Should you call your children your best friend, is this healthy? Had this discussion with a family member and it didn’t go too well really.

[Caramelshortcake1]

We can absolutely all have our own opinions on this but I’m pretty sure making your children your best friend isn’t healthy. This family member definitely has some kind of people trauma and she always talks about how people are bad. Her two girls she is bringing up to be her best friends. They all do things together. They don’t have any friends outside, they don’t go to groups. They say that when they grow up they will all live together and never leave home. Family is all they need, friends let you down etc etc.

I just find this odd. I mean I love my kids but I have my own friends and I actively encourage them about how important friends are. I invite them over and they go to clubs etc. No way in hell do I want us all living together forever. I want them to go and live a life. But obviously we’ll be here if they need in anyway.

Do you think it’s healthy to live with that belief? Won’t it stop them from loving life and seeking who they are?

No, I don't think it's healthy. I love my daughter so so much but we're not friends, I have a duty of care to her which supercedes any want or need in me to be her friend. A friendship is an equal relationship, the parent child relationship isn't (or shouldn't be). I don't think I can be an effective parent while also being her bestie. My best friend is an adult, hers is a girl her own age, as it should be.

She's 16 now and we're very close, but I still wouldn't describe her as my best friend. I hope that once she's spread her wings and grown and become the woman I sometimes see hiding just below the surface these days, then we can be friends, when my responsibility to raise her, nurture her, teach her, and at times manage her has ended. Just like I'm friends with my mam now I'm an adult.

the problem today is too many parents want to be their childrens best friend.. so they leave the dscipline and boundaries too others, usually nursery or school and by then its too late, the child is unruly. then you get the 'why won't my child behave' threads and the 'why are my children so entitled' threads.

parents need to step up and be parents and if that means they upset their child, i can assure you it wont be for long and they will thank you for it when they are adults.

I don't think it is healthy, no. My daughter is now an adult and, while we are great friends, she is not my best friend. There are things I talk about with my best friend that I would never discuss with my daughter and when she was younger I was very much her parent and not her best friend.

My kids are not my friends. I’ve raised them to be people I like and we have great relationships but I’ve absolutely no qualms about setting boundaries and “laying down the law”. My friendships are with equals and my children (16-22) are not my equals yet (as in, I’m in charge). Obviously the older ones I am less “in charge” but you don’t gain equality living in your parents home contributing nothing 🙄

Don’t get me wrong these children are super will behaved with great manners. But they are very nervous and scared now to join clubs and need lots of coaxing to attend parties. The mum needs them, it’s all she has because she is to shy to make friends. It sad, I invite them over but they will often sit in the corner together. They won’t separate from each other. The two sisters and the mum are like one person.

Oh gosh no... Not healthy at all.
What you've described there is a Cult.

It's great to have a close relationship with your parents / children, but best friends? No.

Your family members needs serious help. Her attitude is very alarming and will be very damaging to her children.

It feels like this. They are all the same, they like the same things, dislike the same things, they do the same things, they all wear each others clothes, behave the same way, believe the same things. Sometimes when I visit I come home and thing gosh my family is so challenging. Both my kids are quite independent and loud and want to do what they want and I’m forever trying to manage it. But then I visit friends and feel relief that it’s all normal.

My daughter is almost an adult. I would count her as a friend, we have lots of similar interests and love doing stuff together. She confides in me and we are very close.
But first and foremost I am her mum. I have no problem saying no or laying down the law if she does something I don't agree with or needs clear guidance. It doesn't effect the "friendship" we have and we both have our own friends/do stuff away from one another. But I genuinely appreciate the relationship we have built as she had a very turbulent few years which were horrendous, isolated herself from others etc and was quite mentally unwell. She has bloomed into a wonderful human.

When my daughter was a child she was a child.
She's now 32 and a mum herself.
She calls me her best friend.. even though we have our own friends.
I'm the first person she comes to for advice.. to moan.. to get comfort.
She told me first she was gay.
She asks me advice on just about everything.
She knows she can confined in me and tell me anything .
She has a partner and sister and friends.. but I'm her " go to" and l feel privileged.
She's also my best friend too.
Works both ways.

She is very nervous. She doesn’t and can’t really work and takes anxiety medication. But the partners parents are very involved with them and they promote it all. It’s all quite odd. We don’t really see them much.

The children are being made to fulfil the mother’s emotional needs, in a way that damages their own wellbeing. That’s emotional abuse and you need to consider referring it to your local authority’s safeguarding team. You can do it anonymously.

I think that is putting too much pressure on the child. When they grow up it is going to be very difficult for them to lead independent lifes if their mother is making them all be so co dependent

This is what I imagine when someone describes a parent that way, it sounds totally healthy. I envy you and your daughter. I wish I had that with my mum and strive for it with my girls, to be their go to person whilst still having room for their own friends and relationships outside of family. I’d describe them as best friends tbh!

I think what the OP has described sounds very different and unhealthy. I feel sorry for that mother she sounds lonely :(

How old are the children? Do they go to nursery and/or school? My youngest tells me she is never moving out but then she is only 5.

Mine told me if she can’t marry her sister she’ll marry me! 😂 Hoping she grows out of it..

My mum is deeply important to me and she has helped so very much as an adult but as my mum, she is mum not best friend.

Her two girls she is bringing up to be her best friends. They all do things together. They don’t have any friends outside, they don’t go to groups. They say that when they grow up they will all live together and never leave home. Family is all they need, friends let you down etc etc.

It's blatantly obvious that this is very unhealthy. Your job as a parent is to bring up independent adults. Children should have their own friends and interests with the aim of having their own homes and families (if they want).

The mother sounds mentally unwell.

They are end of primary school. I really feel for them. They are lovely children don’t get me wrong but they are like caged birds.

Really unhealthy and very isolating.

I don’t know. I know she didn’t have a great childhood and started her family age 17 because she was desperate to be a mum. It feels like she is trying to recreate what she didn’t have but that isn’t her children’s responsibility in life.

Yes: https://www.icsahome.com/elibrary/topics/articles/how-a-dysfunctional-family-functions-like-a-cult

Your family, otoh, sounds lovingly normal 😊

I don't think it's helpful to think of it in terms of friendship at all. I think both the best friend gang and the you shouldn't be a friend gang are wrong.

Both of these sides of the coin involve unreasonable expectations of children.

My children are my 'friends' (they are all adults), but even with my youngest daughter, to whom I am very close, we are not 'best friends'. They have partners and other friends for that. If I really WERE their 'best friend' then I imagine that they would be in permanent terror of what they will do when I am no longer here. I want them to be independent, to mourn me when I go, but remember me fondly. Not be too paralysed to carry on.