Healing bittersweet legacies: Revisiting contextual family therapy for grandparents raising grandchildren in crisis

Journal of Marital and Family Therapy, Apr 2000 by Brown-Standridge, Marcia D, Floyd, Caroline Walters

Roe, Minkler, and Barnwell's (1994) qualitative research of 71 African-American caretaking grandmothers associated with the crack-cocaine epidemic found that they intimated a loss of freedom and the feeling of being cheated by their adult children. They disclosed their sense of moving backward in life since they had to quit work to become full-time parents. Nevertheless, these grandmothers saw their grandchildren as a chance to rectify past parenting mistakes.

Kelley (1993) discovered that 56% of grandparent respondents encounter financial difficulties due to taking on grandchild care and legal protections. Of the 4,700 grandparents requesting help from the AARP Grandparent Information Center in 1996, 39%. earned $20,000 or less, and 41 % made between $20,000 and $40,000. Especially expensive were legal issues around grandchildren whose medical care required intervention by the State.

No controlled studies exist to compare the physical/emotional complaints of seniors who are primary caretakers of grandchildren with those who are not. However, Burton's (1992) qualitative investigation of 60 caretaking African-American grandmothers, grandfathers, and great-grandmothers found that 86% attributed their feelings of depression or anxiety to parenting stress; 61 % conceded their increased smoking, 36% owned up to increased alcohol consumption, and 35% pointed to aggravated arthritis or diabetes. Half of the 71 African-American grandmothers studied by Minkler and associates. (1992) self-identified as needing more than the usual amount of health care for their age. They were inclined to trace their emotional and physical degeneration to watching the deterioration of adult children (due to drugs or illness) at the same time they were caring for extended family members and grandchildren.

Grandchildren

Studies of grandchildren in grandparenting systems have largely been indirect by tapping grandparents' knowledge about them. However, Solomon and Marx ( 1995), using a sample of 17,110 children through the 1988 National Children's Health Supplement study, determined that 86% of those in nuclear families were viewed as more successful academically by their teachers than children raised by grandparents. Students from "intact" homes were less likely to repeat a grade: School performance did not differ among children living with a grandparent versus those with one biological parent in single-parent/blended families, and the former actually had fewer behavioral problems. Academic differences may have been the consequence of changing schools, school absences, or seeing parents as interfering with concentration. Living arrangements apparently did not pose a significant health advantage one way or the other.

Based on case anecdotal data only; grandchildren who rely upon grandparents may go through intense emotional and behavioral adjustments at home (deToledo & Brown, 1995). Adamant attempts are often made to defy authority and strain limit setting. They may also try to push grandparents away since they feel others have abandoned them. Their inner feelings reflect a chaotic struggle over grief, guilt, anger, fear, anxiety, embarrassment, or hopefulness for the parents' return. Excessive clinging, sleeping/eating disorders, regressive behavior, limits testing, manipulation, and wanting to contact parents are common reactions. If a grandchild has been sexually abused, exposed to pornography, or has observed a parent with various partners, there may be sexual acting out with other children.