She was a great teacher.
Her husband adores the kids and their world is their kids.
They're constantly doing things with them.
No alcohol or drug problems.

But my wife has been over there weekly helping out
It is tiring work. My daughter looks exhausted some days.
I help with fix it stuff but they don't require a lot from me.

When my wife & I visit weekly, it is the highlight of my week. Lovely family with two little miracles.
We're truly blessed.

But my wife helping 2-3 days a week beyond our weekly visit finds it physically exhausting. And she looks it after 2-3 days.

Grandparents 24/7 as parents for 2-3 kids. That is pretty major.

She's 7 and an amazing, smart kid. ADHD so she's always an adventure.
She can be exhausting but I don't mind in the least. She keeps us in our toes and I just see it as making life as good as it can be for her.
We do get beans every other weekend when she goes to get other grandma house where her letter love. Nine of them have the bandwidth to deal with her. My wife and I are a good team coordinating appointments and entering that goes along with it

What a sweetie. I loved those books.

Thanks for posting

My daughter was married to a violent man, but like so many victims of domestic violence she was afraid to leave the person. Her husband radiated tension, so it was never pleasant to be around him. My husband and I moved from Washington where all 3 of my kids and their families lived to Oregon about 14 years ago. If I had still lived in Washington, I am sure that I would have known so much more how bad it was. Things got really bad in the fall of 2020, and her older son went to live with his biological dad, my daughter's first husband. My daughter's husband, the father of her second son, would come home from work every day and drink until he would get in a rage. My daughter began to self-medicate with alcohol to numb herself to the violence. She became an alcoholic, too. We had a call one night from our grandson who was 11 at the time, that his parents were fighting. We packed our bags and headed north keeping him on the phone to make sure he was okay the entire 3-hour drive. The next day she tried to kill herself. The hospital would not release our daughter to her husband, but only to me. They actually had a guard at her door at the hospital to keep him away. We wound up taking our grandson back to Oregon while things cooled off, as she still did not want to leave her husband or press charges. The next night, she called. She was terrified out of her mind and had to flee for her life late at night with just the clothes she had on and her phone. We had to call the police. She was able to find shelter at a restaurant that was still open, and they kept her safe until the police arrived. Our son, who lives in Seattle, brought her back to his home. We drove up early the next day and brought her back to Oregon.

I won't go into everything that happened after that, but she has been hospitalized over 30 times. We also sent her to a facility in Arizona for two months. She is also bipolar (100% disability) with several other medical issues, so I have had to work with lots of her doctors, mental health specialists, etc. Overall, we have spent well over $100,000 to help her. In the meantime, we have been raising her younger son, and it has not been fun much for a lot of the time. I communicate fairly frequently with his teachers, as he has been behind academically. We put him in soccer, which gave him much confidence and helped with his self-esteem. That's not cheap because he is now playing at a high level, but it is worth it. Finally, after 4 years, our daughter is headed on the right track, is feeling healthy, and is divorced from that monster as of last month. She also lives with us. In the meantime, her older son has come to live with us. He is a great kid but has high-functioning autism.

We have had no vacation since 2019. We had flown to San Diego in 2022 for a cruise to the Mexican Riviera, but the night before the cruise was to leave her estranged husband came down stating that we were not there to stop him from seeing her. She fell apart, wrecked our car, which caused lots of new issues. We had to fly back from San Diego the next day. We also had to forfeit our trip we had paid for to Hawaii. Since then, we have been afraid to go anywhere. We hope that we can start up our life of getting some trips in next year, if she continues to stay well. We had plans to travel after retirement, but life throws you curve balls. We had to cancel our trip to England/Wales because of the pandemic, and then our daughter's situation happened. We are in our early 70's, so we can feel the years slipping away from us. I am thankful that we have adequate income, good health overall, and a house large enough to handle 5 people and 2 dogs.

You're doing the right thing for your daughter and your grandchildren though. Consider taking little
snippits of time to be with your spouse like an hour for a late evening dinner just to get out of the house.
I'm sure there have to be some support groups for older parents with returning children or grandparents parenting.
Thanks so much for sharing this. I'm not a big believer, but if there's a heaven, you've got my vote.

I am lucky to have a great husband, as I know it is hard on him, too. So far, we have made two attempts to go somewhere this year but wound up canceling. It is going to take a long time for us to feel it is safe to leave and be gone for more than a day. Last month was our 50th anniversary, but we could not plan anything. We live near the Columbia River Gorge, so we hopped in the car and spent a few hours in the nice community of Hood River. Currently, our middle child's wife is expecting a baby any day now, so we are on grandparent alert for that. They have two little ones, and we will have to rush to their home, which is about 40 minutes away, to take care of their kids. It's nice to be needed, but it is exhausting at times.

May your daughter continue to recover. You have all been through a lot. I wish you peace and strength.

I have also been raising two kids not my own and I am in my late 60's. It is not easy. Though only one is a minor now. Not the same circumstances as yours but there was substance abuse, violence and child protection involved. It was harrowing for the children but they are well now. It's been 10 years.

Life really does throw curve balls sometimes. I was supposed to be living in Europe and travelling. But that's ok, the time may come for that still. I wouldn't trade my time with the boys for anything.

We just want our grandsons to have a good life. Our ex-son-in-law has no visitation rights now, so we hope he will stay away. The last two times he came by, we had to call the police. We hope we can go to Europe next year, but now because of Trump. I am worried that Americans will not be welcome or that Trump will make it difficult to return to the US for people who don't support him.

By next year we'll all have a better idea of the safety of travel for U.S. citizens. But I don't think he can get away with not letting citizens back in. You deserve a nice break and to do what brings you joy. I hope you go forward with it. I am going to Europe next year, come hell or high water, at least for a few weeks for now. But I'm Canadian, don't have the same risks.

Wish you well!

People may ask, but nobody except the lunatic Reform voters supports Trump. I’ve lived here for three years and most folks I know even in fairly conservative Suffolk think he’s a lunatic.
I’ve had zero issues in France, Italy or the Netherlands either, though to be fair my accent has changed to the point that most think I’m Canadian.

No horrible hardship cases like the ones described above, but half of our grandchildren live two hours away in the Taunus Hills above Frankfurt, and the other half half live across the ocean in the USA. Last year, when our daughters were in the Maldives celebrating a birthday for a week, my wife and spent a week at our German-based daughter’s house in Königstein, taking care of all four grandchildren. I aged a year that week.

Last edited Wed May 21, 2025, 04:35 AM - Edit history (1)

77 years old. Partially disabled due to a head-on car collision. Wife 75% disabled (botched spinal surgery, 50% loss of teeth, cataracts, and hooked on illegal Oxycodone.) Helping to raise three grandchildren. His son works, but part time and is an alcoholic. Son's wife (separated, not divorced) can't keep a job and is an alcoholic.

They get the kids every other week-end b/c son lives with them and has no home of his own.

Barely enough money to have food for the kids when they stay over.

My friend has to "borrow" money from his sister to get gas in his vehicle.

Tragic.