Grandparents: How to Play an Active Role in Your Grandchildren’s Lives
Playing an active role in your grandchildren’s lives is a pleasure. It’s a good way to stay active and to have some light in your life.
Whether you live close to each other or you’re more of a long-distance grandparent, you can be involved in their lives in several different ways.
Both new grandparents and existing grandparents can take steps to build strong relationships that their grandchildren can treasure forever.
Play an Active Role in Grandchildren’s Lives
You need to put in the effort to play an active role in their lives, but it’s worth it to be there for them. Try these tips to make sure you can do it.
Take Care of Yourself
Accepting that you’re slowing down as you get older can be tricky. But there’s no denying that aging can affect you, even if you’re still fairly physically fit.
Taking care of yourself, both physically and mentally, puts you in the best position to play an active role in your grandchildren’s lives. Two simple things you can do are to get your vision and hearing tested.
The benefits of listening devices and even wearing glasses can really improve your quality of life. When you’re healthy and have more energy, you can be there for your grandchildren.
Be Present
Being there for your grandchildren is a must if you want to be a big part of their lives. It doesn’t matter if you live near them or far away, you can still be in their lives in ways that work for you.
If you live close enough, visiting often or having them visit you is obviously easier. But you can also use video calls and other forms of contact to stay in touch with each other.
If you live far away, you could try and focus on longer visits so that you can still spend lots of time together.
Support Your Grandchildren
One of the benefits of being a grandparent is that you can be extra support for your grandchildren outside of their parents. You can talk to them about various issues and be a confidante for them.
As someone older, and hopefully wiser, you can have a lot of good advice to share with them. By being an active listener, you can ensure communication between you is open and that they have the support that they need.
Talk about their thoughts and feelings, as well as your own, to create a deeper relationship.
Celebrate the Big Moments
One of the most important roles of grandparents is definitely to spoil their grandchildren, especially on special occasions.
Celebrating the milestones in their lives, from birthdays to graduations, first jobs, or other achievements, is a great way to make your presence known.
You can send gifts or visit, attending any events like birthday parties. Even if you can’t be there for all events, you can still make a video call or get in touch in other ways.
All grandparents can play an active role in their grandchildren’s lives if they want to. A little effort can go a long way.
