- I want them to hear y'all.

I want them to feel y'all.

You feel me?

- Yes.

- Make the ground shake.

Hit!

(hands thudding) Hit!

- [Ana] The data is not perfect, but we say about 2.5 million children are being raised by grandparents and other kin caregivers.

And again, we don't have great data on it, but primarily, because of parental substance-use issues, parental overdose, parental incarceration, military deployment.

There's just a range of issues that cause these families to form.

- What time is it?

- [Players] Game time!

- What time is it!

- [Players] Game time!

- Let's get right!

- [Ana] Most of them have to do with some kind of traumatic event in the parents' and the family's lives.

(metal clanging) - [Dawna] Hey, boys, pizza's ready.

We're on a journey to get well again.

You know, I wanna live a long life.

I wanna take care of our grandsons, but I also wanna enjoy them.

So, access to additional family assistance would at least mean that we wouldn't have to stress or worry about whether or not we could afford to put the food on the table.

(engine rumbling) - [Tavia] A typical day, raising my two grandsons, busy, busy, busy, busy.

It's nonstop.

(packets rustling) (bottles thudding) The boys are my world.

Everything that I am today, it's about them.

You know, it's more than me being a grandmother and a guardian.

It's just the love and the sacrifices.

(pan sizzling) But it could be a little lonely.

Right there.

Okay.

There.

- No.

- You're kidding.

- We're driving.

- There.

- [Jeffrey] Buckle up.

- [Tavia] For a lot of our caregivers, especially older ones, are experiencing depression, loneliness.

A lot of times feel like giving up.

And it's important that they know that they have a source of support.

- [Jeffrey] I think what a lot of people need to know is that we're isolated as a grand family and we're in two different environments, but we don't belong in either.

You know, we're in a child-raising environment, we're in a retired environment, and we don't belong in either group.

(somber music) - [Narrator] Major funding for "Aging Matters" is provided by the West End Home Foundation.

enriching the lives of older adults through grant making, advocacy, and community collaboration.

The Jeanette Travis Foundation, dedicated to improving the health and wellbeing of the Middle Tennessee community.

The HCA Healthcare Foundation on behalf of Tristar Health, and AARP Tennessee.

Additional funding provided by Jackson National Life Insurance Company.

(cutlery cluttering) - [Dawna] You can have one of each.

You wanna go ask David what he wants?

- Yes.

- [Dawna] So, the boys came to live with us in August of 2015.

David was 18 months old, and Dakota was three months old.

They're 15 months apart.

- Father, thank you so much for this day.

We rejoice and we are glad, and Father, we thank You that this food is blessed strength and nourishment to our bodies.

And we give You praise in Jesus' name.

Amen.

- Amen.

It really felt like we were starting all over again.

We still had a child in the house, so we had a son who was in high school when all of this happened.

And so, we were still, you know, trying to get our last child grown and out of the house.

And so, having to go into that position was really difficult.

There was a lot of emotions with it, because it's not just that we were taking on the idea of raising children, it was also the heartbreak that our child was in the midst of an addictive issue.

And there was, you know, those kinds of, you know, things going on as well.

You never stop being a mom.

So, there was the twofold side to it that we were coping with.

Oh, they're good.

They're pretty happy about that.

Are you gonna try and do that when you get bigger?

- I don't know.

- You don't know.

When we first took custody of the boys, it was an immediate, it was an emergency placement, so it was something that was really quick.

We had to go in, sign paperwork saying that we would support them, that we would take care of their needs.

We had to submit our fingerprints for a criminal history background so that we would, you know, be safe place for them to be.

When we did all of this, you know, I was under the impression that there was still going to be some level of help for us, but immediately we determined that, that was not the case.

And so, I reached out to DCS to be foster parents, placements for the boys so that you can have some help with the, you know, all of the impacted finances that was about to happen.

And when I reached out to them and asked them about that, they just kind of fired back at me and said that we had already signed the documentation saying that we would support them.

Was I trying to profit from this?

Do they need to find another place to place them?

And so, at that point, we just stopped the conversation and just decided that we were gonna have to figure things out.

(car beeping) (somber music) (car doors thudding) (starter sputtering) (engine revving) - [Ana] Sadly, it is not an option to revisit foster parent licensing as a kinship provider.

The child would have to be removed from the home for abuse or neglect to be able to then go into a licensed foster parent situation.

- Get in here tight!

Let's go!

- Chance on three, chance on three.

One, two, three.

- [Players] Chance!.

- We at Generations United always talk to providers about the importance of presenting kin with all their options, because they are their own best experts in their family.

And for the majority of kinship families, the vast majority, they will not have any involvement with Child Welfare.

