An Intergenerational Approach to Perinatal Mental Health: Bringing in Grandparents

A Dialog with PSI Founder Jane Honikman, MS

“All generations deserve social help from conception by grandparenthood. The postpartum motion is successful story. Parental psychological well being networks are in place; nevertheless, most don’t but embody fathers, non-birth mother and father, and grandparents. They need to be embraced by present applications and providers and acknowledge that postpartum is endlessly.”
-Jane Honkiman, Postpartum is Ceaselessly, 2022

Postpartum Assist Worldwide (PSI) is working to extend help and assets for grandparents, fathers, companions, and household mates affected by perinatal psychological well being challenges (or that of a liked one). Out of your perspective, why is that this so necessary?

My imaginative and prescient for PSI has all the time been inclusive of the whole household, companions, mates, and group. Change impacts everybody, all over the place. Social help is just not gender or age-specific. It begins with conception and continues by grandparenthood. Being pregnant, beginning, and the transition to parenthood don’t occur in isolation. It’s the essence of life. It can’t be expressed sufficient how necessary and elementary it’s. From the start of time, from technology to technology, people reproduce and survive due to each other, and I consider that postpartum is endlessly.

You may have volunteered as PSI’s specialised help coordinator for grandparents. Will you share with us a number of the stuff you hear from grandparents, time and time once more?

PSI hardly ever hears from grandparents. The few calls that I’ve obtained specific the identical stress and feelings that new mother and father have: isolation, function confusion, lack of assets, despair and nervousness, battle with the brand new mother and father, alienation, grief and loss, disappointment, and feeling disrespected. I’ve heard from professionals who’re in search of assets on behalf of their shoppers/sufferers. Sadly, I’ve few to share with them.

Primarily based in your expertise, what does help for grandparents appear like? For instance, is it a web based help group, much like these we provide to new mother and father? Is it a Chat for Grandparents open name, much like the Chat with an Professional we provide for mothers and dads? Does help for grandparents look wholly completely different?

Earlier than I began PSI, I co-founded Postpartum Training for Mother and father, PEP. The primary time I took a name from a brand new guardian was on July 1, 1977. By way of PSI, the latest one-on-one help I gave for brand spanking new grandparents was on March 19, 2026. In each cases, I offered empathy, steering, reassurance, and luxury. On the finish of each calls, they expressed the identical appreciation as a result of I shared my very own experiences. They stated, “You made it.” Since 1977, know-how has improved communication and allowed PSI to develop its providers. As we speak, as a result of mother and father have requested it, they’ll obtain specialised help. The problem for PSI is to ask what grandparents need. With out a wants evaluation, PSI can’t know what to supply this inhabitants. There isn’t going to be a “one measurement suits all” reply. I view this as an thrilling alternative.

How does ageism play a task in grandparenthood? How can constructing sturdy intergenerational relationships assist?

Ageism is the stereotyping, prejudice, and discrimination towards people or teams based mostly on their chronological age. It might probably contain unfair remedy and unfavorable attitudes. How elders are perceived and handled varies from tradition to tradition. Anthropology analysis describes the important function of grandmothers. The expression “mom the brand new mom” ensured lactation. It’s postulated that people have survived solely by dwelling in multi-generational teams. The expression “it takes a village to lift a toddler” is derived from this reality. As we speak, our Western notion of household help and help has modified. Is that this a results of ageism? Maybe, or has the medical mannequin of experience interrupted cultural practices and changed the knowledge from earlier generations?

You’re engaged on a brand new venture! Inform us about From Era to Era, a workbook designed to construct bridges between the generations.

Grandparents are the mother and father of moms and dads. From Era to Era enhances my e book Postpartum Is Ceaselessly, Social Assist from Conception by Grandparenthood. It could be part of one’s life course and an extension of parenthood. Turning into a grandparent relies on fertility and life expectancy. They are often genetically linked to their offspring or by remarriage, adoption or infertility. It’s about growing old and birthing one other technology.

The purpose of the Workbook is to acknowledge the significance and impression {that a} being pregnant has on intergenerational connections. It’s designed to:

1. Discover one’s household historical past and study gaps previously.
2. Improve our understanding of the relationships between the generations.
3. Encourage dialogue to hunt consolation, encouragement, and steering.
4. Embody grandparents. Inclusion requires adaptation of the underlying attitudes in the direction of these to be included and adaptive adjustments within the system by which they have interaction.
5. Confront the challenges and limitations. The imaginative and prescient of From Era to Era is to create gender and age-inclusive help networks for all expectant and new households.

From Era to Era’s philosophy is that there are not any gender or age limits for needing, giving, offering, and receiving emotional help. The perinatal interval begins with conception and extends for a lifetime. It’s the ultimate time to interact people from completely different generations and cultures to debate the previous, uncover secrets and techniques, and develop a typical floor of their households’ future. Typically grandparenthood is welcome. Different occasions, it’s a shock and a shock. It might probably trigger emotional ache or reveal unhealed trauma and secrets and techniques. There are turning factors in each technology that must be revealed and mentioned.

This begins with conversations in a nonjudgmental surroundings by dialogue and dialogue, the place questions are requested, and options are probed to implement adjustments in a single’s personal self, group, and medical follow.

What else would you wish to share with us about help for grandparents or the significance of intergenerational connection?

Coaching is paramount. Within the Seventies, the founders of PEP wrote a volunteer coaching curriculum. That coaching continues at the moment. Within the Nineties, I initiated the PSI coaching. In 2014, I authored the e book I’m Listening. It’s the basis to precisely develop help, consolation, and steering for the whole household. What started as a “mothers-only focus” then expanded to fathers and should now embody grandparents. At present, I’m the one PSI volunteer taking calls from grandparents. This wants to vary. It’s my imaginative and prescient that PSI turns into a full-life cycle, intergenerational group as a result of I do know that postpartum is endlessly.

Jane Honikman, M.S.

Jane is an activist and advocate for parental psychological well being who was born and raised in Palo Alto, California.

After graduating from Whittier School with a BA in Sociology in 1967, she and her husband, Terry, moved to Santa Barbara, California, in 1970, the place she joined the native Department of the American Affiliation of College Girls (AAUW). Her profession was launched in 1977 as a co-founder of Postpartum Training for Mother and father (PEP) in Santa Barbara, funded by a group grant from AAUW. In 1980, she obtained a person analysis grant from AAUW to check The Progress and Dynamics of Postpartum Assist Teams in the US. Primarily based on her analysis and the rising want for psychological well being help for folks, Jane based Postpartum Assist Worldwide (PSI) in 1987 and directed the group for 20 years. She obtained her MS in psychology in 1995.

Jane is acknowledged as a world pioneer in perinatal psychological well being and has spoken in Australia, Canada, England, France, Germany, Israel, New Zealand, Norway, Scotland, South Africa, Turkey and Wales. She co-founded The Parental Motion Institute (PAI) in 2016, whose mission is to energise and revitalize professionals and guardian advocates to help new households.

Jane is the writer of: Neighborhood Assist for New Households (2013), I’m Listening (2014), Postpartum Motion Handbook (2015), Parental Psychological Well being Factoring in Fathers (2020), The Fathers Workbook (2021), Postpartum Is Ceaselessly (2022), and Love, Secrecy and Delivery (2025).

Jane and Terry have three married grownup kids, eight grandchildren, and a cat.

Interview performed by Postpartum Assist Worldwide’s Samantha Reaves, MA, PMH-C.

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