To be extremely clear: our parents are perfect. Flawless. Five-star grandparents, no notes. This post is entirely based on what we’ve heard from friends, acquaintances, and strangers in pediatrician waiting rooms. Any resemblance to our actual families is purely coincidental and frankly offensive to even suggest.
Anyway. Here’s what our friends have told us.
Grandparents — even the most wonderful, loving, devoted ones (like ours, who are saints) — were parents in a wholly different time. And things were very different. Nobody warns you how steep the grandparent learning curve can be, and we’ve heard from so many friends that this caught them off guard.
Here are things other people have been surprised by:
Apparently some grandparents don’t remember how to hold a newborn. Like, head support. What a concept. We’ve heard that you may need to gently reposition their arm and they will look at you like you just corrected their golf swing. But also the baby’s head is just sort of… flopping, so.
Diaper changes. We’ve been told that you might have to teach them like they’ve never seen a naked butt before. Because functionally, they haven’t — not one this small, not with these snaps, not with this wipe warmer situation you’ve got going. Be patient. You were also bad at this three weeks ago.
The entitlement/availability paradox. A friend of a friend told us about this one. Baby is their grandchild and they feel they have a Right to time with said grandchild. Capital R. But also — they didn’t choose to birth this baby. And their plan for any given Tuesday night is not to be on call to babysit, thankyouverymuch. Both of these things will be true simultaneously. Often loudly.
Here’s the thing nobody tells you: if your baby is one of the first grandkids, even the most competent grandparents (ours, obviously) — sorry, your friend’s parents — are just as green as you are. Probably more so, because they haven’t done the reading. They haven’t been on the Instagram accounts. They don’t know what wake windows are. They think rice cereal in a bottle is still the move. (It is not.)
And you’re going to have to teach them. Which feels weird — not because you’ve never taught your parents anything, but because you kind of assumed they’d be teaching you how to do this part. Instead you’re simultaneously teaching yourself how to parent and teaching them how to grandparent. Nobody mentioned that would be the arrangement. But here you are, explaining that we don’t put babies on their stomachs to sleep anymore, and no, honey in the bottle is not okay, and yes we really do need to use this specific car seat this specific way every single time.
It can feel like a lot. It can feel ungrateful. It can feel like you’re being difficult when they’re “just trying to help.” But setting these expectations early — clearly and kindly — is one of the best things you can do for everyone involved. Including them. They want to do it right. They just need the updated manual.
Again: not speaking from experience. Our parents emerged from the womb knowing how to install a car seat base. But we’ve heard this is hard for other people.
As Evan puts it: “You go to war with the grandparents you have.”
He’s not wrong. Or so we’ve been told.