Grandparents, do you discipline your grandchildren?

It depends. When my family visits me, if my daughters don't keep an eye on them, I have to. After all it is my home and my rules. If the grandkids are getting into something I don't want them to and their parents don't respond first I have to say something. I prefer that my daughters discipline them but sometimes they aren't around or don't notice. Now,if I am at their home, it is different. It is their territory and I am a guest so it is not my place unless my daughters don't mind.

If a child is misbehaving and the child is in your care of in your house, or disrespecing you, I think it is within your right to discipline them no matter who they are. Their behaviour needs to be stopped!!!

I sure do. I live with them. My Daughter does not like when she is doing the discipline for me to add anything to it so sometimes I have to bite my tongue. But in the end they listen to Big Momma. (Smile)

When my daughter and I had a place together, I did most of the discipine regarding my 3 grandkids. They really didn't listen to her. They were basically with me most of the time, as I was watching them when she went to work, in addition to my job I held oustside the home. I was basically in charge even when she was home, as she wanted me to deal with the problems. The kids came to me for everything, even when she was home. I have since moved out and I know she is having problems getting them to listen to her. Sometimes she calls me up and has me talk to them.

My grandchildren do not live with me, but this is a situation I have witnessed in the past, both with friends and in my extended family. My opinion is that whether the parents are good or bad at discipline, the fundamentals have to be set at their level. If the daughter and grandchildren live under your roof, then you need to have a role in their discipline. You're an adult and it's your house. There is no way out of a mentoring role at some level. If your daughter counteracts all your efforts in that regard, then the kids suffer--and so do you. If she gives you the leeway to enforce discipline, then you have the authority you need and the kids can only benefit--even if her discipline is imperfect. You and your daughter need to talk about these issues and establish groundrules. I'd say that if she can support your role as a co-disciplinarian, then that's key. If she cannot, you will need to decide whether this act of disrepect toward you (that is, by your daughter) merits your continued generosity.

At one time, when my daughter divorced, she and her two children were living with us. She was also working and I was staying home and taking care of her children. She gave me permission to discipline them when she wasn't around. Actually, they never gave us any problems. But, I feel, when you take care of anyone's children, you have the right to discipline them and not let them run over you. I always gave anyone who kept my children the right to discipline them. Now, if they had been abusive towards them, that would have been a different story. But children need rules to go by and if they don't follow them, then they need some sort of guidance that has to come from someone, if not from the parent.