Not that anyone is asking

Aneeda72 said:
I think this might happen. Had not read this before my other post. The situation might be very confusing for Collin as you are starting to recognize. You are becoming more and more attached and perhaps more and more judgmental of mom.

My question is, if you became a judgmental person in the way your biological grandchildren were being raised, as many people are, how would the relationship go? Not good I would guess. So are your feelings towards mom bleeding over and causing Collin issues? Ask yourself are you the issue? Only you know the answer.
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I've been very careful about this. Tara is clinically narcissistic (my opinion), so she always feels judged, and I'm aware of that and stay neutral when we talk. I want Collin to feel that she and I cooperate, and that I like his mom. And honestly, I don't dislike her. She seems genuinely concerned about him, and seems to want to help him. But she's hurt that he acts like he doesn't love her...she's told me that, with tears in her eyes. So, she's got it rough, too, and I don't ever forget that.
 

Murrmurr said:
The preschool decided he does. (more money for the state)
I can only hope he gets something out of it.
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All three of my great granddaughter are in therapy for various reason. One started at 2 and the other at 3. (The 2 years old life was very complicated until grandma adopted her at Christmas, 😆.

One of them was pulling her hair out, which has stopped since therapy. She is non-binary and while we are support her and could care less how she dresses, I think school was/is a stressful situation for a girl who dresses and looks like a boy. She started this when she was 5.
 
Aneeda72 said:
All three of my great granddaughter are in therapy for various reason. One started at 2 and the other at 3. (The 2 years old life was very complicated until grandma adopted her at Christmas, 😆.

One of them was pulling her hair out, which has stopped since therapy. She is non-binary and while we are support her and could care less how she dresses, I think school was/is a stressful situation for a girl who dresses and looks like a boy. She started this when she was 5.
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My sister was a tom-boy. No surprise with 4 older brothers whose friends were also boys. People these days make too much of stuff like that. There's a lady who lives here who dresses like a man. Turns out she's been dressing that way ever since she was violently raped. You never know a person's reasons unless they tell you. People are too quick to judge these days, and to pigeon-hole people who do things considered out of *normal range* or whatever.
 
Murrmurr said:
At least in front of Collin, I'm very supportive with his mom. I wish she was open to my advice and suggestions, but she just isn't, so I have to roll with that. But I do want Collin to view Tara and I as friends and sort of co-parents...maybe not co-parents, but I make certain he sees us working together for his benefit.

I do disagree about the toy situation. If Collin is the big boy/big brother then I think he deserves a piece of property, a big-boy toy that gets put up where the little ones can't reach it, that he gets to play with on his own from time to time, maybe when his dad is there and it's something he and dad can play with together. An age-appropriate remote-control car would be ideal. He has one.

The CPS worker Collin had here in Sac County did not approve of him visiting me. The one he has in the county where he lives does. Moreover, the family court judge is the one who suggested it. So Collin got lucky there. But I am braced for the therapist to advise weaning Collin off the long visits, dwindling it down to a couple hours a couple days a week or something like that. But the county Tara lives in allows the parent a lot of room to decide things like that, like who can visit and for how long, so I expect I will have him for extended periods at least now and then for some time to come.
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Yeah, not co-parents, never co-parents, wrong thinking. IMO. Grandfather would be a fitting title and you might ask Tara about that, if he can call you grandpa. This makes sense in the world of children.

Grandparents have different rules, different methods of child raising, and grandparents are in the multiples which would go along with his peers situations. In a normal marriage, there are four sets of grandparents, in a blended marriage there are 8 sets of grandparent.

Then there are foster grandparents at schools, children hospitals, etc. Grandparents never end, and then great grandparents. You could present this to Tara and to the therapist and become Collin’s grandfather and cement your relationship that way.

What do you think? A way to be there for forever.
 
Aneeda72 said:
Yeah, not co-parents, never co-parents, wrong thinking. IMO. Grandfather would be a fitting title and you might ask Tara about that, if he can call you grandpa. This makes sense in the world of children.

Grandparents have different rules, different methods of child raising, and grandparents are in the multiples which would go along with his peers situations. In a normal marriage, there are four sets of grandparents, in a blended marriage there are 8 sets of grandparent.

Then there are foster grandparents at schools, children hospitals, etc. Grandparents never end, and then great grandparents. You could present this to Tara and to the therapist and become Collin’s grandfather and cement your relationship that way.

What do you think? A way to be there for forever.
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He calls me uncle now, Uncle Frank (well, Unca Pwank). But I'll talk to Tara about it. Maybe it'll be confusing for him, idk, but it's something she can discuss with his therapist, too. Collin only has 1 grandfather, and sees him very rarely so it's hard to say if he would feel any connection to the title or role of Grandpa. I wish I'd have had him call me grandpa from the start. Probably would have been wise. In hindsight, it is.

