I've had enough of parenting adult kids- just a rant

[notatherapist]

Name changed because I feel guilty. Like the title says, I just don't want to parent this heavily when they are NT 21 and 23. I feel emotionally exhausted by how much they need me even when one is at uni and one is working. Working one currently at home as going travelling in a month or so.

Im always needed for 'emergencies', always expected to answer texts quickly, my advice is usually wrong. I can't get involved in issues but if I don't get involved then it's uncaring.

It's probably menopause related too but come on now, I barely needed my parents by their age and yet I see no immediate end in site. I will always be there for them and will never say this stuff to them but wondered if I am alone in my thoughts or is it more common as life is pretty unaffordable for this generation.

I think you are a parent for life but as they get older you need to step back and let them figure out stuff for themselves. Instead of giving advise just listen or help them weigh up choices.

Yes I hear you too and mine are mid to late 20s. The inevitable emotional fall out from (yet another) failed relationship, career/phd choices and issues, accommodation problems, chronic health problems, it's endless. Their childhood was a breeze in comparison. I feel worn out with it all. We're approaching retirement age and I don't think I'll ever feel at peace.

I love this.

That sounds like a really interesting approach. I'm learning!

This has been a very interesting thread. I've always said that parenting adult children is much harder than parenting younger ones. Not physically but very much emotionally.

I'm struggling with my 26 ds. I lost my eldest ds at 18 to cancer of the brain. Youngest ds was 14/15/16 at the time of his brother's illness and death. Horrific for all of us, horrific in many different ways. 10 years on we are both trying to navigate normal life stresses alongside grief and trauma from what happened. 10 years on my ds is now trying to make sense of everything that happened, how it affects his decisions or more likely his inability to make decisions.

He is at crisis point and parenting this is terribly terribly hard. He's good at being physically independent, lives on his own, manages his own bills, washing, cooking, job etc.

I'm finding it hard to know when it's a listening ear he wants or advice he wants. He has survivors guilt, I have a mums guilt that his life was affected beyond measure by what happened. I try to solve things for him because of this guilt, this guilt that I couldn't save his brother, and couldn't save him from the trauma of losing his brother. We are probably both fucked up. We did have an honest, very tearful conversation last week when I was also able to talk to him about my struggles, and I think we have made a bit of headway with communicating with each other.

I need to stop solving, he needs to communicate when he wants to vent or talk through. He has a counsellor but I'm still his safe person. I need to be that for him but in a way that is positive for both of us.

Our life experiences are different. I left home at 19, bought a flat at 22. It was simpler then. His late teens/early adulthood have been traumatic.

We are trying to navigate this but we are both exhausted from life experiences.

I have gone off on a tangent and all our experiences are different. I want to acknowledge that this stage of parenting is difficult. We all want the best for our kids. We will get it wrong many times, as will our kids. There are things from this thread that I will take on board so I can help us both navigate our way through.

I left home at 21 and never depended on my parents either financially or emotionally after leaving home. I found my own way and at times it was tough but I saw myself as an adult. Just as well as both of my parents were dead by the time I was 30.

We need to treat our children as adults and encourage them to think for themselves whilst listening and being supportive. I will listen and give advice if they ask for it but decisions, and the consequences of those decisions, have to be their own. It does them no favours to not enable them to face life's challenges. Life isn't a bed of roses and difficult things will happen to them and they need to be able to deal with them, possibly alone.

A friend told me on Friday that her 24 year old daughter has gone on holiday for 10 days. She's looking after her dog so she's had to cancel all her social arrangements (including a theatre trip we've bought tickets for) and she's going to be doing a 3 hour round trip every two days to water her daughter's plants. Her daughter shouldn't be asking her mum to do this (what happened to arranging for a friend or neighbour to water plants, putting the dog in kennels...) but it's expected that my friend will do it. And my friend thinks this perfectly reasonable. I know she loves her daughter and she's doing it for that reason but she's doing her no favours in the long run.

Thank you so much for sharing these experiences. There have been traumatic things here too over pandemic and before that.

It helps me hearing that parenting adult children can be hard. There seems to be much talk in general about the earlier years and very little about parenting this age group. So important to hear strategies. Thanks.

TBH I ring my mum daily. The same way I ring my best friend daily. They both help me out and I help them out. Aren't you supposed to talk to your Mum about getting a parking ticket and being pissed off? Or you're selling your home and don't know what to do about xyz? Or you've got school options coming up and you're panicking?

I'm 49. Mum is in her 70's.

I'm getting the vibe from this thread I'm not even supposed to bother her with anything in my life other than ""everything's great thanks Mum"

I'm perfectly independent at 49. My Mum tells me all of her friends worry about their adult (my age ++) children so I would say all of this is normal.

