TELL ME ABOUT IT

Dear Carolyn: I have been caretaker of my granddaughter and her siblings since birth, since both parents work.

My daughter-in-law and son are newly divorced. It came (fell) out of my mouth: “Mommy doesn’t love Daddy, that’s why she bought another house.”

You can guess what happened next. Yes, I am to blame for the strife to our son, but deep down, I don’t regret it. I feel liberated. It came out when I was explaining why she shouldn’t be calling her father bad names and why she needed to be nice to him.

Now my son and daughter-in-law are furious at me, since their 6-year-old refuses to go to her new house. My daughter-in-law is threatening to keep the grandkids from me. He’s still in love with her and clearly hurting.

Despite this “event” and the strife it caused, I feel at peace. I feel free, not “blanketed” and not living a lie.

Will this cost me my grandchildren?

– Grandma

Grandma: It might cost you your grandchildren, yes, and rightly so if you continue to be unrepentant. Your self-satisfied treachery has harmed a small child’s view of her parents – both of them – and therefore of herself, since seeing their parents as lovable is integral to small children’s sense of their own lovability.

So you bought “peace” expense.

I find that horrifying, and, operating only from the facts you gave me, I wouldn’t trust you to be around my children anymore without supervision. Not unless you acknowledged to me without equivocation 1. that you put your own vindication above their mental health, and 2. that you’d never do that again. for yourself at your grandchild’s