RFla, what a sweet, sweet post!! I remember all those feelings when my baby -- the only boy after two girls -- left for college. I though I'd never recover! He's now 37, with a sweet wife, a 6-year old and 2-year old twins of his own, so he's experiencing the overwhelming love I felt for him. It sounds as if you're doing it exactly right -- you've raised him to have both roots and wings, and that's not an easy balance to achieve. You're making it "easy" for him to leave home -- which is healthy and appropriate -- yet making it clear that he's still a huge part of your heart and your home. You're helping and supporting, and I'm sure you'll find it possible to gradually back away as he achieves more and more independence. My daughters both moved away from us after marriage . . . and now, after 15 and 19 years, we'll all be building homes next door to one another on a Tennessee ridge. Having established their independence by living away from us, they're now able to reconnect without feeling stifled. We're enormously excited about having them and half of our grandchildren next door!! Treasure the past, enjoy the bittersweet moment, and look forward to an exciting future.

Mercy, have you got a lot on your plate! I admire your cheerfulness & perseverence. I think people have a wrong impression about "mental illness"; they think someone who has a brain disorder acts crazy, when really they usually act like anyone else, & their symptoms often do not include "acting crazy". As you say, bi-polar people can be fractious, argumentative, & unreasonable....& that sounds like a lot of other people as well. I think I might work on that part of the problem first. If he can realize that your daughter really does have a disorder, that she's not just being difficult or using her problems as a crutch, he can calm down & develop more reasonable expectations of her. & I think you're going to *have* to inhale, exhale, take a step backwards, & look after yourself. No one person can solve everyone else's problems, & if you kill yourself from the stress of trying, those grandchildren never *will* get to know & enjoy their grandmother. As far as your hubs's mother rejecting him... That would hurt anyone. but if he can look at the situation from the perspective of his adult self, he'll realize that she couldn't have been a good mother to him then (that's the reason he was adopted), & she still can't be a mother to him. She just doesn't have it. I'd say if he was brought up to be a good person & a responsible adult, & if he's found some uncles who adore him, he's a lucky person indeed. Take care.

I'm not a grandma yet, but my little ones crack me up. The other day my 4 yr old came up to me while she was eating a banana and said "Mommy, I really like bananas cuz they're so much good" :o) At our house we say things like "that's tasty" and "I'm snuggly" and I catch myself using those phrases all the time. We like Doritos chips alot and we call them "the red chippies and the blue chippies" (nacho and cool ranch). The other day at work everyone cracked up when I said "I'm going to the vending machine to get some blue chippies" lol

Darling child! And, it looks like she won't need braces! Our DGD kept the curls as her hair started coming in less blond and less curly. She struggled with hair in her way until she was four, and her locks were long enough to be donated to charity to make wigs for cancer patients. Her cousin had battled cancer from age three; now 'clear', but with stunted bone growth and profound hearing loss from treatment.