By Karen Best Wright, www.RaisingYourGrandchildren.com
This is a very important and hot topic and one that has both sides upset about it. I do not have any good answers, but I have my opinions on the topic. I am not for blanket grandparent visitation rights. It actually makes no sense to me. Just because my daughter and her husband have children does not give me inherent rights to them. (Now if they were to turn them over to me to raise, I would have different feelings and beliefs). Ideally, people should love each other and want to have bonding relationships together. But obviously life is not ideal for many.
Since I am a grandmother raising grandchildren, you would think I would be admittedly for grandparent visitation rights. But I am not. It is not that simple. I am in favor of whatever is in the best interest of the child and yes the parents matter too. Since every child is different as well as their relationship with their grandparents, there cannot be one law that would be right for everyone.
There are laws that fit everyone, "do not steal, do not kill, do not beat people up, do not drive recklessly," etc. but when it comes to relationships, it is a case by case issue.
Now let's flip the coin. My opinion changes when a grandparent has become an important part of that child's life. Perhaps that grandparent has been the child's part-time or full-time caregiver or has just developed a very strong bond with the child. If a grandparent is actually raising a grandchild, then they most definitely should have legal rights. But back to mere visitation. If the bond is unncessarily broken between a child and the grandparent, emotional harm could be done to the child. There are a lot of scenario's where this might happen, such as in the death of an adult child and the other parent moves far away, or a divorce where an adult child loses all rights and obviously so would the grandparents.
However, let me flip the coin over once again. I will make up a fictional scenario (which in many families is NOT fictional). A grandparent is raising a grandchild because her own child is unable to raise the child and the other parent severely abused the child which caused long-term psychological trauma. The last thing the custodial grandparent might want is the other grandparents on the other side of the family visiting the child continually reminding the child of the severe abuse that was suffered. Sometimes these children need to be protected from their harmful past. Even if the other set of grandparents did not directly harm the child, their continual involvement could be detrimental to the the child and the custodial grandparent.
If a grandparent is not allowed to develop a relationship with a grandchild and the grandchild is not in danger and is being well cared for, perhaps the left-out grandparent needs to trust God and keep a record of their own lives through a journal of pictures and writings to be given to the grandchild when he or she is an adult.
When I see people fighting for across the board grandparent visitation rights it is very uncomfortable to me. As a parent and now a grandparent raising grandchildren, I would not want to be forced to let the other grandparents visit my child if I thought it would be detrimental to them or too stressful on me. And yes, I believe my health and level of stress I experience is important, since I am the one raising children 24 hours a day and the children are dependent on my well-being as well.
Karen Wright, B.S. Pathway to Healthy Living
Grandmother raising grandchildren
www.RaisingYourGrandchildren.com
www.BlogforHealthyLiving.com