Grandparenting Roundtable

There are over 70 million grandparents in the US , and each month 75,000 more join the club! Join us to discuss why grandparents and grandchildren need each other now more than ever!

Kerry Byrne, PhD, Founder
The Long Distance Grandparent

kerry@thelongdistancegrandparent.com 

Donne Davis, Founder
GaGa Sisterhood  

donnedavis@gagasisterhood.com 

Link to Podcast

Questions Asked

• How do we measure parents well-being? my daughter and her husband, have 3 little ones, 3, 2, and 6 months. our son-in-law has shut down since the youngest was born and won’t communicate with us. Our daughter does but I feel she is carrying a heavy load. My husband is not yet welcome to visit them and hasn’t met the youngest.  this is a long-distance family. the youngest child is 6 months.
• How do you help grandparents at a distance understand  LGBTQIA+ issues in their grandkids? What resources do you recommend about non-binary and trans grandkids? And then when there is dementia and grandparents can't remember pronouns? Teenagers for LGBTQIA+ question
• Would like to know what impact the spike in housing costs has had on families.   Have young parents and their kids been forced to FLEE high costs markets or made the decision to return to hometown to be closer to grandparents?  For years, the housing community has been talked about Generation Priced Out — have new intergenerational households reversed that trend during the pandemic?

Chat Transcript

00:40:47    Steve Gurney - ProAging Community:    From Donne Davis - GaGa Sisterhood to All Panelists 12:03 PM

<—Half Moon Bay , Ca

00:40:57    Steve Gurney - ProAging Community:    From Donne Davis - GaGa Sisterhood to All Panelists 12:02 PM

Hello~~ I am taking the time to join this discussion as I have grandchildren from 5- 21. I am just back from visiting my oldest grand daughter, 19, who rows for Southern Methodist University and observed a lot of things!!

00:43:30    Steve Gurney - ProAging Community:    https://thelongdistancegrandparent.com/

00:46:15    Steve Gurney - ProAging Community:    https://www.gagasisterhood.com/

00:51:05    Susan Albert:    I've got 3 grandkids in Michigan and 2 in Virginia. (I'm in PA) Ages 1-7. The Portal has been an incredible way to connect with them.  We can talk, sing songs and read stories. Since the younger ones rarely sit still, the Portal's camera follows them. so they're always in view.

00:55:23    Steve Gurney - ProAging Community:    Our positive aging champion in the spotlight this month is MD Relay Jenny Pearson | Hamilton Relay | Maryland Relay Captioned Telephone Outreach Coordinator

O: 410.767.0969 | C: 443-280-4535 | Jenny.Pearson@HamiltonRelay.com

01:00:31    Joe Sperling:    One thing a grandparent can do is arrange for a whole life policy to be issued on their grandchild. Very different than term life insurance. A meaningful way to encourage financial consciousness and responsibility as the child grows into adulthood.

01:01:53    Steve Gurney - ProAging Community:    The Mindful Grandparent: The Art of Loving Our Children's Children https://www.amazon.com/Mindful-Grandparent-Loving-Childrens-Children/dp/1506468063

01:01:58    Gail Crockett:    I have a collection of plastic pins. One grouping is animals and we play what is the animal and what sound does it make. One grouping is princesses (for girl grandchild). Another grouping is Sesame Street characters and asking who is that. I get asked to bring up the princesses and also to do the animals. Now this granddaughter is a big sister and the 10 month old was mesmerized by the colorful pins as well.

01:05:01    Gail Crockett:    I can show the pins, also I cut out a cheap version of the Sesame Street character I didnt  have as Chloe asked where that one was and put it in plastic so I could show the one I didn't have. So you could put things in hard plastic like the animals or dinosaurs or hot wheels what ever.

01:06:15    Steve Gurney - ProAging Community:    Generations United https://www.gu.org/explore-our-topics/multigenerational-households/

01:06:52    Gail Crockett:    Also if parents ok. Think about giving a piece of stock in something that an older child might be interested in like a share of Mattel or Disney, etc. Especially good if that piece of stock or several pays a dividend. Can be followed and teach finances.

01:08:35    Steve Gurney - ProAging Community:    The Sacred Work Of Grandparents Raising Grandchildren https://www.amazon.com/Sacred-Work-Grandparents-Raising-Grandchildren/dp/1452536759/ref=sr_1_1?crid=1ZEONSD53EZ3D&keywords=the+sacred+work+of+grandparents+raising+grandchildren&qid=1663173308&sprefix=the+sacred+work+of+grandparents+raising+grandchildren,aps,47&sr=8-1

01:10:11    Steve Gurney - ProAging Community:    From Donne Davis - GaGa Sisterhood to All Panelists 12:18 PM

I am so very worried about our children today. AARP has a lot of information on our grandchildren. They report 1 out of 10 grands consider suicide. While at SMU I saw every student holding onto their phone, constantly checking them, while have multiple conversations. These are conservations that go nowhere, are cut short, not thought out…all to the goal of staying connected, popular, seeing where everyone els is/doing.

01:11:05    Susan Hirst:    As a former member of Kerry's LDG group, I can highly recommend this group for providing ideas, inspiration and understanding of the long distance relationship I have with my two grandkids.

01:13:01    Bill Wendel:    CROWDSOURCING:  How is inflation impacting grand parenting?  Are gParents on fixed incomes being forced to choose between meeting living expenses and traveling to visit their gKids?  For those in the same city, are rising costs undermining your ability to be as generous or creative as you'd like with activities or adventures?  How are your coping or co-creating solutions — for example, with grandparent lending libraries?

01:16:07    Jennifer Brown:    P-Flag

01:17:10    Jennifer Brown:    https://pflag.org/

01:17:19    Steve Gurney - ProAging Community:    The Grand Life: Wholehearted Grandparenting https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-grand-life-wholehearted-grandparenting/id1455741511

01:18:50    Steve Gurney - ProAging Community:    https://www.gagasisterhood.com/gaga-sisterhood-events/ Nov 13 – Author Cristina Spencer will present a workshop “Navigating Gender in the New World.” She’ll explain what we’re learning about gender and provide some basic vocabulary for understanding today’s gender fluidity.

01:20:13    Steve Gurney - ProAging Community:    https://www.gagasisterhood.com/meetup-information/

01:26:36    Peter Engstrom:    Outstanding information from you Steve and your panel.  Would recommend your audience look at our national website for the Village to Village Network.  We have over 400 virtual villages across the US. A frequent topic is grandparenting.  There are many resources available at the web site.  All free.  For detailed info contact  our Director, Barbara Sullivan.  She is a great resource for this topic.  website is vtvnetwork.org.

01:30:28    Jean-Marie Minton:    LOL - guerilla research on how grandchildren think…

01:31:47    Jean-Marie Minton:    We are seeing that in the real estate sector, multi-generational rquests

01:33:42    Jean-Marie Minton:    This has been so valuable. Thank you Steve, Kerry and Donne.

01:34:55    Kim Cockerham:    Thank you!

01:35:11    Susan Albert:    Thanks for this excellent presentation!!

01:35:23    DONALD BURK:    Thank you.  Excellent!

01:35:49    Gail Crockett:    Thanks a great presentation. I look forward to connecting to keep better ideas going on how to long distance grandparent.

01:36:09    Gregory Fenlon:    Thanks very much all for such an insightful discussion.

01:36:13    Jennifer Late:    Thank you for a great conversation today!