Parenting Grown Children: What Dr. Spock Forgot to Tell Us

Leaving a Legacy: Divvying up the sentimental stuff

 In the piles of stuff we leave behind, who can say what our children will consider a treasure: the Rosenthal dinnerware for 12 (minor chip on one dinner plate) or the well-worn cereal bowls that were filled with Cheerios every morning while the kids sat elbow to elbow with their Dad and talked about stuff.

We narrowed down our legacy of give-aways when we rightsized our way from suburban house (43 years of family living) to an urban apartment (minimal storage space). We offered our grown kids a pick of the pre-move litter. They wanted no cut glass vases or silverplate candlelabras--items deeded us by our parents and hauled out for special occasions.  They opted for stuff with personal or sentimental value--the piano being Exhibit One and their grandmother's hand-painted tea cups another.

We moved with our favorite pieces of furniture, works of art and two bins of family memorablia. So there is still some sorting out our kids will have to do when we're no longer in charge. (Hopefully no fights will break out over who gets my collection of whimsical cats. See above)

Even though we've slimmed down, we should make a list of the stuff we have that our kids will have to divide up among themselves or give away. Like many of our friends, we keep putting it off. There's the temptation to say, 'Let the kids figure that out.'

"Wrong" is what the financial/estate planning experts say. When we pass away, it's an emotional experience for our kids. The 'stuff" we leave behind may hit a deep sentimental note for one of them or--and here's the problem--one item may mean a lot to all of them. The sentimental stuff turns out to be the more contentious than the "valuables" and has the potential to create nasty divisions among the inheritees.

 When we write our wills, it's relatively simple to divide the monetary stuff--the bank accounts, stocks and bonds, real estate holdings. A simple formula will do, as in: three kids, divide three ways. But the other stuff--the low- or no-value things like needlepoint pillows, rocking chair, cat statuettes: There isn't an algorithm for dividing it up fairly. If son A gets the vase we picked up in Greece, does daughter B get the pasta bowl from Tuscany? Is there something so evocative of childhood--the cookie jar, the kitchen table--that all the grown kids in the family want it?

Some families do the picking and choosing with their children. The Washington Post ran a story about parents who laid out all the tangible items, gathered their grown children together and gave them each $2,000 worth of monopoly money. The kids could then bid on what they would want--when the time came. Says a son, who admits he got into a bidding war with his brother over a  living room chair, "I have had friends fight with siblings over their parents' stuff--not the expensive stuff, but odds and ends that each child wanted." His family, the son says, "avoided this problem brilliantly. Dad was the auctioneer and mom recorded the results."

Friends of ours whose basements and attics are packed with photos, memorablia, two generations of  dishes and artwork,  have taken various non-auction approaches to parceling out the eventual disposition of their stuff.

One is doing it with stickers: Yellow dots under the chairs, rugs and lamps they want their daughter to have; red sticker dots for their son. They hope the stickers stay stuck and that the kids find the distribution fair. As to the accumulated stuff in the basement storage spaces, they're leaving that to their son's and daughter's good will.

Another friend is making a list and using past observations to figure out who should get what. They have seen their oldest son eye the wooden statute in the dining room and their youngest son admire the  landscape painting in the family room. They want their daughter to have the jewelry--the rings, bangles and necklaces handed down by great-grandmothers and grandmothers. There is one  caveat: the  eldest son's daughter (and the first grandchild who's now a teenager) gets an early pick from the jewelry collection.

There may not be a "best way" here. An auction would be fun, but even a straightforward list beats having our kids duke it out when we're gone.

 

 

Empty Nest, Refilled: The cost of housing is a universal concern for young buyers and their parents

The pressure on Chinese parents to help their Millennial-aged children buy a home is a jaw-dropper.  The Chinese one-family policy plus the urbanization of the economy  is creating a generation of Little Emperors  that have high expectations for how much their parents will do for them in terms of housing.  With housing tight in urban areas and unaffordable at the salaries the Little Emperors are earning, Chinese millennials are looking to their parents to help with the down payment on a house as well as a hefty assist with the mortgage payments.

