Because you have the timeline backwards, it's always been for both positive and negative relationships, but has increasingly been used only to describe negative or harmful relationships.No. Grooming has a terrible connotation because it is a term for a bad dynamic. If it's a good dynamic, it's not grooming, it's something else. I don't know why people are trying to extend the definition of grooming to include both good and bad situations, that seems to me to be a very slippery slope.
Ever helped a younger relative become a better person despite not being their parent? Congratulations, you groomed them, and they are better for it.