Welp, here I am with a second cup of coffee under my belt, ready to muse/discuss a little more from yesterday’s post about life taking another turn ….
@Blessed, I completely agree with you about not supporting children financially forever. This issue doesn’t have to do so much with $$$ as figuring out what priorities are and what is best for all involved.
Long story short, my older daughter is now a single parent of two special needs girls (the younger one is a little further over on the autism spectrum, being essentially non-verbal). She has worked full time as an RN, put her girls’ needs first, and has not asked for hand-outs or for me to do a lot of babysitting; she advocates for her girls like a mother tiger
Anyway, she now finds herself, despite her best efforts, with only one babysitter and more and more burdens on her. She and the girls were here yesterday and we had a good discussion… she got teary eyed a couple times and she is not a whiner or a snowflake (if that is the correct context for that word ).
She needs a better paying job and there are some travel nurse options in Albany GA (about a 40 min drive from where I am now) which would help but here *main* concern is making sure the girls have a stable, loving environment and a good school with ancillary services (speech therapy, etc). No her ex is absolutely no help at all, in fact he’s pretty messed up
SO…. she was checking into the possibility of us teaming up to ‘co-parent’ the girls. I would babysit while she works (optimally 6 days out of each two weeks). My questions to myself… what is best for the girls and how can I contribute without messing up my own health or getting myself in so deep I lose myself in the process
this post is really long already, I’ll stop there for now. Sorry if I’m boring everyone to tears but it helps to be able to put this down in black and white so I can think it through
lots of prayer going on too… God’s direction is essential