When Jim Maddox, then 43, got the news that he would soon be a grandfather, he felt bewildered. He sat down and contemplated what the family addition would mean to his life.
“I’m going to be a grandpa,” the Concord paramedic recalls thinking. “I have a demanding job. My wife and I are in the middle of our lives.”
Then little Cory arrived, and the overwhelming love Maddox felt for the boy, now 9, is something he says he wouldn’t give up for the world.
In fact, for Maddox, now 52, and his wife Rhonda, 51, contentment with being young grandparents came easy. They had their own daughters early in life, and some of Jim’s favorite childhood moments, such as climbing in the Oregon mountains in search of berries, occurred with his own 40-something grandfather.
Maddox says, “We wanted to be … active in the grandchildren’s lives.”
In addition to Corey, the brood now includes Abby, 5; Gavin, 4; and Emma, 2.
“I’m still working and making money, so it gives us the ability to do all sorts of things,” Maddox says. “And we still do the roller coasters with them.”
The Maddoxes and other grandparents around age 50 hear it all the time: “You’re a grandparent? But you’re so young!” These multi-role individuals often juggle their own careers and relationships with caring for the grandchildren. For many, that old saying about a grandparent having all the joy and none of the responsibility no longer applies.
Statistics show members of the baby-boom generation (now ages 45 to 64) first becoming grandparents at a median age of 50 for women, 54 for men. That appears to represent a significant downward shift since 1985, when the majority of grandparents were 65 and older, according to Susie Owens of Grandparents.com.
Grandparents spent $52 billion on their grandchildren in 2009, according to study commissioned by Grandparents.com.
“These grandparents are shifting the attitude of what it means to be over 50,” Owens says. “They’re more likely to be playing Nintendo Wii with their grandchildren than sitting in the corner knitting. They may be retired, but they’ve taken on a new business. They travel. Or maybe they’re taking care of their grandchildren full time.”
Giselle Vieto, 48, of Fremont had a hard time accepting the “grandma” moniker. So she asked her three grandchildren, ages 7 and younger, to call her mamagita, a term of endearment in her native Costa Rica.
Two years ago, she and her husband, George, remodeled their five-bedroom home to accommodate their daughter Janice, son-in-law Andrew and the couple’s son Freddy, now 2. The Vietos’ 20-something sons, Joey and Gino, also live with them.
“We come from a country where kids stay with parents until they’re older,” says Vieto, who works full time as the program director for Fremont Healthy Start. “The economy is so difficult right now that, if they want to save for their future, this was the best way to go. As soon as I get off work, I pick little Freddy up and take care of him until Mommy and Daddy get home.”
In some ways, she finds caring for Freddy like being a mom again herself. That concept really hit Vietos at a barbecue recently, with adults her own age. She was the only one with a toddler in tow. “When your youngest child is 20, you forget what kind of faces little kids make for certain foods,” Vieto says. “Those nostalgic memories are awakened.”
San Francisco author Adair Lara has written extensively about the guilty streaks of modern grandmothering. “It’s always a juggle,” says Lara, a writing teacher and author of “The Granny Diaries” (Chronicle Books, 2007). “You find yourself dying for their company and wishing you could check your e-mail.”
Lara, 58, first become a grandmother at 52 and was astonished when she realized her grandmother was the same age when Adair was born. “She had a gray braid wrapped around her head and knitted Christmas sweaters,” Lara says. “Today, women my age are working, and those who aren’t look forward to writing a book or going to Europe. And now, they’re called back to watch little kids again.”
Lara is helping one of her children with a down payment on a house. She buys the majority of her grandchildren’s clothes and shoes. And she reserves Wednesdays for them, driving to Fairfax to pick them up from school and take them to San Francisco for homework, gymnastics and maybe a weightlifting class. In addition to helping her daughter, Lara also does it for herself, she says.
“I am more present. I have to keep skiing now because of my grandkids. I get in the swimming pool now, instead of worrying about who’s going to watch the kids.”