Dear LPG

When we look at the animal kingdom in general the female of the species is so often allocated the task of looking after the young and, when it comes to humankind, the situation appears to be no different.  

I am a man in every possible way, but I must admit that mothers and grandmothers seem to do more for their offspring than most men.  And while there appear to be fathers who continue to be ‘new men’ in western society, that tends not to stretch to the next generation up.

I started to think about this when a younger female friend mentioned the things her grandfather used to do for her siblings and herself, and that, now she is a mother, she misses because her parents do not live near enough.  I remember my sister saying the same thing not so long ago because we had a grandfather who chose not to do anything.

Grandmas are asked to babysit at short notice and they usually do it unreservedly, the ones that drive tend to do even more as they travel further, doing chores such as having the children over the holidays.  My respect goes out to Grandmas.

Some men do things for the grandchildren, but unless they are travelling together, I have heard many more stories of Nans travelling from faraway to visit their grandchildren in the UK while granddads stay put, saying ‘If the children want to see me, they can come and visit.’

But there are sometimes other reasons which force the issue and the situation is close to home for me.  The statistics can be somewhat coloured, because it appears that if a split or marital separation presents itself between Grandma and Grandpa, even grownup children will often side with their mothers and all but lose contact with their fathers.  I know of situations where a man’s son or daughter forces loss of contact with grandchildren, spiting them because of a parental marriage breakdown.  Children are often likely to side with their mothers resulting in the grandfathers who never get the opportunity to see their grandchildren.

Most men are more sentimental than women.  We are more likely to take things in our stride and accept such situations in spite of how mad they make us feel.  We are more likely to hope that such things will work themselves out but I am troubled because I know too many grandfathers who can relate to what I have said. 

Perhaps I am calling for parents to remember that they are also children and that both parents are often willing to help out even if they are no longer together.

Rudy Morgan.