Lesley Stahl On Her New Book 'Becoming Grandma'

Jim Braude: Lesley thanks for being here.

Lesley Stahl: My great pleasure.

JB: So, The Joys and Science of the New Grandparenting, Becoming Grandma, so America's second most famous grandma, which you are, we’ll get to the other one of the couple of seconds. I think I understand the joys thing, but the science, you contend that we're actually hardwired to really get into this grandkid. Is that true?

LS: Well you tell me why virtually every grandparent you've ever heard of who may have been very strict with their own kids, may have been controlling, may have been highly critical all the time, sit up straight, all turn into mush balls the minute they become a grandparent.

JB: Because they’re atoning for their sins as a mother or a father, no?

LS: No, believe me, it is just something that happens. So all of a sudden the word no is disabled. You know, and it's universal. So where does that come from.

JB: Because of this hardwiring and whatever it is it is not dissimilar from romantic love or love you feel for the kid.

LS: This is this is why I put science on the front page. Because a biochemist told me that the wiring for romantic love in our brains and the chemicals that coursed through that for romantic love is exactly the same as for baby love. And when you fall in love with a baby you use the same language.

JB: Okay let's stay with the title of The Joys and Science of the New Grandparenting. I think you learn when you read this you are not your grandmother's oldsmobile, I mean that's pretty obvious. And there's data in here to suggest that we have become even more into grandparenting as the years goes along, is that not true.

LS: Well we're more into grand parenting for many reasons. First of all, our children probably both are working, they're stretched, they are exhausted, and they frankly need us. Childcare is ridiculously expensive. It can cost in some cities as much as college, so our children need us as babysitters and they need our money so we are getting more and more involved because they need us more and more.

JB: And the joy part of this, a minute ago you totally dismissed, I mean you are, you were one of the first women to break into the industry at this kind of level. You worked like a dog. So you don't think there's a, I mean you did, I mean everybody knows your history. You don't think there's a piece of you that says maybe I wasn't there for my kids as much as I should have been so I'm really going to be there for those two little sweethearts on the cover. Is there nothing none of that?

LS: I think that I regret the things I missed, but my daughter, I talked her into this, but she always said thank God you work mom. And I used to say that to her. Believe me, Taylor, thank God your mother is at work all day. I do regret things I missed, but I don't think my emotions and how I’m acting toward my grandchildren has anything to do with that. I do think it's all hardwired and I think we all, I mean, you can't ever say all — are you a grandfather?

JB: No I am not.

LS: You're not a grandfather. Well I can tell you that the emotions are unexpected. They're surprise, we don't plan it out, it's overwhelmingly enormous the kind of love we have for these babies, and we want to be in their life so desperately.

JB: Y'know, speaking of am I a grandfather, and the answer is no, you contend this is a gender-neutral kind of thing. You talk about the situations of your with your husband and what Parkinson's that he's suffering – what's the impact you contend was a direct, causal connection between these grandkids and your husband's health.

LS: Well stunningly, when the first grandchild five years ago was born his symptoms disappeared, and we went from specialist to specialist and said what is going on here. And they could never figure it out. It was definitely Parkinson's, it isn't that he didn't have it, and the symptoms did eventually come back, but for one year after having all the symptoms he had no symptoms. So I have my answer since nobody could explain it is just the emotional high of the love you feel for these babies. This y'know, and I worked with Bob Simon who had severe depression and his grandson was born and poof it went away.

JB: So do you. Can you appreciate the notion, I'm sitting here talking to Lesley Stahl. We've been watching, everybody feels they know you even though we don't, you’re a local kid but.

LS: I am.

JB: We feel we know you even though we don't – we just know you through a screen. You're as tough as anybody in the business and you're writing the softest I mean on a pejorative way. I mean it's almost like an out-of-body experience for the reader – do you object to my saying. I mean it is so weird.

LS: Well I don't think I'm the toughest. You know what's really funny—

JB: You were tough. But go ahead.

LS: What's really funny is Mike Wallace. Another local kid, I'm from Swampscott. Mike Wallace did a lot of heart-warming pieces. He flirted with movie stars. He did funny pieces. He did musical pieces, but people only remember the tough, hard news, investigative pieces that he did, so he got this image even though there was a completely other side to him that was seen on television. And I think maybe a little of that has happened with me.

JB: I mentioned you're the second most famous grandmother in America. Let’s talk about the most famous grandmother. Hillary Clinton from time to time – is  it Charlotte, the name?

LS: Charlotte.

JB: I've heard you say that if you were her, you'd be talking about Charlotte even more. Why?

