.

And I had visions, visions of how I was going to spend time with my grandchildren.

At the time I moved, they were ages 7, 5, 4 and 2.

And I dreamed about all the sleepovers we would have, baking cookies with them, going to the park, snuggling up on the couch to watch a movie.

I also the house I bought, it had a bonus room over the garage.

And I imagined the grandkids using it as a retreat once they became teens and no longer wanted to hang out with the grown ups.

But what really happened?

Well, for the first few years I was able to have them spend the weekend a few times.

Now, on the rare occasions that we are all together at my house, the grandkids do use the bonus room as a retreat.

So much so that we almost don't even know that they're here.

And one of the hardest lessons that I have learned is that the parents are the gatekeepers.

As much as I dreamed of a close relationship with my grandkids, I could only be as involved as the parents schedules allowed.

It is not that I was excluded, it is that everyone's lives got busy and trying to find a time when my children and their children would be available for a long distance call.

It's not even a long distance call anymore, but you know, for a cell phone call A call when they would all be there when they were young.

And that became more difficult.

I remember my daughter would call me from the car when she was going somewhere, but she was usually alone.

And I think she liked just having that time just to talk to me.

But it also meant I missed time talking to the kids.

So I knew that I wanted to have my own relationship with each of the grandkids.

And I came up with a few creative ways to facilitate this while they were young.

Again, it depended on the parents agreeing with these ideas.

But this is what I came up with and it did work.

When they were young, one of the things I did was something I called Camp Weiwei.

My grandchildren started calling me way way when they could barely talk because they couldn't say Wendy.

So when they were in the three to seven year old range, I took each set of grandchildren, my daughter's 2 and then my son's 2, on a weekend adventure.

Staying in a mountain cabin, exploring nature, doing art projects, playing games and just having fun for the weekend.

Just the three of us between the ages of 10 and 13.

I took each of them on an individual trip.

Grayson, the oldest, and I drove to Mammoth Cave in West Virginia.

And then on, sorry, Mammoth Cave is in Kentucky.

And then onto Nashville for our trip.

Next was Griffin.

He wanted to go to Atlanta.

He was shopping for some vintage sneakers.

It was the thing.

Then we also went to a ball game and an outdoor history museum.

Maddie and I went to Chincoteague island to see the wild ponies and to learn about the water and creatures that lived around there.

And Alex and I experienced a windjammer cruise off the coast of Maine.

Each of these trips gave me one on one time for about a week with each of them, just me and them.

It really was a special way to build connections.

And I made a picture book for each of them.

And I know it's something that we will remember for the rest of our lives.

But the biggest challenge for me is trying to stay connected now that they are teens and young adults.

Teens and young adults are busy focused on their own lives.

And if I wait for them to call me, I'll be waiting a long time.

Each one has their own cell phone, so if I want to talk to them, that requires four different phone calls.

Texting seems to work and I will usually get a reply.

Maybe not right away, but eventually.

But each out reach is up to me and I know they love me.

I'm just not top of mind for teens.

As I said in the beginning, I've heard from several of you about the challenges of staying in touch with the grandchildren who live far away.

Some of you with younger grandchildren, toddlers until about age 8 find that using FaceTime or Zoom chats seem to work out well.

They are short enough to keep the child engaged.

The parent also feels involved, and the kids are generally still excited to talk to grandma or grandpa.

But once they start getting involved with friends and Outside activities, the FaceTime and Zoom chats may become more difficult.

Trying to find a time that works for them, for the parents and for you can become an obstacle.

Unless, of course, they are old enough to have their own phones and can initiate FaceTime on their own.

But before I get into some suggestions for how to stay connected when there are miles between you and your grandchildren, I want to remind us to lower our expectations just a little.

I say us because I need to remind myself of this also.

So remember when your children were teens?

How much time did they really want to spend with you?

Remember when you were a teen and you wanted to hang out with your friends, go to ball games or dances?

Of course there was always homework to do.

How much time did you have left for your parents or your grandparents?

