RULE 4

Don’t guilt-trip them – even by mistake

So we’re agreed that you need to look out for your parents’ needs and to be appreciative of everything they do for you. But it gets trickier. Let me tell you about a friend of mine who is a grandparent. He picks the children up from school every day because his daughter works, and he takes them home and gives them something to eat before she gets back. She’s a single parent, and occasionally she needs to go away overnight for work, so he stays and looks after the kids, and gets them up and off to school in the morning.

Here’s what he told me a few months ago: ‘I love the grandkids to pieces, and it’s great spending time with them. But as I get older I’m finding it more and more exhausting. The trouble ...

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