seek

My daughter, who is in her thirties now, was a teen mom. I only recently found out she is alcoholic, so while I was dealing with her as a teen mom, I thought she was simply immature - and I tried to educate her the way you would any child - so they have skills in the world.

Her son, my grandson, is now alcoholic.

We as a family (other siblings) have been dealing with a lot of stuff around his alcoholism from the initial crisis to rehab to now sober living and most recently court.

I have a pattern with my daughter of "forgetting" that I can't have a relationship with her. What I mean by that is that she will do something horrible and I will withdraw and then after awhile, she will seem "normal" (i.e., act functional) and I will subconsciously conclude she has grown up and is now safe to have a relationship with . . .wrong. But I keep falling for it because she can seem so rational at times and I must want to believe it is possible that we can have a relationship.

So I am noticing that and also why I became so "co-dependent" to her . . . since she was so young and immature, I had to step in and take care of my grandson and do all kinds of things I would not otherwise have had to do. When you have kids, you think if you "train them" (for lack of better term) on how to do certain things, they will become responsible adults.

Now, since she never did learn to take care of business, she obviously has not trained my grandson to take care of business, so I find myself wanting to tell him how to do certain things (like do a change of address to the post office so he will continue to get court notices and not mess up that way - he would never think of that or to file a tax return (he only started working last year and would not know he has to). He is 18, so legally an adult, but has received no life skills training and now is in trouble and is alcoholic - so it is a set-up for me wanting to advise him on certain things.

Some of this feels normal - that that is what a grandma should do (or a mom, but his mom is not going to do any of that) . . .on the other hand, it puts me in a bad position . . .it's kind of a lose-lose for me, because if I don't tell him any of this stuff, then I will just see the "natural consequences" and problems pile up and then will have to deal with more drama and trauma . . .

Tuffgirl

Seek, is your grandson open to your guidance? If so - I think it would be wonderful to learn how to "live" because if kids aren't taught - they tend to learn the hard way. But if he isn't open to the conversations, well, then you have to back off and let him live his life his own way.

I went through a similar situation yesterday with my 18 yr old...she is not an alcoholic, but same thing of trying to guide her and she shut me down. Oh well, she wasn't open to it yesterday but maybe some other time she will be. Or not. Either way, at 18 it is her choice now.

lillamy

It is so hard because you love this boy and you want to help him. You want to take the hits for him so that he doesn't have to. You want him to have a better life than his mother. And you've tried so hard.

My counselor talks about it as "the slot machine syndrome": We invest so much of ourselves in a relationship that we think that if we only do this, then maybe we'll hit the jackpot. Only ONE more quarter. And we think "what if I leave now and it's that next quarter that will make me rich?"

I think letting a child (albeit legally adult) fall on their face and take the natural consequences of their actions is harder than letting an adult (spouse) do it. And I hear that in what you're saying -- you're basically saying that "either, I try to deal with it NOW or I'll have to deal with a bigger mess later"...

The thing is... it's his mess, not yours. And that's the part that's so incredibly hard to accept. That he's going to make his own choices. That no matter how many times you save him, he can still make wrong choices. And every time we save them... they don't learn.

seek

Yes, I agree with you. It is my problem in that I cannot handle anymore heartache and grief and there is nothing I can do to stop it.