Retrieving mail from our curbside box, I hear her talking as she wheels the stroller toward me. I see the familiar face of the little boy’s grandmother, Ruth, who I see on their occasional walks down our block.
This woman represents thousands of grandparents who help their children with childcare; however, this situation is different. Her grandson Billy is three-and-a-half, does not walk, cannot talk and has a feeding tube to deliver his nutrition.
Both grandparents take shifts, one in the morning; the other comes in the afternoon to relieve their exhausted daughter while her husband is away at work. Ruth expresses her feelings about being grateful she can help with their grandson’s care and she states, “He is our only one.”
I wave to Billy as I ask his grandmother how he is doing. She openly talks about the challenges, his recent surgery to expand his skull bones so that…
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