Child Welfare will not come to their home.

They will not go to the parent's home and remove the child.

Mom may have just dropped off the child with grandma, right?

But for those where Child Protective Services, Child Welfare are involved, they need to be very cognizant of presenting the options to those kin.

And what it means, because they do have the option of becoming licensed foster parents.

And with that pathway, they will get full foster care maintenance payment rates, which is a significant ongoing financial assistance.

They will also have access to services and supports for that child, including help getting them enrolled in school, transportation to school, all of those supports and services that the Child Welfare system can provide.

- When you're working full time, and then you have infant children come in and all of a sudden you have these incredible expenses of coming in and you've got childcare and diapers for two, and then formula for one, and just all of the, you know, clothing and things that you don't normally expect to have to pay for when you're a grandparent.

Unfortunately, we just started to rely on debt, on credit card debt.

And so, when you have to have those things, you start to, you know, just use whatever you can.

And eventually, it just started to become unmanageable, almost to a point of bankruptcy where you feel like, you know, I don't know if we can pay these, but luckily enough we were able to refinance our house and kind of like lump all that in.

And then, so now we owe more on our house than we want to, but that's okay.

We'll get through that too.

(somber music) (water gurgling) - So, even if you don't become a foster parent as a grandparent, you still wanna walk through some of those legal aspects of it.

And then hopefully, by walking through those legal aspects, you're gonna through the court, be connected to those resources that are gonna help your family do better.

- [Tavia] You kept your gym shoes on too, huh?

- Ma'am?

- [Tavia] I said you kept your gym shoes on.

- Yes, ma'am.

- We really encourage our families to go to court.

It covers them when it comes to registering those children in school, because technically, they're not the legal guardian.

So, they have problems registering them in school.

They have problems taking them to the doctor.

So, we encourage them to do that.

It also helps to secure that placement, because when you don't go to court, then a parent can come at any time and get their kid.

(car beeping) - All righty.

- [Laura] Whether that parent is equipped to take care of their child, if they wanna come and knock on the door and get those children and there's no court order in place, they can do that at any time.

- Good morning, everyone.

Thank you all so much for being here and joining us today on our very first caregiver support group.

- Once you get that custody, you can come to us and join the Relative Caregiver Program.

Now, you don't have to have custody, but there are limitations to what we can help you with, because that's considered an informal arrangement.

- Let's just say we were at a function together and I ask you, "May I borrow $20?"

What's your response?

- I need $20 too.

(person chuckling) - The caregiver support group has come to mean a whole lot to me.

- [Facilitator] Okay.

So, we got a tougher crowd over here.

(people laughing) - It took me a while, 'cause I was like, I don't wanna be around.

They not going through the same thing I'm going through.

They wouldn't understand.

These are strangers to me.

And the first, I think I waited about a year and I kept telling, "I'm coming.

I'm coming."

And when I first went, man, I loved it.

It was people, grandparents just like me doing the same thing.

And it motivated me, because there were some that have had their grandchildren for maybe 15, almost 20 years.

And they made me feel comfortable about the decision that I was making about certain things.

And even with being in the program by, you know, just alone, the program itself, you could speak freely and nobody was gonna judge you.

And we all had some of the same things in common.

- So, the Relative Caregiver Program in the state of Tennessee is a program where we help families to become stable in a situation where they have not anticipated or plan for when they're raising their children.

We offer that support and that care and that financial services that they need.

The relative caregivers in our program currently get 50% of what foster parents get.

And that equals out to $16 a day per child.

They no longer have a income guideline.

So, it doesn't matter what they make.

And currently, we have a wait list.

That's how a large number of families we have in Shelby County that really need that assistance.

- Without that financial support, I think I would be behind on a lot of things.

I would have to probably work more, which is no problem.

But it just fills in the gap of our needs every month.

- So, if you've gone to, let's just say.

(pan sizzling) - Today, we are physically at my daughter and son-in-law's house.

Here, their lovely home in Cordova, Tennessee.

Where we were living, we were told we had to move or pay a higher rent.

At the last minute, we had to move.

So, we are still displaced.

I've been back and forth here at my daughter's and my son's house too.

(packages rustling) (door thudding) Housing has been a real challenge, because things are just terribly expensive here in Memphis.

It's challenging, because I have other priorities with the boys, food, clothing, other expenses.

(paper rustling) I ended up with my grandsons 10 years ago.

My daughter, their mom, is my youngest.

She just made the wrong decisions in life.

I'm the grandmother, but I raised them from babies.

And I just wanted something to call a home where we had more room.

(footsteps plodding) (scoop thudding) (machine beeping) I stopped working once I had them, I had to have different surgeries.

