Care and Feeding is Slate’s parenting advice column. Have a question for Care and Feeding? Submit it here or post it in the Slate Parenting Facebook group.
Dear Care and Feeding,
My fiancé passed away late last year, leaving behind two adult children and several grandchildren, all of whom live out of state. My fiancé regularly sent his grandchildren Christmas presents, and cash gifts (so-called “Grandpa dollars”) on each grandchild’s birthday. He took such pleasure in sending them these gifts! So, striving to do what I believe he would have wanted me to do, I sent each grandchild a Christmas gift last year, and I’ve been continuing his practice of sending the grandchildren gifts of cash of their birthdays, signing my name to the card but adding the note, “In loving memory of your Grandpa.”
But not one of the grandchildren has personally thanked me, either via phone or text, and I’m feeling very slighted. I do receive a text from one parent of a grandchild (not my fiancé’s adult child, however) acknowledging that the gift has been received. The grandchildren range in age from third grade to middle school. Am I being unreasonable to expect them to thank me? I was raised to understand that if you’re old enough to spend the money, use a phone, or know how to write a sentence and sign your own name, you’re responsible for your own thank-yous. Should I not expect this? Would it be appropriate for me to say something to one or both of my late fiancé’s children? Or should I simply discontinue the gift-giving without explaining why?
—Feeling Generous but Slighted
Dear Feeling,
I’ll make a confession: I don’t like it when I’m not thanked for a gift either. It leaves me feeling uncared for and unappreciated (and even foolish for taking the time to pick out something I believe the recipient would especially enjoy). So I understand, on a deep gut-level, why you’re unhappy: repeatedly bestowing gifts and not being thanked for them is a drag. But (you knew this was coming, didn’t you?) you have been giving these gifts for a specific reason—to honor the memory of the man you loved, to keep up a tradition that meant a great deal to him, to do what you say you believe he would have wanted you to do. Continuing this practice would be posthumous gift to him, whether his grandchildren send thank-you notes or not.
You don’t mention whether they thanked him when he sent gifts (perhaps you don’t know). My guess is that they didn’t, and it didn’t bother him (lots of people don’t mind this! Don’t ask me why!). But they might have. They might have been more inclined to write thank-you notes to someone they’d known all their lives and loved very much—someone they had a deep-rooted relationship with. Or their parents might have insisted they do so—and they are not insisting now.
Finally: I must deliver the bad news to you that many, if not most, children are not raised the way you were. Their parents do not teach them to write thank-you notes; they do not insist they do (they seem to think it’s old-fashioned, a nice but outdated custom). This is not to let these kids—or, more to the point, their parents—off the hook, just to say that, alas, this is how things are.
The bottom line? Keep sending gifts without expecting to be thanked, or stop sending gifts (and do not explain why, because that “explanation” would be designed only to make these children and their parents feel guilty—which is certainly not what your fiancé would have wanted). I do not think it’s appropriate to split the difference: send gifts, but also “say something.” It is not your job to teach good manners to the adult children of their late father.
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Dear Care and Feeding,
I have a newborn daughter and a toddler son. I lost both my parents before either was born, and the only remaining grandparent they have is my husband’s father, an, err, eccentric roaming nomad who uprooted his life after the death of his wife. He has met neither of my children and it remains a sore spot for me as I mourn my parents and the wonderful grandparents they would have been to my kids, just as they were to my nieces and nephew. I think having elders in a child’s life is important, though, and so my brother-in-law’s parents have been more than happy to swoop in.
My BIL’s parents send typical cheesy holiday cards and gifts to my kids, things like matchy outfits, and refer to themselves with cutesy grandparent names, but I find myself struggling to accept this on several levels. First, it feels a bit…unearned? They live too far away to do any babysitting or help in any other way, and even when they visit, their health issues keep them from being as hands-on with the children as real grandparents would be. Honestly, I like them fine for brief visits, but they are very traditional and not the affectionate, funny, and worldly people my parents were. As much as they ask me for pictures of my children, and want to visit often, I have a gnawing resentment that they are here and my parents are not.
And then there’s this: they give my kids small gifts, while I know my niece—their actual grandchild—stands to inherit a lot of money from them (several million dollars, in fact). We are comfortable and don’t need their financial help, but it irks me that they swoop in, playacting as grandparents for the fun of it, and bragging about my kids to their friends and congregation, but we have no idea if they intend for my kids to inherit anything. Can I get a reality check here? Am I holding them to the lofty standards of the memory of my parents or does it read like these people are getting the grandparent experience on the cheap?
—Mourning Mama
Dear MM,
I’m deeply sorry about the loss of your parents—that’s a terrible blow—but I’m afraid your grief does not excuse your awfulness. These people are stepping (not swooping!) in and offering your children love. “Small” gifts or not, inclusion in their wills or not, getting down on the floor to play with them or not, they want to be a part of your children’s lives. The more love and kindness, the more pleasure taken in their very existence, the better. The reality check here is manifold: yes, it’s a great pity your parents aren’t alive to be the grandparents you wanted for your children—and sure, I understand how pissed off you are by your father-in-law’s uninvolvement (though it sounds to me like he’s neck-deep in his own mourning, so maybe cut him some slack)—but this bonus set of grandparents is a gift. In fact, anyone who wants to be a part of your children’s lives, who pays attention to them, who widens the circle of love around them, is a gift. Don’t be churlish about this because it isn’t precisely the gift you have in mind.
