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Parenting

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Original poster

Grandparents disciplining grandchildren

4 replies

HettyMeg · 01/07/2022 22:05

A friend has three kids and the eldest (5) is at an age where he's testing boundaries. Thing is, his parents don't seem to be getting a chance to discipline as MIL does it for them! Noticed this at a family meal for her birthday recently. Telling him off when she perceives him to be misbehaving (he wasn't, IMO) while his parents are sat right there. The kid looked visibly upset and my friend didn't seem to notice. I find this pretty odd and a bit toxic. Is this normal for grandparents??

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MammaWeasel · 01/07/2022 22:07

Not in my experience....
Our kids' grandparents were more likely to cajole, persuade/dissuade or make excuses for negative behaviour and praise them to the heavens when they were even half right.

AnneLovesGilbert · 01/07/2022 22:08

Are the parents very young or lacking in confidence? It doesn’t sound healthy and it must be confusing for the children.

User354354 · 01/07/2022 22:09

Depends on the relationship of each one.

Personally, my parents looked after DC when they were younger, so took on that role when I wasn't there. I guess they found it hard not to do the same when I was there. I never took much notice, it took the strain off me a bit. Takes a village and all that.

The positive is my parents and DP and I have similar parenting styles, so the same things are acceptable and unacceptable to us.

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Maray1967 · 14/02/2023 21:33

PIL tried to get involved in discipline when DS1 was 7 and we were on holiday with them. Nothing major, but telling him off while we were there. DH stepped up straightaway and they backed off. There’s no way I would allow it and DS hated it. Even though I’d told him off as well he was happy to walk with me but pulled on my hand to try to hold us back from PIL as he didn’t want to walk with them afterwards. That made me realise that they’re fine with a telling off from parents but when we’re there with them there’s no place for it from the grandparents. Mine never did it when I was a kid - they were the ones to talk gently to us after we’d had parental discipline - I loved my Grandad doing that.
PIL also tried to do it with DS2 when he was tired and hungry and worried about whether there would be anything he liked to eat at the restaurant we were at in France. Took all my strength of mind to focus on calming him down, and sent a sharply worded text to DH to get them to shut up.

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