Grandmothers : An Essential Role

The problem is accentuated by the widening of the gap between rich and poor, that can be translated in this matter as an increase of difficulty for low-income families to have access to the much more expensive high quality day care options. There are several aspects that built such a controversial situation and the most important are certainly the cultural and economical ones. The huge growth in women’s independence and professional ambition, in addition to importance, of the last decades, caused the fall of the cultural basis that have always taken for granted the responsibility of the mother as the full-time caregiver (Chisholm 38). Now women are more willing to gain a successful and respectable place in society, and this can be achieved almost exclusively through hard work and full immersion in their jobs. Simultaneously, the economical situation of our society caused many families to depend on two incomes to satisfy the basic needs. In fact, the increase in the cost of living not sufficiently balanced by a relatively smaller rise in wages, and a greater attitude toward materialism and conspicuous consumption, have given women the same financial responsibility as men (Chilman 451). This aspect can be fully applied only on families with an average income or better, because professional daycare programs are pretty expensive and in some cases can reach prices higher than the minimum wage. Those factors

In today’s society more and more women are working outside of the homes and are not able to take care of the children on a full time bases. When the parents are unable to tend to their children, they have to seek help from an outside source. Years ago, it was natural for the mother of the children to stay at home and care for them while the father goes to work. But time has changed and there is a major increase in single parenting than before. Even in two parent homes, the mother has to work in order to maintain the house

I chose to interview my grandmother, Maryann Metzger. I chose her because she is probably one of the strongest people I know. I wanted to learn more about her childhood. After talking with her I realized that she may not remember a lot about women’s rights at that time but she does remember segregation. Through this I learned many things that I didn’t know before.

In this study, the authors Francine Conway, Carolyn Springer, Carol Magai and Samuel C. Jones analyze the results of optimism and pessimism in grandmothers who are the initial caregivers of their grandchildren. Researchers are trying to find if character traits such as optimism and pessimism have an outcome on the psychological and physical health of grandmothers who take care of their grandchildren. It seems that the intended audience is of an older crowd particularly those interested in studying cases similar to this article or having to do with psychological studies about personality traits. 67 Latino and African American grandmothers who are the essential caretakers for their grandchildren were the participants in this study. These grandmothers

Throughout growing up, grandparents become an important figure for many children. My grandparents impacted my life enormously through teaching me things as I grew up. I remember my Grandpa Farber impacting my life immensely, even though his time with me and my other cousins lasted a few years to short. He always made me laugh and he remained there when I needed him. Throughout his life and mine, he became the strongest and uttermost caring person that I knew. I endured his life coming to an end at the age of seven, but I cherish every day I got with him. Memories helped me to remember my grandpa through the great times we enjoyed and forget about the tough year of him battling cancer.

When one thinks of grandparents, they are usually compared to as being a wiser adult who has had various positive and negative life experiences and throughout it all managed to keep their family together. The family structure has changed and more grandparents are forced into parenting for second generation children. Raising second generation children can be difficult for the grandparents who have been forced into the role of becoming a primary caregiver. Most children have a loving and trusting relationship with their grandparents, but when the roles have been forced to change the environment changes as well. With the mass amount of changes happening to the family structure, it was necessary to assist these secondary grandparents in learning how to promote and advocate in their new roles as secondary parents. With the structural changes faced by African Americans, it was appropriate to use this group because of the barriers and challenges faced and it allows for a replication with other groups. African American women can become dominant in an unfamiliar setting, so limiting the size of the group was justifiable and allowed for more interaction and engagement among participants. Using the family system theory would be necessary because this theory places an emphasis on reciprocal relationships and mutual influences between the individual components (Barker, p. 157).

In Flannery O'Connor’s A Good Man is Hard to Find, a family trying to go on a trip to Florida plans and lives come to a tragic end because of one person in their family: Their manipulative Grandmother. Even though she says in the beginning “I wouldn't take my children in any direction with a criminal like that aloose in it” (O’Conner pg), she does the complete opposite of her word and leads them all in to the way of danger; The hands of the criminal, The Misfit. If she would have just stayed home, no one would have died in the end and the trip would have went as smoothly as it has before. Yet, the tragedy of their grandmother’s choices and commitment of many of the deadly sins are what lead them to their fates, and the grandmother to

Often time’s grandparents raising grandchildren face many challenges that are not easy for them to deal with. However, grandparents raise their grandkids willingly

Carole B. Cox explains the importance of focus to the needs and concerns of these grandparents that are increasingly growing and becoming more known and the lack of services that address this group’s unique strengths and abilities to cope with any and all problems that they may face while caring for their grandchildren such as: their own physical health, increase of depression and insomnia, economic costs, low incomes, discrimination already present due to history, communication within the family, behavioral problems, and legal and entitlement issues. A study was conducted to see if a program that focused on providing these grandparents with a way to become more empowered in their role as custodial parents in strengthening their parenting skills,

The one quality that I liked about the grandmother was that how kept up her appearance and how she conducted herself as a lady. She would carefully select her attire which includes a hat and dress these particular items would give her a virtue of being a lady. In my opinion sometimes, your appearance can determine how people may judge you as a person.   But in the grandmother case just because you look like a lady doesn’t mean you act like a lady.

The interview with the Harrisons associates with some of the information that I’ve found within my research. According to Connidis (2010) about 55% of grandparents over the age of 50 have been taking care of their grandchildren for five or more years. There is an estimation of about 6.6 million children below the age of 18 who are living with their grandparent (P.S Storm & R.D Storm, 2011). In 75% of cases it was shown that it was mainly single grandmothers who take on the role of guardian with a little over 70% of them being less than 60 years old ( P.S Storm & R.D Storm,2011).

My Grandmother goes by the name of babunya, and baba for short, this means grandma in Ukrainian. She lived in Ukraine for most of her life, and she is almost 90 years old now. She’s been through a lot in her years, thus her appearance has changed. For every wrinkle she has there’s a story to match. She has had every color hair: blonde, red, brown, and black. Now her hair is a short gray color. She keeps it short because it stays out of the way, even though she hates it short. She has always had long her until now. She has also progressively become shorter over the years due to a very bad back; she now stands just under five feet. Since she spends most of her days in the garden her usual outfit

Why does this have to happen to the best of us. My grandma was and still is the greatest grandma ever.She gave me everything I could bargain for. She would take to amusement parks,And we would make sweets with my cousin and I would never want to leave.Also my most memorable Easter was with her and she gave me a stuffed bunny rabbit and at the time it was as big as me.She has given me a live fighting for.

When comparing this Critical commentary article to one we have already read this semester I have chosen to connect it to Charlotte Perkins. Perkins Talks about the women as a caregiver for her children and her husband, however, in this article “just over one-third of the 45 wives in- interviewed were heavily involved in providing emotive support and performing care tasks” (Fancey and Keefe,9). Even though there is a very few amount of wives who are continuing the role of caregiver, we are seeing many sons and daughters and loved ones who are stepping up in this role and taking over for their loved

From their appointments to their schooling, women are given the responsibility to take care of all of it while the man goes to college to get an education so he can support the family (108 Brady). I agree with the claim that women are expected by men to take care of all the children because women in society are believed to automatically be the caregivers just because they are the mothers. Since this essay was written, women’s roles have changed so drastically but this ideal that women are the mothers and sole caregivers is a common belief that still manifests itself in most society today. Society believes that since mothers give birth to the children that they are required to take care of the children despite the lack of scientific evidence to prove so; because of this misconception, women are forced to quit their jobs or take a long maternity leave in order to care for the children while the men get to continue living their lives as usual and continue pursuing their dreams and