A new way to support grandparents raising kids affected by the addiction epidemic

Happy shouts and laughter fill the cafeteria at Locust Grove Baptist Church in New Market, Alabama — a small town just outside of Huntsville, in the northern part of the state.

While the grandparents eat dinner, their grandchildren chase each other around the tables.

They call themselves “grandfamilies.” Everyone here knows each other.

It’s the quarterly meeting of a group called Grandparents as Parents, a time when they can get the kids together and catch up over spaghetti, Caesar salad, and homemade chocolate mud pie.

But beneath all the joyful camaraderie lie tough stories. These personal histories and traumas bubble up casually, as they can in conversations between people with shared experiences.

“My daughter is addicted to drugs,” explains Donna Standridge.

She’s seated at a table with her husband, Jeff. Between bites, she’s keeping an eye on one of her grandsons. He’s desperate for her attention, hanging onto her arm, crying “Mawmaw! Mawmaw! Mawmaw!” as she tries to eat and talk.

Standridge is 55, Jeff is 66. Instead of retiring or traveling, they’re raising four grandsons — ages 11, 7, 5 and 3 — in nearby Jefferson County.

“Opioids is where it all began,” Standridge says of her daughter’s struggles. In a story that echoes so many others, Standridge says her daughter’s opioid use disorder started with prescription painkillers, before eventually moving to heroin and finally, fentanyl.

Standridge says her daughter loves her sons and has had periods of sobriety. At times, she’s been in treatment and made progress. Other times, she’s gone back to using. The back and forth, Standridge says, is hard on the kids. That’s why she and her husband stepped in to care for them.

“Because of the addiction and being in active addiction, relapsing and stuff when she was clean, it wasn’t a healthy environment for them.”

Parental addiction is driving formation of new ‘grandfamilies’

There was another reason these grandfamilies had gathered at the church on Aug. 22 — besides support and community. The Standridges and about 15 other families were here to learn about a new pilot program just approved by the state legislature.

Alabama has received almost $100 million dollars from legal settlements with opioid manufacturers and distributors like Cardinal Health and McKesson and pharmacies like CVS and Walgreens.

In January, the Alabama Department of Mental Health appropriated $280,000 for grandparents like these, thrust into a new phase of parenting because of their children’s struggles with opioid use disorder.

The new pilot will be managed jointly by the Alabama Department of Mental Health (ADMH) and the Alabama Department of Senior Services (ADSS).

More than 2.5 million children in the U.S. are raised by grandfamilies — grandparents, aunts, uncles, and other extended family members — when their parents are unable to care for them, according to the 2022 “State of Grandfamilies” report from Generations United, a national advocacy group.

Parental substance use, especially the rise of opioids, is a key driver behind this trend, with other family members stepping in to prevent children from entering foster care.

In Alabama, 48% of foster care entries list parental substance use as the reason for children entering the system.

Yet, the grandfamilies at this church often struggle without the formal support systems available to foster families

The funds from the new pilot program come from the opioid settlement funds the state has received thus far. Advocates say the estimated $1,000-$2,000 per family is not enough to cover the expenses that come with raising a child — much less multiple children — but it’s a good first step.

Other states may follow Alabama’s experiment

The payments are expected this fall, for grandfamilies in three counties: Madison, Coffee, and Escambia, in the northern, middle, and southern part of the state, respectively.

For the grandparents at the church, any support would be helpful. Standridge reflects that people often focus on drug users when thinking about the opioid epidemic. But it’s their families — especially the children — who must live with the impacts — and who need support as well.

“We’re the silent victims, if you will,” she says.

In Alabama, grandfamilies in Alabama don’t have access to certain welfare programs, like Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF). This new program is supposed to help alleviate that.

Unfortunately, Standridge learned later that evening, during the presentation, that her family wouldn’t qualify for the pilot payments this year, because they don’t live in one of the three counties in the pilot.

Still, Keith Lowhorne, the founder of Grandparents as Parents, is excited for the families that will be helped.

“This is like a dream come true. You’ve got grandparents that are suffering,” Lowhorne says.

As far as he knows, this is the first time that opioid settlement funds will be directed towards grandparents or relative caregivers over age 55 raising their grandchildren because of opioids.

“Alabama is not known for being first about anything,” Lowhorne says. “As far as we know, and as far as everyone has told us, this is the first for the country. We are extremely proud of that.”

Other states, such as Nevada, will soon be following suit in using settlement money to help grandfamilies, according to Lowhorne. He’s been contacted by organizations like Foster Kinship, a statewide support program in Nevada.

Using opioid settlement funds in this way is essential for placing kids with family members, instead of entering the foster care system, according to Ali Caliendo, founder and director of Nevada’s Foster Kinship.

“Every state should be allocating a portion of their settlement dollars to families raising children who are victims,” Caliendo says.

Raising grandkids later in life, on limited incomes

These grandparents have stepped up, doing the work of raising children, despite their limited resources, Caliendo says. It’s true that they are motivated by love — but love isn’t always enough to support young children.

“Love doesn’t buy groceries. Love doesn’t get beds. Love doesn’t solve medical issues,” Caliendo says. “So grandparents really do need extra financial support to make sure that those children can thrive.”

Lowhorne agrees that grandfamilies can face difficult and unique challenges. Many of them live below the poverty line and survive on fixed incomes from pensions, Social Security, or disability payments. And because grandparents are older, getting a job can be difficult — or just not an option for many.

“Some of them are living on $1,500 a month,” Lowhorne says. “And that’s not very much money these days when you’re trying to take care of a kid, possibly a baby.

In addition, Lowhorne knows grandparents who are caring for premature babies with medical issues, or infants born dependent on opioids because of the mother’s substance use.

Older children have challenges as well, Lowhorne adds, including histories of trauma, abuse or neglect.

Three counties across Alabama will receive funds

Under the pilot, Madison County, where New Market is located, will receive just over $90,000 for the year.

Families will apply for the money and could get a one-time payment between $1,000-$2,000.

Lowhorne concedes that the payment doesn’t come close to helping with all the needs, but it still “makes a world of a difference” to these grandfamilies.

Grandparents will be able to use the money to buy groceries, pay bills, obtain dental care or to enroll the kids in sports programs to keep them active. Funds can also be used for school supplies or uniforms.

Lowhorne and his wife are raising a granddaughter, and he had just taken her shopping earlier that day for a school uniform.

“Let me tell you, I learned some things on how to shop with a young, seven-year-old girl,” he says, laughing. “But it was fun. We had a good time. She said it was a daughter-daddy day.”

While the state’s first round of settlement funds is now being distributed, Alabama expects hundreds of millions more in the coming decade. Lowhorne hopes that Alabama officials will continue to distribute that money to grandfamilies, and become a model for other states as well.

“We want other states to follow because other states are just like Alabama,” Lowhorne says. “You’ve got tens of thousands of grandparents who are raising their grandchildren with hardly any help, if any help at all. Like in Alabama, they get nothing.”

This story comes from NPR’s health reporting partnership with the Gulf States Newsroom and KFF Health News.