It's a familiar story--at least the housing part of it.

In Australia, where there's a housing crunch too, a study of 2017 home purchases found that more than half--55 percent--of first-home buyers got a financial boost from their parents. It's quite a leap for the land down under. In 2010, only 3.3 percent of first-time buyers got help from mom and dad.

Here in the U.S., the pressure also starts at home. According to a recent analysis of census data by Zillow, in 2005 roughly 14 percent of millennials (ages 24 to 36) lived at home with mom and dad; today, it's nearly 23 percent. They're there for a variety of reasons but chief among them is the cost of housing in urban areas, which is outpacing wages.

Both millennials and their parents would like to see the youngsters move out and into a home of their own, and parents are helping make that happen.  A 2018 survey by the  National Association of Realtors found that, among homebuyers who made a down payment, 23 percent of those 37 and younger had the wherewithal of a gift and 6 percent a loan from family or friends — the highest proportion for either type of assistance among all age groups.

Feels like help with a down payment is becoming a universal language of love--or for parents who can afford it, a loving necessity.

 

Parenting Grown Children: Mistakes we make steering our kids through the job search

You may find this hard to believe-- I did. But there are those among us who are taking a few dubious extra steps in helping our kids find a job. Where we used to assist by fine tuning a resume or buying them  interview clothes, a few of us are now marching to the job interview with our kids or even sitting in on that interview.

No wonder Alison Green says that some of us "intervene shamelessly in our children's professional lives." Green, who runs a website called Ask a Manager and Slate's Direct Report,usually sticks to general workplace advice aimed at work-seekers and workers. But she's also had some things to say about the "shameless" stuff.

When it comes to advice, the most common type of parent misstep falls under the umbrella of gumption. It’s the idea that to get a job, you need to impress an employer with your persistence and resourcefulness, often by doing things that in other contexts would be considered aggressive or even creepy.

Green's real-life example: A parent advising a recent college grad to make the rounds of offices and drop off a resume--or even insist on seeing the hiring manager.

Green points out how totally out of date that idea is:

For the record, while the idea of getting a job by “pounding the pavement” remains deeply popular among parents of twenty- and thirty- somethings, it doesn’t work in most fields these days, where employers generally want candidates to apply online and not show up with a résumé without an appointment for an interview.

Green also points to a whole category of bad parental advice "rooted in the sweet but misguided faith that employers will surely be blown away by how impressive their children are." A college adviser told Green that a father, who accompanied his daughter to the meeting with the adviser, accused the adviser of sabotaging his daughter's job search. He thought entry-level positions were beneath his daughter--even though she was 21 with no work or volunteer experience at all--and insisted the daughter apply for mid-level positions because “that shows initiative and drive.”

To Green, the most troubling issue is that some parents haven’t accepted that their adult children can--and should--manage their professional lives themselves. Even when their child lands a job, some parents, she reports, call an employer and ask why their child was not given a promotion or raise or singled out for praise.

These parents are doing their kids no favors. Not every employer will bother to ask, “Does your kid know that you’re calling us?” and instead will assume that the kid knows about and has condoned the parent’s interference … which will get them tagged as immature and out of touch with professional norms at best and difficult at worst.

Green's advice to children caught up in these forms of helicopter-parent advice is to limit how much information they give their parents so that the parents will have fewer opportunities to interfere.

Not exactly what we're aiming for when our kids are going through the grueling job of finding a job.

 

Looking Ahead: Grown and Grand kids are no excuse to dwell in the past

As we age and head toward or are in retirement from our day-to-day jobs, do we dwell on the past too much? It's a question I've asked myself, in part because it can be a drag on our lives and on our grown kids and grandkids. It can be charming to refer back, to say, "When I was your age...." but it's only charming if it's a once-in-a-while thing.

Yes, it's important as I've written in previous posts, to leave a legacy--to let our grown kids and grandkids know who we are, what we've done with our lives, what our values are.  We don't have to wait till we're no longer around to let our Wills or "last thoughts" memos let them know what we've found meaningful in life and how we found it.