(Tavia sighing) Two hip replacements, and the income that I had coming in, it ceased.

I did start back working, which helped a lot, 'cause everything that I do, every bit of money goes to them.

(ball thudding) (somber music) Tommy is the ray of sunshine where I remember they told us he wouldn't be able to do this.

You're gonna have to keep in mind that he was born this way.

He had heart failure, liver disease, lung disease, asthmatic.

I said, "Okay," but Tommy, he's my warrior.

Any challenge, no matter what they say he couldn't do, he took it on.

And to this day, he's still basketball, football, running.

He's just defeating the odds.

He's just doing everything they said, and that's what keeps me going.

Chance?

Chance is my genius.

(Rubik's cube shuffling) Even before he was diagnosed with autism and on the spectrum, ADHD, I could see, he didn't talk a lot the first years, okay?

But his eyes, I could see his strength.

I didn't know how smart he was until he got into school.

Chance is the one who inspires me to do things that I didn't think I could do.

(door creaking) (Chance sighing) It gives me that purpose to know that I can't stop doing what I'm doing, you know, 'cause it lights up my life.

It's just a joy to have 'em.

And I don't know where I would be without 'em.

But at the end of the day, what we need is our own home.

(somber music) - There are many benefits, decades of research in fact that show that children who are raised by kin rather than non-kin do better.

That they have better behavioral health outcomes, social emotional outcomes, educational outcomes, and better connections to siblings.

The smells from the kitchen are the same, you know?

All those kinds of things that matter to children.

And primarily, they feel loved, you know?

These folks know them, know their family, and they feel like they belong.

- This is how we get like this, so that they can turn to, so they can turn.

- [Jeffrey] This is not our first experience with raising kids.

We adopted our son and daughter at seven and eight and we realized very early on that adopting is a challenge.

It's not easier the second time around dealing with that, but you know what to expect.

- I think the most challenging part of raising grandchildren is I'm just tired.

There's just days when I am just plain tired.

I love you.

- I love you too.

(footsteps plodding) - It's fun to play with them.

It's fun to have an interaction with 'em, enjoy them coming home and discussing with them, you know, how their day went.

And always have some nice quiet time in the evenings.

I think the big thing is the fact that I have to do two jobs right now.

- [Jeffrey] Yeah.

- [Marcy] Because that takes me away from the children and it makes Jeff have a lot more things that he has to do.

And you know, his health isn't the best and he gets very tired easily.

And so, it puts a lot more on his shoulders.

And I prefer not to, but I have to do the two part-time jobs so that we can, you know, pay the bills at the end of the month.

- I have severe neuropathy, which limits what I can do, you know, run with the kids, do things with the kids.

That's limited by my neuropathy.

And the other thing that I have is I have a fatal condition and that has put a lot of weight on my mind as far as, you know, the kids and my wife.

You know, when I'm gone, who's gonna take care of 'em, what money they're gonna have and how I can take care of them once I'm dead or gone.

Time to go, boys.

- I mean, I guess the thing is, is that I've got a strong faith in God and He gives me a lot of hope and I enjoy the two jobs that I'm doing.

So, that helps, but it does get tiring sometimes.

And sometimes I have to just talk to my employer and say, you know, "I need a few less hours."

- Many older adults are struggling with chronic health issues and that's no exception to our grand families.

And I think there are two priority things that families need.

One, is some legal assistance in helping with estate planning and wills to help them feel more comfortable about their long-term condition and what's gonna happen to the future of these children, because that's a big worry for families.

And the second thing is respite care.

Families need respite care.

They need a moment alone.

They need some time maybe to recover from an illness or an injury that they have without having that responsibility of the children.

And it is very difficult to find respite care resources.

- [Marcy] Sometimes when we talk to some people, they kind of feel sorry for us.

I don't want people to feel sorry for me.

I just wanna talk to somebody who understands where I'm at and maybe has some helpful suggestions on something that we can do to do something better.

- I had a grandparent tell me yesterday, for three years she felt like she was in a vacuum.

She didn't think anybody else felt the things that she felt as a grandparent raising her grandchildren.

And then she was able to be a part of a panel and she heard these other grandparents and she's like, "Oh, we, that's it.

That's how we feel."

You know, and you're on this island of just like, what do I do?

And so, having a community of adopt parents and having a community of grandparents that are doing this hard work, important work, it's important that they're supported and they're cared about, and they're heard and they're seen.

- Hey, boys.

Guys, are you hungry?

Come on.

Come get so numb.

Come on.

So, the boys are 10 and nine today.

They're doing great.

You know, they still have some struggles in school.

You know, and they're growing boys.

So, they have the same things that all kids do.

They have good days and bad days, they have ups and downs, but you know, we're very blessed.

