Unmotivated adult child refusing to work or leave home

[BBU]

My sister is now 23 years old, graduated from university over a year ago and has since just lived at home and not made any effort to find a job / earn any money. Part of this is my parents fault - because they were very busy when we were younger with work and weren’t very present, they’ve always felt quite guilty and have tried to make up for it by being very generous with money. As a result my sister has never worked a day in her life, always received an allowance from our parents and continue to do so. My parents just assumed this would stop when she graduated and started working.

Since finishing university, she has just stayed at home - playing computer games, watching tv, sleeping. She doesn’t have many friends and doesn’t like to leave the house. When my mum has tried to talk to her about needing to find a job and becoming independent, it’s always ended badly with her crying and saying she’d rather kill herself. The situation has got worse recently as my parents both retired last month and they hadn’t factored in needing to support another adult in retirement, so feeling the strain financially.

When I’ve tried to talk to my sister about finding a job, her response is she doesn’t like the idea of “answering to a boss” and “being forced to do things she doesn’t like”. When I’ve tried to explain that not all work is like that, I get very teenage responses like “my lecturer at university said that was exactly what it’s like” and “I look at your life and would die if I had to live it”.

My parents don’t know what to do as they’re worried she’ll hurt herself if they push her too hard. They are asking me to “help” her because she usually listens to me more but I’m not sure I know what to do either. They’ve stopped giving her an allowance since retirement but they still pay for everything around the house and she has mum’s credit card which she shops on…

My mum has on occasion said things to me like: “when we die, you’ll have to make sure your sister is looked after” but I’ve made it quite clearly I can’t support a fully grown adult.

Please don’t let them do this to you. They are your parents as well as hers, and they shouldn’t be trying to make you feel responsible for her. She is an adult, she isn’t severely disabled, she just doesn’t want to work. At 23 she could turn things around. Threatening suicide is appalling.

I actually got half way through reading this before my 'fuck that for a game of soldiers' response kicked in.

What's your gut feeling? Is she lazy and manipulative or is she scared and in need of mentoring and/or mental health assistance?

She's a bit of a product of your parents goal to leave her wanting for nothing. Advising tough love is a bit unfair as she didn't ask to be spoiled from a young age and being a good parent is gradually giving responsibility and installing work ethic and resilience and not just providing a nice home near good schools.

On the bright side it's an unmotivated sister and not a brother. There's plenty of men willing to take on the burden of looking after her and a lot less patient women who'd do the same for a brother. Also lots of unmotivated young girls can get money from OnlyFans and the like which men don't have as a fall back.

The only real solutions to her fixing this is find someone else to spoil her ie an unbalanced traditional relationship where she doesn't work. Or alternatively she needs to move out and take on some responsibility. This will motivate her and give focus and achievement. Could your parents stump up a deposit and pay the first few months rent with goal she has to take on the lease and moving back in isn't an option?

Ah thank you for point that out! Have found the quote function!

I think it’s a bit of both tbh. She has a very gen z mentality of I hate office jobs / your lives all look awful / I want to do something I’m passionate about and don’t know why you would “suffer”, which I find frustrating and we’ve had a lot of convos throughout her childhood / teenage years about how we can’t always have what me want - it always ends in tears and “I hate growing up” statements.

She lives a comfortable life at home but is also very low needs - in that she doesn’t have a lot of “wants”, so even if parents took away the credit card, she could probably “survive” a long time just relying on her savings (basically parent’s allowance for the last 8-10 years). She doesn’t want to travel, go out for dinners / with friends, doesn’t do a lot of “nice to have” shopping. It’s essentially just computer games all day.

My parents actually purchased a 1 bedroom apartment for her using university with the intention she’d move in and live rent free but cover expenses. She never moved in cause covid hit and now has made it clear she doesn’t want to move out (she doesn’t want to cook / clean etc).

My mum has also always been generous with her because she’s worried if she’s not, my sister would find it somewhere else - ie be dependent on a man, go down other routes like OnlyFans or worse. I don’t think that’s really a huge concern but it worries my parents, so they’ve always be unwilling to push her too hard and think it’ll get better “when she grows up”.

This sounds exactly like what we are going through. And totally agree it feels like it’ll just get harder the older she gets / the less forgiving society will be.

She was always not incentivised by social activities / money - never really made friends at school, never goes out with friends / do any social activities. Didn’t help that her last 2 years of uni was during covid so that was the perfect excuse to never leave home.

Thank you! That’s absolutely on our radar but I don’t think she’s anywhere close to that, thank goodness. When you don’t talk to her about this stuff she’ll perfectly happy and normal - she also has online friends who she games with and they happily chat away.

She does have the credit card but actually doesn’t buy much with it other than essentials like food / groceries / petrol. Still it ideal at that age to be spending your parents money though…

Has she ever had a boyfriend or relationship? Does she show any interest in one day getting married or having kids of her own?