But it's also important to be moving forward--whatever age we are. As financial writer Carl Richards noted in a recent column,  he could feel the energy change in the room when he got together with two friends from his high school days. After they reminisced for a bit, the conversation shifted from the past to the future.

Here's how he described the moment:

It started simply enough, with one of us asking, “If we were having tea three years from now in this exact same place, sitting in these exact same chairs, what would need to happen for each of us to be happy with those three years?”

Talking about high school was great, but this was so much better. You could immediately feel energy and confidence enter the room as we started scheming.

Turns out, we are not the first people to entertain this question. Dan Sullivan wrote an entire book about it. In “The Dan Sullivan Question,” he talks about designing a question to help people make their future seem bigger than their past. “The moment your past becomes bigger than your future, you die,” he said, when I eventually heard him speaking on a podcast.

I read that and asked myself, does that apply to me and my relationship with my grown children? Am I able to bring something new and energizing to my conversations with them? Do I have something interesting to say about what I'm doing in the here and now or am planning to do? How much more vital I feel when the conversation is not just about what they're up to (what a burden on them) or what I thought or did 20 years ago.

In her search for a formula for happiness, happiness guru Gretchen Rubin found Aha! moment in a line from William Yeats:

“Happiness is neither virtue nor pleasure nor this thing nor that, but simply growth. We are happy when we are growing.”

Here's what Gretchen had to say about that moment of discovery:

That word, "growing," snapped everything into place. Of course. Growth. Growth helps explain the happiness brought by children, by gardens, by pay raises, by stamp collections, by training for a marathon, or learning to use PhotoShop, or cooking your way through a Julia Childs cookbook.

All of which is a long way of saying, it made me realize that we who are of a certain age and at a certain stage in life need to keep on truckin'--be it a project to work on, a class to go to, a trip to take. Whatever it is, I find the forward movement not only makes me happy but helps me bring energy to my conversations with my grown- and grandkids. It helps me makes sure I'm maintaining a life independent of theirs.

That is what we want, right?

Observation: Philip Galanes on the etiquette of correcting the mannerisms of your child's life partner

The mother finds her son's latest love interest "a wonderful woman: kind, hard-working, self-made." So far so good. In a letter to Philip Galanes at Social Qs she writes that she would be pleased if her son married her. The mother's only problem: the wonderful woman practices a dining custom of her culture where "people lick their knives during meals." Looking ahead, the mother who may be future mother-in-law to this "kind, hardworking" woman is worried that any children her son and this woman have will pick up the knife licking habit and that the extended family will hold her grandchildren up to ridicule. How should she broach the knife-licking habit with her possible daughter-in-law.

Knife licking may not be something any of us are faced with, but we all may have had concerns about an unfortunate habit--or culturally based idiosyncrasy--that we would like our daughter- or son-in-law or our child's life partner to curb. So what does Philip Galanes say we can do about such matters?

"If she and your son marry and produce offspring, you will be entitled to express grandparental concern about sharp objects in tiny mouths. But that's a problem for a far-off day. You've done very well to keep quiet about cutlery to date, and I encourage you to keep it up. A supportive mother-in-law trumps a Westernizing etiquette coach every day of the week."

 

Grandparenting: Lessons learned about the critical thinking of teens

It's always a thrill to get together with our grown kids and their kids, to be absorbed, however temporarily, into their family routine and culture. For those of us whose grown children live beyond the reach of a casual Sunday dinner, the visits in and of themselves are gifts. So, when something extraordinary or insightful happens, the gift moves into the treasure category.

What could be more of a treasure than to hear our high-school aged grand kids use their critical faculties in ways that open our eyes to their understanding of the world and how it works.

We had such a treasure when our son and his family were visiting us for a weekend this summer. The reason for the visit: a soccer tournament in which the oldest grandchild's team was participating. Weather being weather and thunderstorms being a tournament buzz kill, we ended up sitting around our living room amid the wreckage of cancelled games.

Our son had in hand 16 essays from finalists for a small stipend for their freshmen year in college. He read them aloud to get our critical input, with our grandkids as additional in-house critics.

