Wealth of Wisdom

CHAPTER 39Developmental Life Lessons for Grandchildren

William (Bo) and Suzanne Huhn

This chapter describes a process to be used by grandparents to convey personal development lessons to their grandchildren. Our specific effort was aimed at teaching the kids certain tools to protect them from substance abuse and addiction, but the process could be used to achieve other goals.

As we all know, wonderful things sometimes grow out of the most painful experiences. In our case, the disaster involved a daughter who lost her adolescent years to drug addiction. This was a horrible experience for her and our entire family. Fortunately, she fought her way to recovery, and we are very proud of her professional accomplishments and, even more important, her success as a wonderful mother.

As a result of the nightmare, we pondered a way to help protect our grandchildren. As the idea of developmental life lessons crystalized, we realized that our attitude and the process was more important than the specific lessons. We started with confidence and optimism. We decided to use a lot of humor and personal interaction. We figured this would be a long-term effort, requiring different media and much repetition. The goal was to slowly pound the lessons into the kids' bones over the course of years.

Before listing the lessons, it is important to describe the specifics of our process. This involved our four daughters (10-year age spread), their husbands, and 13 grandchildren (18-year age spread).

For ...