As he's maturing, he's understanding more, and as he understands more, he can be more open to changes, like changes in titles and who's role is what - or even just to accept the roles people play in his life. Maybe as his understanding develops, I can be grandpa and that will be meaningful for him. I would like that very much.
 
Aunt Bea said:
I'm afraid that the only thing the poor kid will get is a label that will follow him for the rest of his life.

Very sad.
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Brings up another point - if his mom would get a job or get a career started and get off welfare and state-dependency, Collin wouldn't be owned by the state, you know what I mean? California is especially enthusiastic about labels. Of course, that spills over into the public schools anyway, so I guess there's no escaping it for him. And I've dealt with this kind of crap before, when my daughter was in gradeschool. She has what they now call ADD. They didn't have a name for it back then. But now it's not a diagnosis it's a label. Not that it's not a real thing but it has become a widely used label. Or I should say mislabel. Anyway I had to fight the school So many times to just let her be. She made straight As, aced all her tests and stuff. They just didn't like it that she twiddled her hair and fidgeted in her seat and whatnot. I didn't mind being called when she was disruptive, but they'd get their panties in a bunch over the stupidest stuff.

Oh well, she's a very successful, happy person now, so she showed them. :ROFLMAO:
 
Aneeda72 said:
I don’t remember how old she is, how old is she?
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I'm not sure but I think she said she's 24, somewhere around there. She might have said 26. Not more than that.

I have mentioned her horrendous childhood. Her mom, Collin's grandma, was a heroin addict who's been clean for about 10 years now. About the same time she went into rehab, Tara found her father and went to live with him but he died of cancer shortly after, like within a year, and from what I gather Tara lived on the streets for a couple years rather than go back to live with her mother. They have only *sort of* patched things up, and Tara tends to not let the grandmother see the grandchildren as often as she wants to; doesn't want her kids around their grandmother much bc she was a horrible person to Tara until Tara was abt 15 and she doesn't yet trust her mother - there's all this unresolved resentment and animosity and it sometimes manifests as hatred. So there's that going on, too - this tug of war over grandma seeing the kids and Tara punishing her for a miserable childhood.

So, yeah, Tara needs work. She's not a happy person bc she really needs to resolve these issues. This is why she gets my sympathy; I feel sorry for her and I wish she could find a quality therapist but, of course, there's no way she can afford that. The whole thing is heart-breaking all around.
 
Murrmurr said:
I'm not sure but I think she said she's 24, somewhere around there. She might have said 26. Not more than that.

I have mentioned her horrendous childhood. Her mom, Collin's grandma, was a heroin addict who's been clean for about 10 years now. About the same time she went into rehab, Tara found her father and went to live with him but he died of cancer shortly after, like within a year, and from what I gather Tara lived on the streets for a couple years rather than go back to live with her mother. They have only *sort of* patched things up, and Tara tends to not let the grandmother see the grandchildren as often as she wants to; doesn't want her kids around their grandmother much bc she was a horrible person to Tara until Tara was abt 15 and she doesn't yet trust her mother - there's all this unresolved resentment and animosity and it sometimes manifests as hatred. So there's that going on, too - this tug of war over grandma seeing the kids and Tara punishing her for a miserable childhood.

So, yeah, Tara needs work. She's not a happy person bc she really needs to resolve these issues. This is why she gets my sympathy; I feel sorry for her and I wish she could find a quality therapist but, of course, there's no way she can afford that. The whole thing is heart-breaking all around.
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Wow, it is heartbreaking and sounds like despite all her challenges she is trying her best to do her best. When I hear these stories I always so torn because this could have been me if I had not recognized, early on, the danger I was in from my horrific childhood. Such childhoods are so hard to overcome.

I let my mother have access to my children, but she actually did not want much access. She was more interested in my brother’s kids. I do find it amusing that his children give her the brush off, where my children talk about how much they would have done for her had she chosen a relationship with them. But she still ignores them. Stupid woman.

Like is so hard and so complicated and it can be so sad for some of us.
 
Aneeda72 said:
Wow, it is heartbreaking and sounds like despite all her challenges she is trying her best to do her best. When I hear these stories I always so torn because this could have been me if I had not recognized, early on, the danger I was in from my horrific childhood. Such childhoods are so hard to overcome.

I let my mother have access to my children, but she actually did not want much access. She was more interested in my brother’s kids. I do find it amusing that his children give her the brush off, where my children talk about how much they would have done for her had she chosen a relationship with them. But she still ignores them. Stupid woman.

