One repeated concern of parents is the fear that their actions, if too harsh, may lead their son or daughter to cut them off. This fear is not unfounded, since 1 in 4 young adults become estranged (cut off) from their parents for a period of time during young adulthood. Is there anything a parent can do to ensure this never happens? The short answer is “no.” Ultimately, the young adult who has moved out and wants nothing to do with you can’t be forced to reconnect. If this has happened to you as a parent, please access the work of my colleague, Josh Coleman, for some steps you can take to try to bridge this breach. The long answer to whether you can do something to reduce the risk of this cutoff is “yes.”
Letting Go of Control
Start by acknowledging what you can’t control. This involves changing one’s “mindset.” I coach parents to let go of myths such as:
- I can control my young adult’s behavior.
- I am responsible for my young adult’s behavior.
If a young adult is living at home, you have some leverage (control) by establishing house rules and expectations, but your son or daughter may say, “No thanks, I want to have my own rules,” and move out. This isn’t so bad if it’s a joint decision, where the parents indicate the situation isn’t working and offer to work with the young adult to find an alternative living arrangement. See my blog: Never Evict Your Young Adult. Ultimately, an 18-year-old or older young adult has the right to make their own decisions regarding their lives. This leads to the second myth that we are responsible for their behavior. In a recent survey of parents, most believe they are responsible for their adult children’s success. At some point we have to “let go” and allow them to take responsibility for their success and failure.
As parents, we need to shift from control and direction to coaching and consulting with our teens and young adults. This is a gradual process of turning over more control and decision-making to our kids as they get older. It can’t just start when they are 18 or 21. I worked with a family whose father was a Marine captain who had finished two tours of duty in Iraq. He survived because he followed the Marine imperative of the chain of command. Your life and the lives of others depend on adhering to this rule. Unfortunately, when he came home to his family and found his 17-year-old son didn’t follow the “chain of command” requirement, conflict broke out and led to a physical confrontation. Fortunately, this father adjusted to less control and more shared decision-making with his son.
Moving From Control and Directing to Coaching and Consulting
As a parent, it’s important to find that sweet spot or balance between having some firm expectations for our kids and allowing them to make their own decisions. In other blogs, I’ve discussed three sets of expectations: non-negotiable, negotiable, and discretionary.
- Non-negotiable expectations when a teen or young adult is living at home include such things as no violence or threats of violence, no stealing, no illicit drugs, etc. These are societal norms, and parents aren’t doing a child any favors by ignoring such behaviors.
- Negotiable can include car use, who pays for gas, phone bills, help around the house, etc.
- Discretionary would include those decisions or actions that are completely in your young adult’s court – clothes they wear, friends they hang out with, what they eat, etc.
Parents should move from control and directing to coaching and consulting. Coaching and consulting apply to discretionary areas and some negotiable decisions and actions. The graph below illustrates the necessary shift parents need to make from control and directing to coaching and consulting. Parents never reach a point with no expectations, as shown by the blue line not reaching zero; as kids get older, coaching and consulting need to increase. Coaching means listening to what the teen or young adult is thinking and feeling by checking out what you hear, then asking open-ended questions that help the young adult reach their own conclusions. For instance, asking the young adult what they think are the pros and cons of a decision is a good coaching approach. Consulting is offering your perspective, knowledge, or experience on a particular action or decision your young adult is considering. Some parents take the position that they will never offer advice to their adult child unless they ask for it. This can feel like abandonment if the parent has always been active in giving an opinion in the past. Besides, I want my kids, at any age, to benefit from my experience. That said, I use a sandwich approach when they are considering a decision. By this I mean I tell them it is their decision, then share my experience or ideas, then tell them again it is their decision, and I won’t be upset if they ignore my advice.
Move Closer
Rather than abandoning and withdrawing from our kids as they move into the teens and young adult stage of life, we should move closer to them in a new way. Coaching and consulting allow us to keep connecting with and influencing our kids; however, these tactics should focus on the critical developmental tasks they face. I call these tasks the four “Is.” Specifically:
- identity – who they are and want to become;
- independence – financial, emotional, behavioral;
- intimacy – relationships with others, including a potential life partner;
- and intention – their sense of purpose or mission in life.
These are huge challenges for our kids, and we want to move closer to them to help them face these.
Vulnerability to Stay Close
Finally, one way we can maintain a relationship and closeness with our kids as they move through the teen and young adult years is to allow ourselves to be vulnerable. In a Ted Talk on vulnerability, Rene Brown states that vulnerability is the route to intimacy; the way to be fully engaged and connected to another human being. In this regard, parents can continue to express unconditional love and acknowledge mistakes, no matter the child’s age. We connect more with others and our kids by sharing our failures, mistakes, difficulties, and challenges we have faced in our lives than our victories and successes. Not that our successes aren’t important, but they don’t allow for the same heartfelt connection. I have yet to find the perfect parent, so we clearly have opportunities to speak to our vulnerabilities, and we can all do better for our kids’ sake as well as ours.
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