We adults brought to our comments on the short essays, which were written by kids who were graduating from inner-city high schools and who had lived in and with poverty.  We were going to advise as to which three finalists should win the stipend. To the task, we adults brought the wisdom of our life experiences but also our unconscious biases. Our two teenage grands are closer to the ground--closer in age to the kids writing the essays about their life experiences and to teen life in general. They were much more understanding of some of the shortcomings in the essays, and surprisingly harsher on others. One exceptionally well-crafted essay they suspected of leaning on a formula of what one was supposed to say. A less elegant but emotionally direct essay they saw as an authentic reflection of obstacles this youngster had to overcome and where he hoped to go in life--not necessarily to a place that we, as adults, saw as aspirational enough.

I was struck by the seriousness of purpose our grands applied to the task and their ability to understand the essayists at a level where we as adults had to struggle.

The lesson I took away from this: As grandchildren grow into teens and young adults they have points of view that add to our understanding of the world, though we usually think it's the other way around.

 

 

Observations: President Obama on the feeling of loss when kids go off to college

I know, I know: This is not what Obama's Sept 7 speech was all about. But hear me out: Those of us who are parents of adult children--especially young adult children leaving the nest and going off to college--can't help but notice that in his opening remarks he took note of parental pain and shared his with us.

Here's what he had to say at the University of Illinois 

... now that I have a daughter in college, I can tell all of the students here, your parents suffer. They cry privately. It is brutal. So please call. Send a text. We need to hear from you, just a little something.

Grandparenting: My Granddaughter Googled Me

 

Given the teen preference for texting, an email this summer from a granddaughter in Massachusetts to me in Maryland was a surprise. The subject line even more intriguing: Is this You? it read. The body of the email held links to articles I'd written. A click and I was reading stories I'd penned for various newspapers and magazines--one from 1978; another, 1983.

Why was my 15-year-old granddaughter sending me links to long-ago and far-away articles? Why, in short, had she Googled me?

The prosaic answer was this: She was applying to a summer program in journalism and had to write an essay about her interest in communications and the media. One paragraph was about her grandmother (that's me) being a journalist, and she evidently checked that out--looked for proof--by calling up some of my stories.

I am still a journalist--part-time now. But when my granddaughter was born and until she turned 11 I was a full time editor at a national magazine, having worked my way up from staff writer. 

That being so, the question nags at me: Why did she have to Google me to find out about my standing as a journalist? When I asked the grandfather (aka my husband and a lawyer who once worked for the U.S. Congress) what he thought, he reminisced about all the legal and political issues he had shared with this granddaughter once she was old- or interested-enough to understand.

I had not. My granddaughter knew I worked but I never talked to her about my career. When I went to visit her or she came here, I kept my grandparenting focused on the quotidian. I was observing, getting a feel for what she cared about, thought about, was interested in and how I could add background, anecdotes or information to her concerns. I didn't bring my world to her.

I must have shared a funny story or two--in search of a story we journalists are a riot. Sometimes. But I hadn't discussed what I wrote about or the many climbs and plateaus, hurdles and high points I faced--from my first job answering letters to the editor at Time Inc to ending up as an editor and  columnist on municipal finance at Governing Magazine.

"She absorbed some of it by looking around," my daughter said when I brought up the missed opportunities. My home-office, which doubled as my granddaughter's bedroom when she came to visit, had various memorabilia hung on the wall for my own viewing pleasure--a plaque for a journalism award, a "joke" Washingtonian cover with my face on it.

If I ever finish the memoir I'm writing about my years at Time Inc (an aggressively sexist time in the work place in general, in journalism in particular and at Time especially), my children and grandchildren will know more about what this grannie did with her life. It's an important part of the legacy we leave. The life choices we made reflect our values and give our children and grandchildren at least one road map--hopefully among many others--about what paths there are in life and ways to deal with some of the stickier issues those paths can throw at you.

The written version is where I'm heading in terms of explaining myself and my world to my grown children (it's astonishing what they don't know) and grandchildren. In the meantime, the idea that my granddaughter had to Google me to learn about my career is a reminder (note to self) to share the past--the good stories, fun anecdotes, and rich experiences--with our family in the here and now. It's an on-going story, even if we capture it in a final written or video'd form some time down the road.