Like is so hard and so complicated and it can be so sad for some of us.
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What I want most for Collin is to learn healthy ways to cope, because, including by proxy, he'll have a lot to cope with. He's got a load to deal with now and he's not even 3. And, you know, this is just the beginning. And I can only focus on him bc I'm just one person but when you think about the millions of other kids in this very situation right now, it's overwhelming.
 
Murrmurr said:
And I can only focus on him bc I'm just one person but when you think about the millions of other kids in this very situation right now, it's overwhelming
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What I was thinking. TG, Colin has you. Many don’t have anyone.

Even mothers or fathers with a good solid background have difficulties raising kids. When I look back at myself at 25, boy oh boy, did I ever make mistakes. Tara is trying, at least.
 
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Jules said:
What I was thinking. TG, Colin has you. Many don’t have anyone.

Even mothers or fathers with a good solid background have difficulties raising kids. When I look back at myself at 25, boy of boy, did I ever make mistakes. Tara is trying, at least.
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I believe she is. It's unfortunate that she still puts her feelings first - she hasn't got her priorities straight - but she wants to do her best for them; she is trying, she just doesn't even know how to begin unraveling her own past and her mixed up feelings about it. To me, that's the sad part because she's not much use to her kids if that doesn't get squared away. And how can it if she doesn't have the proper resource?
 
Murrmurr said:
I believe she is. It's unfortunate that she still puts her feelings first - she hasn't got her priorities straight - but she wants to do her best for them; she is trying, she just doesn't even know how to begin unraveling her own past and her mixed up feelings about it. To me, that's the sad part because she's not much use to her kids if that doesn't get squared away. And how can it if she doesn't have the proper resource?
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I feel you are overly pessimistic about her. A lot of people in her life probably are and that makes it even worst for her. Until you have walked in her shoes, you have no ideal how hard her life is. And it’s million times harder than you think.

As far as unraveling her past, and mixed up feelings about it, hmm, that is rarely achieved, if ever. I am 74, still have mixed feelings about my past, still haven’t unraveled a lot, and I will die without closure or completely understanding. She is very young to have so much to deal with. Give her the benefit of the doubt.

Try walking in her shoes. Even if she loses the children again, she is trying her best; that’s all she can do. Is try and try again. That’s all anyone can do. IMO, people are judging her too harshly. Do not let your wanting Collin influence you, walk in her shoes. How do you think you would have done?
 
Aneeda72 said:
I feel you are overly pessimistic about her. A lot of people in her life probably are and that makes it even worst for her. Until you have walked in her shoes, you have no ideal how hard her life is. And it’s million times harder than you think.

As far as unraveling her past, and mixed up feelings about it, hmm, that is rarely achieved, if ever. I am 74, still have mixed feelings about my past, still haven’t unraveled a lot, and I will die without closure or completely understanding. She is very young to have so much to deal with. Give her the benefit of the doubt.

Try walking in her shoes. Even if she loses the children again, she is trying her best; that’s all she can do. Is try and try again. That’s all anyone can do. IMO, people are judging her too harshly. Do not let your wanting Collin influence you, walk in her shoes. How do you think you would have done?
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I'm not criticizing her, I feel sorry for her because I know she won't get the help she needs bc she can't, and I know she's an unhappy person and I truly wish she could be happy, especially since that would be obvious to the kids; it would spill over.

I'm too old to raise a child. I just want Collin to be healthy and happy. Tara is trying her best, I'm just saying it's unfortunate she doesn't have the kind of help she really needs. Right now I'm it, but I'm basically a bandaid, or more like a respite, and that's not gonna to cut it for the long haul. This will end at some point fairly soon, I'm sure.
 
These foot cramps have been waking me up every morning lately, anywhere from 3 to 6am. Man, they hurt. At least they don't last long. I figured out months ago that if I put on my shoes or hard-soled slippers and walk around for a few minutes and then sit in a firm chair, it goes away pretty quickly. I used to roll around in agony for 10 to 20 minutes. That still happens if I don't manage to get my shoes on quick enough, before my feet and toes start curling up. The pain is almost unbearable then.

It starts with a minor back spasm, then a feeling of extreme heat sort of drizzles down to my hip, like a little lava flow. Then the calf of my leg, or sometimes both legs start twitching and that's when I jump outa bed to put my shoes on, because what happens next is horrible cramps in my feet. They start curling weirdly, slowly turning sole-side up, and my toes bend backwards. Looks freaky and it's extremely painful. I was prescribed muscle relaxers for it but they don't work. I think that's because it's a nerve thing, not entirely a muscle thing.

But it stopped now, so I'm gonna go back to bed. Collin's coming to visit till Sunday. I went and bought us some water-based paint, brushes, and a couple of poster boards and a big sketch pad. He loves to draw and he's pretty good at it, but this will be his first experience with paint.

😴
 

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