Christian Parenting – Parenting Adult Children – Parenting Adult Step Children

Posted by on September 20, 2010 · 3 Comments

Christian parenting of adult children, and step-parenting grown adult children in Christian families, has lead to several questions from readers on the matter of helping vs. enabling adult children. The questions came from numerous parenting articles here, where I discuss the problems many parents and step-parents are having with grown children, especially in regards to the adult children asking for money or needing some kind of monetary “help” on a regular basis.

Mothers, fathers, step-mothers and step-fathers, have emailed me asking for tips and advice on how to handle their parenting problems with their adult children, from a Christian perspective. Some parents even asked for Bible scripture quotes and biblical principles for them to share with their grown kids, to help explain why the parents should not, could not and will not give the grown children money and/or pay their bills. Trust me, if there were ever public speaking opportunities for me to discuss parents enabling adult children, I would not have to be asked twice.
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Letting Go of Our Grown Adult Children, When What We Do is Never Enough

Posted by on July 30, 2010 · 14 Comments

“Letting go of adult children. It’s something parents do all the time. At least we’re told that’s what parents are supposed to do about the time their children turn eighteen”, says author Arlene Harder in her book on dealing with grown children who haven’t turned out the way parents hoped and expected. Whether our grown “adult children stayed living under our roof longer than we want, or strike out into the world earlier than anticipated, parents are told they need to cut the apron strings that have kept us focused on our child.”

In other words, says Harder, “when our children reach the age of maturity, we are expected to make a major change in our relationship with them- to transfer responsibility for decisions concerning their lives from us to them. If we successfully complete this transition, we will, says conventional wisdom, accept our children as independent individuals just as they are, including imperfections, values that conflict with ours, and different needs and desires. And they will accept us in return. We will communicate openly and share our values and experiences with one another without believing we have the right, or the power, to change the other person.”
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Support Groups for Parents with Grown Adult Children Living at Home with Parents

Posted by on October 4, 2008

Numerous emails from parents needing help in finding support groups for parents with grown, adult children living at home have arrived in my inbox, especially after reading How to Stop Enabling: When Our Grown Children Disappoint Us and the “Helping vs. Enabling” articles listed there that deal with the difference between helping and enabling and parenting adult children.

Having grown, adult children at home with the parents, after adult children leave home to attend college, get married and start having families of their own, creates enormous problems and conflicts for many families.

Frustrated parents begin searching for a “child parent contract” with a list of “adult children rules” for grown children and parents to agree on and sign, only to discover the hard way that rules for adult children, parent child contracts and adult children moving back home rarely (if ever) works for either the parent or the adult children.

Having adult children living at home may temporarily ease some of the empty nest feelings and emotions for parents, but thinking that you are truly helping your child by allowing your grown children to move back home, especially lazy adult children who refuse to work, don’t budget or live within their means etc will not cure empty nest syndrome, but your enabling behavior will cripple your adult children.

It’s time to stop enabling, and there are online support groups, forums and/or message boards to help you stop enabling people that can, should and need to be doing things for themselves.

CafeMom is the largest support group/social networking site for moms and moms-to-be. Included amongst the various support groups found at CafeMom are groups for parents with adult children at home (commonly referred to as Boomerang Kids).

There you will experience emotional help and support in setting boundaries between parents and adult children, and groups of women/parents sharing personal stories of their adult children living at home and discussing ideas of getting these kids out of the parent’s house once and for all.


Join CafeMom Today!

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What It Means to “Let Go”

Posted by on August 8, 2008

To “let go” does not mean to stop caring,
it means I can’t do it for someone else.

To “let go” is not to cut myself off,
it’s the realization I can’t control another.

To “let go” is not to enable,
but to allow learning from natural consequences.

To “let go” is to admit powerlessness,
which means the outcome is not in my hands.

To “let go” is not to try to change or blame another,
it’s to make the most of myself.

To “let go” is not to care for,
but to care about.

To “let go” is not to fix,
but to be supportive.

To “let go” is not to judge,
but to allow another to be a human being.

To “let go” is not to be in the middle arranging the outcomes,
but to allow others to affect their own destinies.

To “let go” is not to be protective,
it’s to permit another to face reality.

To “let go” is not to deny,
but to accept.

To “let go” it not to nag, scold or argue,
but instead to search out my own shortcomings, and correct them.

To “let go” is not to adjust everything to my desires
but to take each day as it comes,
and cherish myself in it.

To “let go” is not to criticize and regulate anybody
but to try to become what I dream I can be.

To “let go” is not to regret the past,
but to grow and live for the future.

To “let go” is to fear less,
and love more.

(Unknown Author)

Related Posts:

The Art of a Good Marriage
How to Be a Good Stepparent
How to Be a Good Mother-In-Law
How to Fight Fair in Marriage
Keeping the Fire Alive in Your Marriage

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