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From this week’s letter, My Kids Have Been Playing a Very Weird Game of Deception at School: “They insist that I have ruined their social lives. I am mystified.”
Dear Care and Feeding,
My 38-year-old husband passed away four months ago of a brain aneurysm—here and seemingly healthy one minute, gone the next. Of course everyone is shocked and heartbroken. What no one knows is that he and I were early in the process of divorcing.
For the last year he had been much more distant, taking on significantly more work-related travel and stepping back his involvement with our 4-year-old son and 5-year-old daughter even when he was at home (before that, he had always been great with them). When I tried to talk to him about this, he would deny that anything had changed. Two months before his death, during a particularly cold and disconnected weekend at home, I told him I wanted us to start seeing a counselor if he wouldn’t talk to me. He told me that he didn’t feel any romantic love towards me anymore, more like just familial connection/obligation, and that it wouldn’t be fair to me for him to agree to counseling when he already knew he would like us to divorce.
We made an appointment with a lawyer and started the divorce process, with him taking full responsibility for the split and basically giving me everything, plus generous child support and majority custody. He said he was finding fatherhood very different than he had expected and that he’d been traveling so much more for work specifically so it wouldn’t be such a big change for the kids when he moved out. I strongly suspect (and have some pretty good evidence) that he had started a relationship with one of his coworkers, though he denied that when I directly asked him.
My whole world was shattered by all of this. But of course now that he’s gone, everyone thinks I’m a grieving widow, not the wronged, soon-to-be ex-wife. I’ve moved from sad and upset to angry at him for blowing up our life. At every gathering, he is talked about wistfully, with his family going on about what a great partner and father he was, and I’m finding it increasingly difficult to listen to this. My last memories of him are of him coldly telling me he felt nothing for me anymore and didn’t have much interest in being involved in our kids’ lives going forward. I’m afraid this will burst out of me while I sit there listening to his parents gush about how much “he would’ve enjoyed being here for this” at one of our kids’ events. Would it be cruel to tell them what happened? Do I need to just deal with it and let them have their untarnished version/memory of their son? I know I don’t ever want my kids to know the truth—I’d prefer to leave them with nothing but happy loving memories of their father—so I’m thinking that means I need to find a way to keep it to myself with everyone. For what it’s worth, my kids and I are on waitlists for therapy, but I’m told it will probably be a few more months to get in.
—Grieving the Marriage, Not the Death
Dear Grieving,
I’m glad you’re on a waiting list for therapy. You’re going to need help carrying this burden and making peace with it. In the meantime, I understand your desire to protect your children, but I believe you should rethink your determination to keep their father’s imperfectness a secret forever. I see no reason for you to tell them everything about what happened in the year before his death, but I don’t think there’s any harm in your letting them know (eventually, and gradually) that their father was complicated—and, like all of us, flawed. I also think that pretending, for the rest of your life, that everything was perfect between you two will do you so much harm that it’s not a reasonable goal. How much should you tell them? I don’t know. But you have plenty time to figure this out (they are still so young!).
For now, while you’re waiting to see a therapist, think about who among your friends or your own family you might be able to speak freely to, because I think you’re going to explode if you have to keep silent. I think it would be cruel to tell his grieving family any of this—particularly this soon after his death; perhaps ever (you don’t have to decide this now). If it’s hard for you to spend time with them (I can imagine it would be), limit it as much as you can: have the children spend time with them without you. It’s the least you can do for yourself right now.
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Dear Care and Feeding,
Low stakes question here. I have a “no toys that make noise” policy for my kids. My otherwise lovely in-laws tend to play a bit loose with this rule, but last Christmas was beyond the pale. They got my 3-year-old an honest-to-God bagpipe, claiming that because it’s an “instrument” and not a “toy,” it did not violate this rule. Like I said, my in-laws are fabulous and I don’t intend to blow up our relationship over a loud toy. BUT. I am a fastidious thank-you note writer, and I need a script for saying, “I am going through the social nicety of writing this note even though I am zero percent happy about this present and would like you to not repeat this gesture.” It is, of course, March, and my MIL has noticed that she has not received my thank-you note yet. I write them frequently enough that not sending one at all will seem odd. Advice?
—Miffed in the Midwest
Dear Miffed,
I am of multiple minds. My first mind is: Those are some sly (and pretty funny) grandparents. My second: Hmm, are they being funny? Or are they just yanking your chain for their own amusement? Or do they truly and somberly think your rule is silly (i.e., that children should be allowed to make all the news they want, or some such thing)? Is this a power struggle between you and them? (My second mind has a lot of subsections.) But my third mind, honestly, is: What is your policy regarding instruments? Are (all) instruments noise-making toys? I assume this particular bagpipe was a small-child-friendly one. Will your no-noise-producing gifts policy change as your child gets older? Would you be angry if, when the kid is 6 or 7, the grandparents’ gift is an electronic keyboard?
But to answer the question you pose at the end of your letter: If you want your in-laws to know you’re not pleased with their gift, skip the thank-you note altogether this time. If they’re accustomed to getting one, this will send the clear message that you’re displeased without your having to spell it out. You are not grateful for this gift, so I hereby (as a dedicated thank-you note writer and, as noted above, thank-you note advocate) offer you dispensation from saying that you are.
—Michelle
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