What an impact does a baby have on the life of… well, everyone. Of course, it impacts the mom and dad. But it also impacts the lives, even if indirectly, of many more people than just us. The newborn might have grandparents, aunts and uncles, cousins, grand-aunts and grand-uncles, etc. The baby changes their life too!

But what I want to discuss here are the most immediate direct bloodline relationships, which are parents and grandparents. All six of them, in the fortunate scenario where all four grand-parents of the baby are alive and present, share between each of them the same relationship that exists between the newborn baby and the mom and dad. It is so obvious, it has been like that all the time. However, it has some implications for first-time parents that are worth discussing.

From seeing my parents and my in-laws, when your kid has a kid it’s a moment of pure joy. Our baby girl was the first grandchild for both sides so they had not lived through the moment before. I felt it was as exciting for them as it was for us, which gave me a sense of security for which I was grateful. Their excitement and willingness to help and participate made me realize we had a very good support system on which we could rely. As the days went by, however, the feelings we had as parents and the feelings they had as grandparents evolved in different ways, up to the point where they diverged significantly.

In hindsight, what I’m describing above seems if not obvious, at least logical. When I think of my own childhood, there was a very clear differentiation between my nuclear family and my grandparents, even if we were very close and we all obviously considered ourselves part of the same wider family. But my wife and I didn’t fully see the implications from the beginning that the birth of our baby girl would have in this sense. Of course, the baby would complete the nuclear family that we had founded when we got married, that much we had clear. But it also definitely pulled us out of our original nuclear family, the one with our parents and our siblings.

It might sound harsh but it is true. We now have our own nuclear family, of which we are the parents. The relationship now with our own parents is the one that they had with our grandparents. It’s still close; it’s still fundamental, for us and the new baby, in many ways; but it is not the same as before. And it is not just a theoretical differentiation that marks an abstract milestone.

For my wife and I, the initial elation of the day our baby girl was born and the following days in the hospital, matured into a sense of responsibility that at times felt very overwhelming. My parents and in-laws' initial elation got tempered down, but it was all just happiness and excitement. They still wanted to be present and to participate, which at times was a lot of help, and I mean a lot of help; but the divergence in feelings and ways of seeing the experience we were all part of also created tension and stress. 

For example, the grandmothers wanted to help out with diaper changes, getting the baby dressed, and bathing it; the grandfathers wanted to hold the baby. Those things are all very manual and logistical tasks, which do get a bit monotonous as time goes by, but that is all of what a baby does and needs. In other words, if you do not do those things, you will not bond with the baby. And this is where the pure, even if tempered down, joy of the grandparents clashed with the sense of responsibility that my wife and I had as parents: they saw taking care of the baby as a pleasure while my wife and I saw it as a new responsibility that we needed to master to ensure the well-being of the baby. 

Which makes sense, when you think about it. In our case, the four grandparents of my baby girl had already had their children (seven, all combined) and we all grew to be healthy adults. This granddaughter represented to them a return to that time of their lives, which I now know firsthand, is unique and special. As one of the people who visited us to meet the baby said: "Grandchildren are the dessert of life!".

But for my wife and me, as with all new parents, it was not a pleasure. Or rather, it was not a pleasure in the same way, that of being thankful for the opportunity to relive a very special past moment in our lives. We were facing, and still are, a very big challenge. Being willing to face it and be successful at it manifests in the sense of responsibility I mentioned before. To us, the experience was indeed a pleasure, but it was also very hard. 

That nervousness that is so common to new parents and that is generally misunderstood by other people, grandparents of the baby included, seems to me like the biological manifestation of the desire to do the new job bestowed upon us well and ensure the new baby has an environment that allows her to grow up healthy and happy. Changing diapers, dressing the baby, bathing, and holding her to us were ways to raise our baby. 

It might seem exaggerated and we certainly did not think about it like that from the very beginning, but it is what underlies the sense of responsibility. My wife and I wanted to do those things well because that would mean the baby was well. And to get to the point where one is comfortable doing those things and in consequence comfortable in the whole new-parent thing, is by actually doing them, by getting your hands dirty. And that is the essence of the clash between the two ways of seeing the experience - it’s either a joyful grandparent or a nervous new parent changing, clothing, bathing, or holding the baby, but not both.

In the long run, the pure joy of grandparents and the sense of responsibility of parents complement each other. It was like that for me and for my wife growing up. A way to illustrate it is by thinking of the nuclear family as a circle within a wider circle, which is the nuclear family plus the grandparents. The first one to benefit from it is the new baby, as it widens its horizons. There is a safe and secure world for her to go on and learn outside of her parents and their home. That’s when the pure joy of grandparents and their close relation to the baby turns to pure gold. They cannot create a home for the baby, at least not as we parents can, but they can create something that gets really close to that. And everyone benefits from it. But that’s in the long run, as it was in my experience with my grandparents. 

During those first few days and weeks, there are of course moments for the grandparents to be with their grandchild. The newborn stage is special and it is so short, that it is of course a good thing that grandparents are present to enjoy it. And it’s not just enjoyment on the part of grandparents, they can also help quite a lot. It’s just that their presence and enjoyment need to come second to the new parents’ need to get to know their new baby and grow into their new role, with all the responsibilities that come with it. 

That’s the biggest lesson I think I can share from our experience. Grandparents are optimistic, they are convinced everything will be Ok. New parents are pessimistic, everything can go wrong at any moment. During those first moments, the pessimism of parents needs to prevail. It is how the new nuclear family will grow and consolidate itself; it’s how the parents will be able to create a safe space for the new baby to grow. It won’t be long after that when the optimism of grandparents will be needed.