Last year our son went to visit his grandmother for the summer. He was so looking forward to the vacations, so he packed a bag ahead of time and went away indefinitely.
Grandma did a good job with him. She was happy with her grandson and gave him her full attention. She allowed everything – complete permissiveness. When John arrived in the village, he felt completely free. So he was delighted. He always lived in anticipation of a trip to Grandma’s. His parents have no control over anything. But this time he didn’t get a taste of freedom.
At the same time as his grandson came to visit his grandmother, her second daughter, who often travels around the country. In fact, she lived there the rest of the time. She has no husband. So she travels for work. Vacations are rare. But my son doesn’t even know about it. He’s used to having only Grandma and Grandpa at home. And no one else is in charge. John and his aunt communicated most of the time by video link. But they rarely saw each other in person. So she wasn’t really involved in his upbringing. She was a magical woman who brought him presents, a kind of fairy.
Only when they were forced to live together for a couple of days, his sister began to make comments to him, she did not like the fact that he slams the door, how he folds things, how much time he spends on the phone. To put it another way, she controlled his every move. Clearly, he was upset. He goes up to his grandmother and says, “Grandma, my aunt is so mean! Is she leaving soon?”
Grandma told him that she was just raising him, not being nasty. That’s her vision of parenting. And he should have listened to her. Show her some respect. But the grandson kept saying his own thing. When his aunt made him another reprimand, he got brave and told her that she was not the one in charge here and that she should not be in charge! Only the grandparents can be in charge and make remarks.
Her sister smiled, and then spent a long time trying to prove to him that she also lived here. Therefore, she has all the rights. After that incident, John decided to apologize and they haven’t had a conflict since. I guess that’s how his view of reality changed. After all, he wanted to relax, to get away. But it didn’t work out. Again he began to be reprimanded and controlled. No better than at home.
We still remember that story and laugh about it. And my sister was told that he needed to come home more often.
