Doing Life with Your Adult Children: Keep Your Mouth Shut and the Welcome Mat Out

Product Information

Lately I’ve wondered if adult children sense we need them and they don’t need us and painful ouch don’t want us or the thought of having to be around for us? But they don’t consciously face this? They rant, evade with blame and smokescreen us basically to force a distance hoping we will go away. Or they yell rudely to make us go away. But we still can’t condone obviously bad treatment or accept blame that’s not ours when accusations aren’t even factually accurate!

Are you struggling to connect with your child now that they've left the nest? Are you feeling the tension and heartache as your relationship dynamic begins to change? In Doing Life with Your Adult Children, bestselling author and parenting expert Jim Burns provides practical advice and hopeful encouragement for navigating this tough yet rewarding transition.I thought there were some good tips to help if your adult child is "failing to launch", and the chapter about entitlement and enabling was also particularly good (how could I get away with handing this book to a certain few people, I wonder. . .NO! Mind your own business, Shonya!) There were also some excellent tips for adding in-laws to the family and being being both fun and God-honoring in the grandparentin You think you have your children sorted. You got them through GCSEs and A levels, off to university perhaps, or into employment, then – after they brought home a few bad ’uns – settling with a partner and starting their own family. Along the way you might have had some advice from parenting experts such as Penelope Leach, the National Childbirth Trust, fellow mothers at the school gate, siblings or friends.

Adult children don't distinguish between what we consider an innocent remark or desire to fix a problem, and parental control." This one felt odd to me, probably because I seldom, if ever, felt controlled. [One of my sisters felt differently here, so there's a difference in personality coming into play.] This is just one of many stories………I have a beautiful son. He just turned thirty..so nice young man. He is finishing school to be an electrical engineer. He just started with a fortune five hundred company as an enturn. I feel she drains me and always has to the point I can’t spend time with him. I am exausted. Psychotherapist Annette Byford first unearthed the silent torments of mothers in their post-child-rearing years when she researched and wrote A Wedding in the Family: Mothers Tell Their Stories of Joy, Conflict and Loss. The book, published in 2019, dug below the tulle, bouquets and party favours of modern weddings to explore the complexities of family relationships. In the organisation of one of the last traditional transition rites in Western society, emotions can run high for months before the big day. While there are shelves of baby and toddler books, and a growing number on teens, late-stage mothering is a wasteland. That doesn’t mean women aren’t interested in it though. Byford found more than 30 women to interview, and many felt huge relief at being able to voice their opinions.

Subscribe to our Newsletters

Independence is the goal. This means adult children take full responsibility for their finances, actions, relationships, and growth and development. Then, if you have the emotional strength, get curious How do you feel about what I just said? (Just listen and show that you understand what he is saying. Don’t worry about whether he is immediately saying he understands and will act differently henceforth. Assume he heard you and will absorb this and consider it going forward.). If it’s all too emotional for you: “Thanks for listening – I’m grateful for you – good bye for now”. If you are serene, ask more questions: “How did you feel about the surgery – were you scared?” etc. Maybe even: “How do you feel about growing older? About death?” Adjusting from being involved in all aspects of their lives to respecting their autonomy as young adults has been interesting. I've definitely made some blunders along the way and expect that, even with the best of intentions, I'll likely make more in the future. It's hard letting go. It's hard keeping opinions and unsolicited advice to myself. Sometimes I step on toes and hurt feelings, which is not what I want to do. Not at all! So, when I stumbled across this book with its catchy little title, I figured I'd give it a listen. Whatever parenting adult children concerns arise in this new phase, the challenge often boils down to setting and honoring boundaries: