Dear Reader,

For the last few days, one of my sisters, her husband, and my mother have been staying with us. I’ve been reminded once again that I am fortunate to have family members who not only get along, but genuinely like to spend time together.

I recognize that not all of you are so lucky. Families are messy, and conflict is normal. It’s normal in my family, too. Even though we choose to spend time together, we don’t always get along.

But what we do is something that Rachel Haack mentioned in her Grandparent’s Week interview on getting along with your grandchildren’s parents: we choose not to get offended.

I haven’t been able to watch all of the Grandparent’s Week interviews and classes—I have house guests and a business to run and am leaving on a trip tomorrow an hour after my guests depart. But I made a point to watch Rachel’s interview, because she is such a voice of reason in a world of extremes. (Follow her on Instagram if you aren’t already!)

Rachel pointed out that we all have a natural negativity bias. This leads us to focus on grievances, unless we work to combat it. I think we do a good job of combating it in my family.

Are we all nice to each other all the time? No! One of us has a mean streak. One of us never listens and always interrupts. One makes promises they never keep. One of us gets their feelings hurt too easily.

But instead of dwelling on the times we hurt or annoy each other, we forgive and move on. We resist the urge to get offended—even when it’s pretty tempting to do so. I promise, it’s not always easy.

Rachel listed this ability to not get offended as one of the three key ways grandparents can work to get along with their adult children and their partners. She likened it to a force field: just let things bounce off of you instead of letting them hurt you.

The other two things she encouraged grandparents to do were these:

1. Be a cheerleader. Notice the good and call it out! Encouraging your children and grandchildren is so much more fun than trying to correct them.

2. Be proactive and flexible. Making the effort to connect in ways that matter to your adult children shows them you are on their team.

If you’ve been getting these emails for a while, these suggestions may sound familiar. These are messages that I’ve shared before.

I share them again because they are so important to your experience as grandparents. If you can get better at these things, you will enjoy your relationships so much more.

Warm regards,
DeeDee

P.S. Rachel Haack shared a lot of other gems in her interview. If you’d like to hear the full conversation, you can still sign up for Grandparent’s Week and view it.​

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DeeDee Moore | Founder, More Than Grand LLC | morethangrand.com