Maternal grandmother vs. paternal grandmother

I’ve always been the only grandmother to all of my grandchildren. I’m not someone that was ever desperate to spend time with them when they were babies and certainly didn’t want the responsibility of being left alone with them; too much of a worrier. Don’t understand this ‘bonding’ stuff (even with parents, let alone grandparents). But there was a huge difference in my role as grandmother with my daughter’s children and my sons. Right from the start I found DIL’s family were made much more welcome than I was. By just accepting the situation and keeping my head down we have a good relationship now but, at the beginning, I did feel very hurt. But I guess all families are different and so are situations.

My grandchild was born and lives 1000 miles away from me. We see each other in person for 2 weeks per year... since birth.
Yes I miss/missed out a lot when they were small, but now runs to me at the airport and I get the biggest hug!!
You hopefully will have a couple of decades to 'bond'... don't carry this tally in your heart... you will be the loser....

Maternal grandmother vs. paternal grandmother

Honestly, it's not a boxing match!
You're making it sound like one - 'and in the red corner we have paternal grandmother, in the blue corner maternal grandmother'
'In the white corner is the referee, Baby, who will remain neutral.'

Seconds out.... and... box!

The seconds have gone off to the pub together, wondering what's wrong with their wives. One was heard to mutter "It's only a little baby", the other whispered "Shh, Jack, they'll hear you".

I didn't have any direct competition from the other grandparents because one set lived in the US and were much older, and the others lived in Hungary. That said I have always had a closer relationship with DD and her boys than I have with DiL and hers.

My older grandson has a very close bond with his other nan, and I'm happy about it.

It's quite touching to see them together.

Ladies, thank you for your insightful comments. I understand many of you have difficulty understanding why I feel as I do. And that's ok, you're not in my position, but it is the way with sons and I have 3.
I do appreciate those of you who understand and have posted helpful thoughts to live by.
I have never let my feelings be known to my sons or their wives or the maternal grandmothers - who I am very good friends with, it is not of their doing, it is how I choose to react - you have left me with excellent thoughts to live by ... and so I shall!

Again, thank you!

Well as both a paternal and maternal grandparent my first question is :

How often did you see and spend time with your son and dil before the baby arrived ?

And my second question would be :

How close is your relationship to your son?

Because those two things should be the starting point for contact and closeness after baby as well. If dil and her mother were close all along and you enjoyed a visit every few months to see your son or less - then that same sort of frequency should be expected post baby as well. I’m not saying that’s the case for you , but sometimes grandparents who were perfectly content with the occasional visit before children think a baby being born resets the
Established relationship. It does not. So I’d make sure that you weren’t doing that.

Beyond that I’d do my best to stop keeping score. As we all told our kids , life is not fair and fair is not equal. Work to better your relationship to your son and his family , as you see fit. Slowly increase visits to the family if that is what you want but focus on that - visiting and being close to the family. Not just on getting your hands on alone time with their baby.

Oh dear I hit post before I was done.

It’s possible that if your relationship to son and dil gets closer you may be asked to look after the baby at some point but even if not , it’s entirely psa me to have a lovely relationship with the grands without being a caregiver as well.

M0nica

It shouldn't be maternal grandparent v paternal grandparent. I always describe DDiL's mother as my companion grandmother. She lives round the corner from her daughter and my son and was a lot of help when the DGC were small.

We live 200 miles away, so day to day care, was never a possibiity, but I have ever felt cut out, we just ploughed our own furrow and developed our own relationship with our 2 DGC. I taught DGD to sew, we go on fanily holidays. I have provided instant help a couple of times in emergencies, my companion grandmother was well into her 70s when DGC were born and is now nearly 90,

Do not compete, offer a different relationship.

Perfectly said and a wonderful attitude to take

Judithjack1, I totally understand how you feel, and it's all completely natural. Having had (have) a very good, close relationship with our DS and DiL, we saw no reason why, when our first GC arrived, that we should be made to feel hurt/left out.

However, it wasn't our DS or DiL that made us feel this way, it was the maternal GM herself. We did get along quite well with her, for years, until GC arrived, but then she suddenly treated us as though our GC was nothing to do with us. At a time that should've been happy for all the family, she deliberately made us feel extremely awkward, and excluded. She has always been quite a bossy/intimidating person, and likes to have things her own way (even her own daughter recognises this). We decided to stand back and let her get on with it, as we didn't want to cause any upset to our DS & DiL by saying anything out of turn.

I hasten to add that our DS & DiL knew that we were always available if they needed anything/help in any way. And we always made ourselves useful when visiting by cooking meals and cleaning, etc. Of course, I understand that most DDs will gravitate towards their own mother when they have a baby, I have been in this situation myself, and I certainly never had any intentions to encroach on that. But, this behaviour from the maternal GM was totally uncalled for and out of order. Our son has since said that he realised what had happened and he wasn't happy about it, and he basically simply tolerates his MiL so as not to cause any upset to our DiL.

I guess, what I'm trying to say is that it's not necessarily the DiL who is making the paternal GPs feel left out of things. Sometimes, there's a driving force behind it all.

At one point, things did come to a head between maternal GM and myself. There had been so much upset caused by her, to both my DH and I, that I couldn't contain myself any longer, I simply had to say something. Not particularly proud of the fact, but something had to give. Thankfully, we managed to iron out our differences, and we now have a mutual respect for one another as grandmothers. We both do what we can to help out with the GCs when needed, and we both get called upon quite often (sometimes, too often!). Oh, and we both have a great relationship with our GCs. So, just be patient, it will happen!