I think we all have this kind of Hollywood vision, Hollywood expectation of the perfect grandparent grandchild relationship.

The results can be hurt feelings on our part, stress for our kids, and maybe even confusion or stress for our grandchildren when they're not sure what we want from them.

Let's get straight about why it is important to us to stay connected with our grandchildren.

Knowing your why will help you lower your expectations of what you want them to give to you.

Some of the reasons I heard from you about why we want to stay connected to our grandchildren were we love them.

That's obvious.

We may want to pass on family traditions.

They are part of us.

We feel like we have more time to be present for our grandchildren than we had for our children.

We're interested in them and in watching them become who they are meant to be.

And we want to build memories that they will remember even after we're gone.

These are some of the reasons I heard from you, some of my reasons, and I think knowing your why for maintaining a connection can help lower our expectations and increase understandings, right?

So our grandchildren probably just take for granted that we're going to be there for them whenever we're not.

They can't even imagine us not being there.

They're so focused on their lives and their friends.

They do not have the sense of limited time that we may be starting to feel.

So we reach out because it's important to us and that is enough.

Don't expect that they're going to be reaching out to you anytime in the near future, maybe as they get older.

But for now it's enough that we continue to reach out to them.

So are you ready for some suggestions?

All right, let's talk about the little ones.

Like toddlers to about 8 years old.

As I said, FaceTime and Zoom calls work well for the very young ones.

You could sing songs to them, read children's books, ask them to show you their favorite toy, or maybe their newest trick.

Maybe they learned to do a somersault or they learned how to hop.

Keep this call short.

Sweet, engaging, fun.

Once they start school, they might want to show you something they made, or maybe they want to read a story to you to show you how well they are reading now.

This might also be a time when you can share something with them.

You might tell them about something you did together when they were babies, or what their parents were like when they were the same age.

You might show them something that you got from your parents, or that you've saved that their parents did, or or even tell them about their great grandparents.

Let them set the rhythm of these calls.

Your desire is to connect, to build memories, not to have long drawn out calls.

Have fun with this.

Kids are all about fun.

Some grandparents told me that they'll send little things in the mail to their long distance grandchildren, which I love that idea because everything is online now and getting real mail.

I remember being excited about that.

I know the kids are too, so they send them cards, pictures, something homemade.

What if you find cute images?

You could find the cute images in magazines online and cut those out and send them.

I would discourage you from sending money every time you send a card just because you want them to look forward to getting to know you and not just think of you as a bank.

My opinion.

And of course, when you can visit in person, be present.

I remember my daughter saying to me one time, mom, I was your daughter first.

So I guess I was focused almost exclusively on the grandchildren.

So remember, our children were our children first and they want us to spend time with them too.

And it's easy to get distracted when the little ones are so cute.

Now let's talk about tweens to teens ages like 10 to 17.

Things get more challenging during these times.

They become involved with friends, with sports, with music, with gaming, try to learn from their parents about what they're interested in.

Once you know that connecting around things that interest them is helpful.

I am not a gamer.

My grandson, both of them actually were, are and you know, I try to understand and pay attention at least to show an interest.

And remember that teens are all about themselves.

It's part of their developmental stage.

Try not to take it personally if they are busy and cannot talk when you want to talk.

Many kids at this age in the 10 to 17 year old range will have their own cell phones.

So using texting to connect can be received better than always trying to call.

Not every day, you know, you don't want to annoy them, but maybe once or twice a week, depending on the child, you can send them just a quick I'm thinking about you text or a funny picture or you know, something that you saw over the weekend that you took a picture of.

And occasionally ask a question but make it relevant.

Like I sent Valentine cards with a little Starbucks gift card we would all like to have received.

Oh, thank you for that.

But I said I hope you received your gift card and enjoy a special treat.

Then I got my thank yous.

It's just the way things are now.

They do not like to be questioned about school or grades or even future plans.

You're more likely to get answers to these types of questions when you're visiting, but maybe not so share about yourself because that makes it easier safer to have a conversation with you than if you're quizzing them all the time.