Hi OP I'm the younger sister with a similar age gap and my sis is also a bit of a "second mum"/ wiser adult who I have relied on for advice and support. Being honest, there are (occasional) times she's had to tell me some uncomfortable home truths, and it IS much better coming from your sister than your parents.
I don't think it's your responsibility but your parents are right that she might respond better to your intervention then theirs.

That said, I think you ask need to agree to present a United front. You could agree to deliver the difficult message but mum and dad (when she comes wailing back) need to say "BBU is right and we all agree that it's now time for you to start [paying rent, earning money, engaging with career coaching/ counselling, whatever]" and not pander to her.

You can be clear that you love her, will be there to support her in any way you can (not having her move in rent free obvs 😉) but that you can't sit back and watch a capable, talented young person waste their youth doing nothing.

PPs are right that she sounds depressed and may have much lower self esteem so be prepared to engage and offer sympathy but be clear that these problems are only likely to get worse unless she engages with some outside help.

Best of luck! You sound like an awesome sister xx

To add, after your follow up, her life sounds utterly miserable and neither would I be motivated to work if it was just to buy crisps at the local shop and petrol to drive there!! I think you all need to have a good hard think and identify one thing, anything that has sparked some passion or enthusiasm in her during her life so far... going to the theatre? Making clothes? Any sport or activity? Puppies? Fly fishing? Baking? Something you can really actively encourage and engage her in which would give her a purpose in life beyond eating, sleeping and looking at a screen.

Never - and when asked, she says she doesn’t want any of that. When she heard that my husband and I were considering children she was absolutely shocked and … quite frankly … disgusted, which I told her was quite rude.

She loves art and really enjoyed her degree in design but flat out refuses to make a living out of it because she thinks it’ll ruin her passion for it. She hates the idea of being “told what to do” - ie if she was to do freelance artist work, she’d hate being told by a customer what they wanted.

During covid she got really into beauty / skincare / nail art and got really good at it so we encouraged her to pursue that more professionally (and parents even offered to pay for courses) - but the answer was the same, she didn’t want to turn it into a job as that’ll involve listening to what customers wanted and not what she wanted!

It's a real shame as she sounds so incredibly spoilt and also so very disconnected from the real world.

Beggars can't be choosers! How does she think the rest of us put up with working? Does she think she's better than you and your parents??

I think for now I would fucus on engaging her in the activity, not talking about making a living from it. But mum removes the credit card so its: oh your nails look amazing what design are you planning next? Oh you ran out of supplies, well if you got a few hours work it would cover plenty of supplies (just retail work/deliveroo anything to get in the habit of working is fine). Then if you can get her to do a tiny bit of any work, encourage her to do nice things with the cash (can she afford to buy mum or dad a nice gift? Or take them out to eat?) And lots of praise when she does it. Maybe she just needs to get into the positive loop of work =money =freedom/ choices to do nice things. I wouldn't think about a career anything just generating positive feelings about work, which she doesn't seem to have atm.

But I mean an expensive hobby would be even better 😆 paragliding, flying lessons, a dog, riding lessons, surfing, van conversion. All very immersing and really motivate you to earn some £££ 🤣

Is there a chance that your sister is using the threat of self-harm to manipulate your parents into doing what she wants?

She hates the idea of being "told what to do"

It is fairly common for people to feel like that about the workplace, but it also sounds very teenager-ish and it appears she's like it at home as well, and is digging her heels in at every suggestion from you and your parents.

She might not like being told what to do, but she's holding your parents to ransom and demanding that they support her financially.

Apart from the roof over her head, food and basic toiletries, they need to cut off the supply of money.

I’m going to stick my neck out here. She sounds undiagnosed ASD.

No friends
No past relationships
No desire for a social life
No desire for a relationship
Scared of getting a job.
Prefers to stay at home.

l have an ASs Dd 17. I’m terrified of failure to launch, but she easily gets overwhelmed and retreats.

I think your first point of call is a GP. This sounds like very anxious avoidant behaviour to me.

I was thinking that too, especially coupled with the immature thinking, the desire for everything to remain the same and the very childish reaction to the idea of the OP having children.

(houseful of varying degrees of ASD here)

I'm the parent in a similar situation, not a sibling, but:

• we are doing our best to ease our very worried 20-something out into own accommodation
• we have told his siblings that they are not to feel responsible for his support later (well, I did; DH was appalled and tried to argue that it was their duty, but has seen sense)

This is very interesting and not something that was on our radar (we thought maybe depression was). Will ask parents to look into it!

I’ve definitely had the “it’s your duty” guilt tripping thing but I was very firm shutting that down. I’m more than happy to help my sister if she was helping herself / has goals - in fact my husband arranged for really helpful contacts in her industry to mentor her / help her get her foot in the door into the industry but she refused to attend and flaked. We are definitely not able to / willing to support her financially forever.

They often fall apart after a degree. There are other flashpoints but a degree is one of them.