Maybe, gently, I could suggest that my generation are the first generation who were super selfish so don't like having their 20 something children still needing them!!!

I really think it's irrelevant that at this age you were living independently, or were married or whatever. So what? My dds are the same (my 24 yo ds less so) - they come home to recharge, and I like that! It's nice that they still think of home as a safe, nurturing place. It's nice that they ask me for advice. My 20 yo dd was just dumped by her first serious boyfriend - why wouldn't she want to come home and be hugged by her mother, be looked after? I wish my mother had done the same for me.

I don't drive them anywhere, because I don't have a car, I don't pay for much because I don't have a lot of money, but they do come to me for support, and that's fine.

I dislike it more that they would, if left to themselves, revert to toddler mode at home and expect me to cook and tidy for them, but I think I was probably a bit like that too - reverting to my childhood role when I went home.

This is exactly what's wrong. Helicopter parenting and not allowing them to sort out their own problems. It's not about "running themselves into the ground", it's about being an adult and not expecting your parents to solve any problems which arise. Young people are being molly coddled and not allowed to grow up!

I do think the pandemic also plays a part for young people.

At the age your DC were at during covid, would have been peak going out and socialising time for previous generations.

They missed going out and making multiple small mistakes that they learn from. Now they are a bit older with bigger decisions to make but none of the experience.

I would also talk to them about it, explaining that you want them to have the chance to start solving problems on their own.

I also think you can then talk to them slightly differently, asking them to sort things themselves more.

Its swings and roundabouts isn’t it? At that age I was way way more independent, but on other hand I barely spoke to my parents, and I also took all manner of shit at work. As an employer now I think Gen zs are more sensitive/too sensitive, but I admire their refusal to work all hours to get on as my generation did.

For many years now society has been infantalising kids and parents have been complicit in this.
How can young adults be expected to grow up if they're not allowed to go to the dentist on their own under 16? If they're not allowed to walk to school alone under 12? If they're not allowed to play out all day unsupervised under 14? They're given pocket money but no responsibility. They get looked after, picked up after, organised.
It's probably your fault but it's not yours alone. Society has a massive guilt here.

I must say I hear you and I do think kids are less independent and confident in their judgement these days. I was unusual in that I lost both parents as a teenager and had been used to fending for myself before that as my mum spent most of her last few years in hospital. So I had to work it out-and when I had my own kids, I resolved to ensure they grew up able to look after themselves. I was amazed at how other parents of my acquaintance used to step in and sort out issues for their kids. Anything-friendship issues, teacher issues, finance, controlling how they spent their money and their time. No wonder those kids never developed the confidence to deal with setbacks and things going a bit wrong. A permanent case of Mummy Fix It.

I personally think it’s lovely that they still choose you for support at their age. It’s really a compliment about the relationship you have built with them and how much they value you. I’m 34 and have a very close relationship with my mum and hope I have the same with my children when they get older. I don’t think there’s ever a time when you’re not needed as a mum but it’s also completely normal to feel emotionally drained by it and need a break sometimes - I think that’s just the life of a mother at all different stages.

My dd is 32 with 2 kids and a dp but still expects me to financially support them and run around after them, it hurts so much

I never had support from my parents so I'm a very resilient as is my DH. My adult kids it seems to be all or nothing ! they seem to be very competent adults and I'm not even on their radar when everything is going great for them but when they have a crisis I couldn't be more visible . Fucking pisses me off and it feels like I'm just trauma bonded to them just to clean up their shit . So I distanced myself from it and I decide if I'm available now . It's amazing what they can cope with when they don't have the option of dumping it on someone else 😉

There is a difference though-I’m close to my young adult children-and my daughter is still happy living at home. I really enjoy spending time with them and they chat to me about anything -my son regularly messages me for recipes so he can cook him and his gf a meal. I want to help and support if they need it. I’m talking about things like petulant entitlement, expecting parents to fund whatever lifestyle they want because they don’t fancy a full time job, expecting parents to drop everything to sort out minor problems and to put parents out to satisfy adult children’s convenience. Not good.

I think you need to ask them ? you might be surprised to learn that they aren't so chuffed with it all ! In my experience adult children rarely know or care what their parents actually think of the relationship .

I think that brain development line is a cop out and an excuse to keep helicoptering. They need to make their own mistakes - will they even listen to the parents anyway? Plus our advice is way out of date.

I completely agree. In the past people functioned as adults from a very early age. This pretense that people in their 20s are children with under developed brains does nobody - parent or offspring - any favors.

It certainly would never occur to me to burden my elderly mother with such trivia.

I wonder how much the pandemic followed by wfh as played into this too?

Certainly young people feel more isolated with a smaller social circle now.

Your adult children want to reset and recharge? When do you get to reset and recharge? I thought the selfish stage was supposed to be over by 20s.