Top 5 Tips for
Building Family Bonds
Maybe world peace is a little out of your reach this year, but family peace isn't.
Intergenerational researcher Susan V. Bosak runs workshops across the country with parents and grandparents. She's found the five simplest but most powerful things you can do to reduce stress and conflict, and bring your family closer.
Bosak's new book How to Build the Grandma Connection has won a Parent's Guide Award as one of the best books of the year. It's helping families build better relationships between children, parents, and grandparents.
"Relationships between generations can be difficult to navigate," says Bosak. "Most people think they need to do big things, but it's the small things you do on a regular basis that count most."
In How to Build the Grandma Connection, Bosak has gathered together and tested practical ideas for things like how to handle visits and babysitting, ideas for playing with your grandchildren at various ages, giving creative gifts and keepsakes, how to build bonds over long distances, how to listen to your grandchildren, how to resolve conflicts with your adult children, the best books to cuddle up and share with your grandchildren, and the list goes on and on.
Building better relationships in families involves all generations -- children, parents, and grandparents. Here are Bosak's top five tips so that you can get started in your family:
- Listen first: One of the biggest problems in family relationships is rushing in with your own opinions and advice before you really understand the situation. If you're a grandparent, start with the expectation that your children will raise their children differently than you raised them. To get productive conversations going, use phrases like "Tell me about it" and "So you feel like..." .
- "Once a week" goal: Regular contact is key to building closer family bonds, especially for grandparents who may not live near their grandchildren. You need at least one visit, phone call, e-mail, or postcard a week. Share things that are happening in your life, and ask lots of questions about things your grandchildren are interested in.
- Second chances: One couple was so upset by their grandchild's "disrespectful" behavior that they didn't speak to the parents or see the grandchild for a year. You can always find a reason to justify your anger. Find a bigger reason to let go of it. Put the relationship first.
- Less TV, more books: Start your own family book club, with parents, grandparents, and children taking monthly turns choosing books. It's a great way to build children's reading skills, a chance to cuddle close when you're together, and something to talk about over the phone. Long distance grandparents can even audiotape themselves reading stories.
- Give and take: Family relationships involve reciprocity, giving when it's needed. A grandparent can gracefully agree to babysit in an emergency. Parents can make sure grandparents get thank you notes for gifts they've sent so that they feel appreciated. Building goodwill helps everyone over the long run and sets a positive model for children.
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The above information is from Susan V. Bosak's new bestseller How to Build the Grandma Connection (200 pages; $8.95 US), which has won a Parent's Guide Award as one of the year's best books. In this one, concise, easy-to-use book are all the practical ideas, inspiration, and wisdom you need to build loving, rewarding, lifelong relationships with your grandchildren.
"Outstanding!... Excellent advice.... Grandparents and parents alike will love this highly usable, imminently practical guide."
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