You know, they're very healthy, they're very strong.

They're just well adjusted for the situation.

You know, it's not normal, but it's our normal.

- Bro, I'm getting filmed right now, so I'm gonna have a little bit stress, but I'm gonna go hard on, okay?

- We've never wanted to be their parents, so we've never, you know, wanted them to call us mom or dad.

We've always been Nani and Poppy and that's just who we are.

And we always hoped and prayed that we would be able to integrate the family together again.

And they would have a relationship with their parents.

- Nothing happened?

You just went to school and sat around and looked at each other all day?

Nothing.

Did you go to lunch?

Oh, you did that, huh?

- [Dawna] I was lucky enough to remarry a wonderful man and he's been the glue that kind of held this all together.

He's been so impactful with the boys.

He's been fabulous father figure for them.

Role model, disciplinarian.

He's the fun one, but he's also the one that, you know, makes sure that they understand that there's boundaries and rules in the household.

We all need that.

But he's been very, he's been a good father to the girls as well.

You know, he did step in, in the midst of all of that.

And even though it didn't heal the hurt, they still look now and realize how lucky they were to have a strong man come in and be that father figure for them.

- In a lot of ways, I feel like growing up from a big family, my Latin heritage, you know?

We're just kids raising kids pretty much.

And I have, oh, like 12 or 13 uncles and aunts and everybody has at least five or six kids in each family.

So, you kind of grow up in a big family.

Just growing up in that environment, I think being a father figure is just something, it's kind of ingrained in who we are as influencing our homes.

Things take time, be patient, be a good listener.

You know, I endeavor to work on my patience even more.

That's something I'll, you know, I'll be better at next year and two years from now.

If I hopefully, 10 years from now I'll be a lot better than that.

And being understanding, and giving people grace and room to grow and to make mistakes and to pick up from there and get better in their lives.

- Oh my, I got blood on.

- No, no, no, no, no.

- Here go, go away from it.

Let me clean this up.

In the beginning, their relationship with my parents was awful.

Like, I didn't have one at all.

But now, now I call my mom at least 15 times a day.

I would not call her at all, because I was so ashamed.

But now, I love my parents.

Like I grew, I fall in love deeper and deeper with my dad every day.

And I know that sounds crazy, but I didn't have a relationship with him growing up, because he's my stepdad, you know?

And then I started doing drugs and then I left and then, so now here I am, you know, 36 years old and I've got my life back together.

I'm trying day by day, step by step, yeah.

We took a towel and we just put it right in there.

Just a little floor.

Of course, I didn't.

- Family life today is just, you know, we just kind of hang out and do our thing, but we also, you know, we make plans with their parents.

They get to spend time with their parents.

(engine rumbling) (people chatting indistinctly) I'm glad you made it.

- Huh?

- Your boys are playing.

- Yeah.

- Well, getting ready to.

Their mom spends time with us and they get to go and hang out and spend time with her and she's really grown a lot.

Cody, got any homework?

- Mom, no not today.

- Hank, we're going in the front door.

Yeah.

- She's very much involved.

She will stop by the house on a regular basis.

She spends time with the boys daily.

She picks them up from school and takes care of them until we get home.

So, she's doing great.

- What was that?

Was that a little froggy hop pop?

- No.

- It's very rewarding.

You know, every day that I get to ask them, "Hey, how was school?"

You know, and whenever you're in active addiction, you don't get to do stuff like that.

You know, you don't even think to do stuff like that.

It's not that you don't get to, it's that you don't even think to.

- On my math test today?

- A 94.3.

- 100.

- Did you really?

Good job.

It's amazing being able to be back here.

That is what has kept me going every single day, is that I am able to be here and I am able to do these things.

- Who wants to draw first?

- Here, I'll.

baby go sit here.

- So, first you draw one of these, okay?

Go!

You see those?

Keep these two black pieces, okay.

You keep them.

- I keep them?

Tell me how it does it.

- Okay.

So, take this and get one of them.

- [Amber] I love my boys.

I do, and I've walked away from them before and they think I'm the best person in the world.

And my parents are the reason that they love me so much.

So, I'm so grateful for my parents.

- Look at me.

- Bro, yeah.

(somber music) (somber music continues) - [Narrator] Major funding for "Aging Matters" is provided by the West End Home Foundation.

Enriching the lives of older adults through grant making, advocacy, and community collaboration.

The Jeanette Travis Foundation, dedicated to improving the health and wellbeing of the Middle Tennessee community.

The HCA Healthcare Foundation on behalf of Tristar Health, and AARP Tennessee.

Additional funding provided by Jackson National Life Insurance Company.

(gentle upbeat music)