I am a paternal grandmother and I have never felt left out or side lined. In fact I have spent more time with GC than DIL's parents ever have. They do live further away than me.

I'm both paternal and maternal grandmother.
I don't see DS and DIL's children as often as their other Granny does but see them often. As I said, I probably see her more than I see the DGC.
As maternal grandmother, well they see DGC more than we do simply because of logistics.

It's not a competition.

I have always got on well with my son & daughter in law so when Grandson arrived did not feel pushed out by them but did feel this way with other Grandmother. Since then she has proved to be the most objectionable person, having rowed to the extent with my DDiL that they no longer speak!
When my DG hugged me & told me I am the best Nan in the world made all the worrying about fitting in go away!

Judithjack1

Ladies, thank you for your insightful comments. I understand many of you have difficulty understanding why I feel as I do. And that's ok, you're not in my position, but it is the way with sons and I have 3.
I do appreciate those of you who understand and have posted helpful thoughts to live by.
I have never let my feelings be known to my sons or their wives or the maternal grandmothers - who I am very good friends with, it is not of their doing, it is how I choose to react - you have left me with excellent thoughts to live by ... and so I shall!

Again, thank you!

We've only daughters, no sons. However I believe one has to maintain a strong relationship with their own child, the one they raised to have any sort of relationship with their child's child. It's not down to the in law to allow 'bonding' (a daft idea if there ever was one). Where is your son in this conundrum?

Regardless, I'm sorry you're upset by the logistics with GC - wait it out, babies do grow up and don't have to be hovered over forever.

I love well over 2 hours away from my DGC. I'm the maternal grandmother and I have a really good relationship with my DD and SiL but the other set of grandparents see the DGC more because they live 20 minutes away. I went down for 5 days when my eldest dgs had chicken pox to care for him while his parents worked. I made myself useful cooking and freezing meals they could pull out of the freezer once I was back home. As the dgs's have got older I always send ice cream money when they have half terms or school holidays. They now refer to me as ice cream Nanny. They are very active dgc. When they come to visit I always have several activities lined up for them to do like rock climbing, skateboard park, swimming with shoots and flumes and painting a Xmas decoration which I then collect after it's been fired 2 weeks later then I take it down to them. Basically I make sure they have a lot of fun when they come to me, and they love my 2 dogs and 2 cats too, or I go to see them I take them to a farm park or aquarium. My DD has told me the dgs's get really excited when they know I'm going down to see them or they are coming to see me. When they were small I crawled around on the floor with them playing with their train track. They are coming on holiday with me and DH for the first time this year. I expect this will mean spending a lot of time in the water with them. I'm getting them little body boards to surf on. You will find your own relationship with the dgc. I know after coming down to see me last time my DD told them they were going to go to see my exh before going home and both boys moaned and said Grandad doesn't have any toys or nothing to do at his house. You will make your own relationship with your DGC. It will be different than the relationship the other grandparents have.

As my own mother died when I was 15 and by the time I had my first child I relied on my DMiL and had a really close loving relationship with her until she died when my eldest was 22. I know my circumstances are different to many, but I do believe we would have had a balanced relationship if my parents were still alive when my kids were long.

I am a maternal granny and an very closely bonded with my grandchild. That said the paternal grandparents live a long way distant and the Mum has health issues. Also they are closely involved with their single parent daughter who lives near to them. I think if they were nearer they'd do more but they seem fine with it. That said my young Mum neighbours parents do NOTHING to support her with two young children. They are wealthy so throw money at her but her husband's Dad is there all the time!

Just to confirm my relationship with my son: he and I have always been very close ... he is 8 years younger than my middle son and so therefore has experienced with his dad and I some of the grandparenting issues that comes with the title.

Nansnet, I do not know the other grandmother very well, but I do know that her opinion of her own in-laws was very low and that of her older daughter's was not respectful. I can only assume the feeling about my husband and i is following the same footprint, so to speak! I also know that they travel to my DIL's hometown at least 2 weekends a month for various family functions.

Regardless, my feelings and action are controlled by me and therefore I need to move on from this and focus on my life and my own happiness.

I've been given lots of opinions to think about and its very helpful.

Believe me ….it all comes out in the wash! Little babies grow up so quickly - so don’t fall out with family over this! It isn’t worth it because you will risk alienation from the whole family. There will be so many opportunities as your granddaughter grows up to enjoy ‘special’ times together. Be thankful with the fact that you have a healthy new granddaughter ……and move forward being you best self with your own life …..time has a way of changing everything.

The child will form a unique relationship with each grandparent - this is never a competition, unless you think yourself into one by counting hours spent, visits etc.

Learn to accept this. I rarely see my great-grandson, his other great-grandma sees him often as she lives closeby. It doesn't bother me, I still love him.

Whilst I agree “it’s how it is with paternal grandparents i think it is wrong especially if they are local to you , we love our grandchildren just as much as the maternal ones but we have to keep quiet at the risk of causing upset. I do think the dil should be more aware and try a little

It's not a competition stop making it one Find yourself another interest and make yourself a fulfilling life that doesn't revolve around baby point scoring I'm both maternal and paternal grandmother and have equally close relationships with all the grandchildren !