LS: Well I joined a focus group and during the campaign and they were Republicans, and I asked them: Hillary Clinton's being a grandmother – do you think that softens her image and would help with the negatives that she has, very high negatives. And these were Republicans. They said yes, as long as it doesn't look like she's exploiting the kids, so she can't walk around with the child. But I thought after I did the focus group that if she mentioned the baby more than just reminded people that she's a grandmother, because grandmothers have this golden halo over their head. Just the sense of a grandmother, people think love. They think unconditional love.

JB: But doesn't run a foul notion, one of the places she’s not doing terribly well is white men. White men want toughness, theoretically that's why they're gravitating towards Donald Trump – you don’t think so?

LS: I don't think that's why they don't like Hillary.

JB: Why do you think they don’t like Hillary.

LS: I think they see maybe too much toughness in her. And I really haven't looked at the polls to say why, but I think it's how she presents herself. More than that they don't want a strong leader

JB: Do you want a quiz? Sure, why not Jim. Who are Arabella, Joseph, Kai, Theodore, Tristen, Chloe, and Spencer? I can't believe I'm stumping Lesley Stahl. I'll give you one more hint. The eighth one is Donald the third, now who are they.

LS: Oh okay.

JB: The eight grandchildren of Donald Trump. He's a grandfather too. Ivanka, allegedly his daughter's, they say his closest adviser, she's got at least a couple of kids. We interviewed her in New Hampshire I think when she was very pregnant right before. Does it work for Trump when he talks about the grandkids or doesn't fit the M.O.?

LS: Well and my focus group it was about grandmothers. And I think it does work only for grandmothers – you know any president – because grandmothers have a reputation of being wholesome. Baking cookies, being warm, and having that unconditional love, and grandparents – grandfathers – they're the more playful ones, they do the horse playing, the throwing the kids around, and it's just not, it doesn't have the same connotation.

JB: Well let me just challenge it in one way. I was thinking a lot about this when I was reading your book. Bernie Sanders is 74.

LS: He doesn’t come across as a grandfather.

JB: Well, except for the fact, stay with me on this, I'm not even sure I agree with myself on this, but he's saying what you describe here. You know it's almost like the doting grandfather. You can of all the ice cream you want, you can have free college tuition, and that horrible parent of yours, that Hillary Clinton, she's not going to let you have those kinds of – I mean young people are drawn to him. I'm not saying it's not ideological, it's not on the issues. You don't think there's a little piece of that incredible connection between young people and a 74-year-old guy.

LS: Oh you know something, I remember when Reagan ran for president and the first time I went with him to a college and they went crazy. I thought a rock star was coming into the stadium. Same kind of energy for this much older guy. So there's sometimes is a connection with grandpa. We love grandpa by the way. And maybe you're right. Maybe that sense of that generation and skipping your parents, you know that idea of that common enemy, maybe there is something to it but why isn't it working for her?

JB: Well you've read the book Not I. You know you know I was going to bring this up but since you brought it up briefly before we go. You were a White House Correspondent for a long time. You faced a major dilemma as you were leaving the White House with Ronald Reagan. Can you briefly describe to people what that dilemma was?

LS: Yeah, that's not in this book, it’s in the other book! I had a meeting with him in 1986. And I thought–

JB: That was your exit interview, right, sort of a ceremonial say goodbye to the correspondent.

LS: Right. And he seemed to be off in space. He didn't seem to be alert or even aware what was happening in the room. My husband was with me, he’s a screenwriter. And I kept throwing out little things that I thought would amuse the president and engage him. Nothing, nothing, nothing. So I start composing a piece in my head about how the president is senile. So the press secretary said her husband's a screenwriter. I'm telling you, Ronald Reagan popped to life. He went from a hundred years old to 30. And he put his arm around my husband and they went off to the corner in the Oval Office and the press secretary couldn't get Reagan away from my husband Aaron. And I thought, ‘What the heck did I just see.’ And as we were leaving the Oval Office, he brought up things that I had said that he hadn't responded to when I said it.

JB: Which convinced you that it probably as the non-scientist was unwise for you to say what you were contemplating saying.

LS: Oh, I didn't know what I was saying so how could I say anything?

JB: Before you leave, Lesley Stall, in light of what happened this weekend, when you see 49 young people killed and you care as much about these two little beautiful kids on the cover of your book, what do you say to yourself about the world in which they will grow up.

LS: Well don't think it doesn't just pop right into your head. As a grandparent, that's what you worry about. What kind of a country, what kind of a world will they face. It just sits here, and I think every grandparent listening is going to say I'm just like that. But I wonder if my grandparents didn't say the same thing. Because every generation faces some kind of crisis, always, and we think when we're in the middle of it it's the worst ever. But it certainly does feel like the worst ever.

JB: Lesley it’s a pleasure to meet you. Congratulations on your book. Thanks so much.

LS: Thank you so much.