Grandmothers earlier than expected: women life changes, involvement in grandchildren rising and intergenerational relationships

Abstract

We conducted a qualitative research to study, with a hermeneutical approach, about the experience of women who became grandmothers under the age of 45 as their daughters became teenage mothers. We studied how women assumed grandmother hood, how they were involved in the raising of their grandchildren, which life changes them and their families underwent, and the family intergenerational relationships associated with grandmother hood. Grandmothers’ narrations found out significant personal, social, family and work changes for these women, who cared for their grandchildren when they already felt released from parenting duties.
We also found that these mothers usually gave up their life projects to support their daughters, and that they have the affective and emotional support of relatives belonging to other generations.