And being a kid today is not easy.

Being a kid may never have been easy, but I think it's even more difficult today.

So do you remember that phrase reach out and touch someone from the AT&T commercials in the 80s?

Using text to reach out and let them know they're loved can be so important when they're going through some kind of teenage angst.

So reach out and touch them now.

Young adults, 18 to whatever.

They'll always be young adults to us, right?

So here's an interesting suggestion that I've not tried, but I think I will try with my two oldest grandchildren.

They both are away at school so they don't see a lot of each other, although I know they facetime and they text each other.

I'm going to see if they might be open to scheduling a monthly a monthly zoom call with just the three of us.

One of them is more talkative than the other and so maybe having both of them on the call will create more ease and laughter among all of us.

I'll let you know if that, if that comes to fruition and how it works and of course, once again, text Text is always a good way to stay connected.

You have probably already figured out that you're more likely to get a response when you text your own children.

It is quick and easy.

Texting with your college age or young adult grandchild works too.

Again, watch out for those expectations.

Don't expect an immediate response, but eventually you will probably get something back.

And if you're able to visit at their schools or their new cities once they have jobs, plan to do that.

Not only will you feel good because you'll be able to visualize where they are, but you also might meet a couple of their friends.

Maybe there's some event that's happening when you're there that you could attend with them, take them out to eat.

They always appreciate that.

And be careful not to give unsolicited advice.

You want to be a supportive, loving person in their life.

This is a feedback I got from my son about being a grandparent.

He said parents will do the advice and the teaching and all of that.

You just be there as the loving person in their life.

We had this idea that we were also going to be that wise, loving person in their life, but that doesn't seem to be necessarily what they want.

Maybe a little bit when you have them one on one.

So listen to what they are saying.

Show interest if you're concerned about something they said or you disagree, keep this between you and your adult or young adult grandchild.

If you believe that some of their thought processes may be unhealthy and could be a danger to themselves, well then of course you want to share your concern with their parent, but otherwise understand that they are developing their own sense of self, their own place in the world.

And if you disagree with their actions or their point of view, you can let them know as you would let any other adult know your thoughts and then let them know that you love them.

Working on this episode has been good for me.

I think I was a very good grandparent when my grandchildren were young.

It's so much easier then, right?

They're just like little puppies.

They're lovable and cuddly and just fun to be around.

But I know that I have struggled with unrealistic expectations now that they have become teens and young adults.

Doing my research for this episode and hearing from some of you has helped me reset my expectations.

So keep reminding me if I ever run into you and you're like, how are you doing with your grandkids?

Oh, reset my expectations.

Staying connected isn't always easy, but if there's one thing I've learned, it's that love travels any distance.

We may need to get creative.

Like I said, reset expectations, adapt.

But our role as grandparents is as important as ever and knowing your why.

So you're making the effort because it's important to you.

I'd love to hear from you.

How do you stay connected with your grandkids from a shofar?

Share your stories with me and I hope this was useful.

I want to tell you about another podcast called Fading Memories.

This is a podcast that offers valuable insights for effective caregiving techniques and self care strategies.

Join host Jennifer Fink, who is part of my collaboration group as she discusses brain health recommendations and some of the challenges of being a caregiver to a loved one with dementia.

Tune into Fading Memories podcast for practical advice and compassionate support through your caregiving journey.

Wherever you listen to podcasts, if you like what you're hearing, drop me a note, let me know.

It's WendyBoomer Biz and sign up for our newsletter Bitbit Ly/Navigate Aging.

We are a concerned, compassionate, loving community of people that are aging well.

So join us.

My final episode in February next Monday will be with the Collector of Stories.

Her name is Marty McNabb.

Marty hosts Story sharing gatherings and interactive art history expeditions for individuals, families and organizations all over the world.

She's a legacy artist on a mission to build deeper connections, community and legacy through the stories of things that matter.

She's fun.

You'll have fun on that episode.

So thank you for choosing to spend your time with Boomer Banter and I look forward to seeing you next week.

Weekend.