EARLIER this month I was attending a meeting of my local women’s institute when the discussion turned to my grandchildren.
Most of my friends admitted that they had a favorite grandchild, but swore blindly that they would never reveal such a guilty secret to their adult children.
Personally, I don’t see what this is about. After all, my whole family knows perfectly well that my eldest granddaughter, Elise, is at the top of my hierarchy.
I have five granddaughters in total: Elise, 16, Isabella, 13, Scarlett, 11, Lucy, eight, and Ivy, six.
I love them all, but Elise can’t do anything wrong in my eyes. She is beautiful, bossy and belligerent, but so loving. I can’t help but love it more.
And I don’t hide it either. We are a close family and my only daughter Hannah lives a five minute drive from me in Cardiff, with her children and her husband Scott.
As a retired civil servant, I have a lot of free time now, so if I’m bored or Elise is depressed, I love nothing more than texting her and taking her shopping. We laugh at the same things, and the same things infuriate us.
Emma Parsons-Reid with her favorite granddaughter Elise, aged 16
I get unbearably sad and angry when people are disloyal and Elise is the only one who doesn’t think I’m being overly dramatic. “I understand, grandmother, really,” she will say.
In other words, we are like two peas in a pod. We look so much alike that Hannah said, “It’s like I gave birth to my own mother.”
Elise also wrapped her finger around me. When we go out, she always manipulates me into buying something, and I’m only too happy to do it.
In return, no area of Elise’s life is off limits to me. I met his friends from school, all his friends think I’m cool and I’m friends on Facebook with his female social circle. I need to know who she’s dating.
This is not something I do with my other granddaughters, however. I really like them, but that same spark just isn’t there.
In my defense, I think many women would say that their oldest grandchild is their favorite.
Think about it, these are the ones we spent the most time with. We have been a constant in their lives as unpaid nannies since the days when their parents weren’t very knowledgeable about a newborn.
Hannah separated from Elise’s father when she was little – and even though Elise has a stepfather, I justify this preference by telling myself that I am that person who gives her boundaries. Hannah tries to be strict but Elise walks all over her.
Even though it’s obvious to everyone that I adore her, Elise likes to ask me if she’s still my favorite. I have no problem reassuring her and I often tell her that this is the case. In fact, she could do almost anything, even commit murder, and I would defend her.
We are so close physically that she loves nothing more than to lie on my lap and let me stroke her hair.
But, according to Hannah, my overt favoritism has limits. We recently went shopping and Isabella, Elise’s younger sister, arrived. Elise wanted a new feather duvet and I paid the £70 price without batting an eyelid. Painfully aware that I also had to look after Isabella, I persuaded her to choose a £5 lipstick.
Hannah has a rule of spending equal amounts on my grandchildren, but I vetoed that notion because it’s a lot to spend every time I want to spoil Elise.
However, his mother was furious. She wouldn’t talk to me and refused to let Elise use the quilt until Isabella had one too. So, of course, Muggins had to fork out.
Elise has been precious to me since she was born. I made it my mission to be at the birth, and in the delivery room I asked the midwives if I could catch it. So I was the first to hold her in my arms and the bond was created straight away. I cried for three days straight, I felt so emotional.
There’s all this love and yet, as a grandparent, you don’t really have a say in how that child is raised. As a guilty control freak in life, this was a hard lesson for me.
When Hannah was single again, I was only too happy to take care of my granddaughter while she went out with friends and went on dates.
I went down to four days of work so I could have Elise from Tuesday to Wednesday evening. She never slept! We watched TV and went to the park. She never wanted to leave.
Elise had her own room at my house, with specially made curtains, although she ended up in bed with me most nights. She was still sneaking in for a cuddle when she was five, and my partner Kevin didn’t mind it, because he adored her too.
“We’re like two peas in a pod,” Emma (left) says of Elise, who, she admits, has her grandmother “wrapped around her finger.”
Their temperaments are so similar that Emma’s daughter (and Elise’s mother) Hannah says, “It’s like I gave birth to my own mother.”
When Hannah reunited with Scott, Elise’s little sister, Isabella, arrived when she was three. Of course, I was happy to welcome another granddaughter, but I’m proud to say that nothing changed in our relationship. On the contrary, I took Elise out more often.
There is, however, a downside. Because we are mirrors of each other, I can see in his behavior how annoying I can be.
We have had spectacular results over the years. On one occasion, pushed to the extreme, I blurted out that she was a disappointment to me and would never amount to anything.
We both ended up in tears that night. But I’m the only one who can stand up to Elise. And to put it simply, I’m the only one she has respect for.
I think about what will happen if my blatant favoritism backfires when the others are older. I wouldn’t blame them for judging me negatively for being so open about it. I try not to say it in front of them, but Elise does – she almost flaunts it, in fact.
Isabella just raises her eyebrows and laughs; I suspect she thinks she dodged a bullet by avoiding any special attention.
But Scarlett started making me feel guilty. Her reasoning is that if I don’t do something for her, she will use the fact that Elise is my favorite against me. And yes, I have a habit of giving in.
But when they ask me why I have a favorite, I’m honest. It’s a good lesson to learn early: life isn’t always fair.
But for now, I justify this imbalance by saying that Elise needs me more than them: they have a dad and a mom in their lives, while Elise only has her mom.
Sometimes when I treat or spoil her sisters, I have to do it behind Elise’s back, otherwise the green-eyed monster comes into play.
However, I don’t see this as pandering to her. Elise is going through a very difficult age and needs the reassurance of knowing that someone on this planet loves her unconditionally.
No matter how hard life is or how horrible it can be, I will always be his number one fan.
Like I told Samantha Brick.
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