 

Observations: Philip Galanes on what to do when you don't like your grown child's mate

Philip Galanes by Durell Godfrey

A woman has griped to her daughter about the daughter's husband--that he treats her and her spouse dismissively, is always checking his cellphone messages in her presence and doesn't help his wife (the woman's daughter) around the house. She has complained to her daughter about this but the daughter has not responded positively.

Neither does Philip Galanes at Social Qs. His advice, which applies to all of us who may not be happy with out grown child's choice of a life companion:

I get that you’re protective of your daughter (and offended), but she didn’t ask for an assessment of her marriage. Even if you’re right on all counts — your son-in-law is a jerk — what upside did you imagine in telling her? Do you think she’s unaware of her husband’s bad qualities? Mightn’t he also have good ones that he reveals in private?

The smarter play for parents of adult kids with partners is to find something (anything!) to admire in the mates — their business acumen, tennis games or bonds with their children. You’re not off to a great start, but it may not be too late. Become a vocal fan of your son-in-law.

 

Empty Nesting: There's more to their childhood bedrooms than you think

 

So maybe you were thinking home office or crafts room or even a man cave. When the kids leave for college or for their first self-supporting job, thoughts of repurposing their bedrooms may dance in your head. After all, they've gone off to start their independent lives. They probably will not live with you again full-time. All they need when they come home for the holidays or for a brief respite  is a place to crash.

Not so fast, is the advice of Carl Pickhardt. Newly minted adult children can be unmoored by no longer having their bedroom to come home to. Writing in Psychology Today, he says that at this major jumping off place (leaving home to live independently), "it’s emotionally important to know that one has a family belonging place to return to, whether to visit for pleasure or for an emergency stay when there may be a need to boomerang home for a while."

Our recent grads may be adults, but he suggests that it's best not to think of this first foray into independence as a final “departure.” They are at the beginning of a “transition into more independence,” Pickhardt writes, adding these points:

*For many young people, it takes some measure of courage to move out and on into a new and different residence. To help make this move feel safe, parents can act to make membership in family remain secure.

*Parents often underestimate the difficulty of the last leg of growing up.... The demands for adequate self-care, the risky temptations offered by unsettled peers, the hardship of maintaining self-discipline, the increased availability of recreational drugs, the uncertainty of direction in life, and the widening scope of personal responsibility, these all conspire to make this final adolescent passage challenging indeed. 

*Unless parents have pressing practical needs to the contrary, I suggest not immediately repurposing the bedroom of an adolescent who is off at college, or otherwise starting to live away from home. Better, I believe, to keep that space as is for a few years, and for the young person to know that her or his family place is being securely held.

 

Nuptials: Grandchildren at the wedding? It's the bride and groom's call, not the granny's.

GIOVANNI FRANCESCO DA RIMINI  - Le Mariage de la Vierge

Two years ago, when a co-worker was in the throes of being a first-time grandmother, she asked her son to invite his sister's toddler to his wedding. The son and his bride refused. My co-worker argued the point but the bride and groom's vision for their Saturday evening formal wedding did not include small children. The mother of the groom pouted and complained, and then came up with a solution: She brought the toddler to a casual morning-after brunch where due homage was paid by extended family and friends to an adorable child: a grandmother's pride, salvaged.

I was reminded of that episode by a letter to Philip Galanes at SocialQs.  A grandmother was outraged that her husband's niece failed to invite his (and her) three pre-teen grandchildren to her wedding--a destination event at a popular resort. The grandmother writes that she had told the bride that she had rented a large home at the resort to accommodate her adult children (who were invited) and the grandchildren. Once again, the bride had her own vision of her wedding and said No to adding the children to the guest list. The grandmother wrote to Galanes to say she has refused to go to the wedding and has canceled the rental. Her husband, who is to officiate at the wedding, and her son would attend, but she would stay home. "We should have been told about the children [not being invited] much sooner," she wrote. "Thoughts?"

Galanes had plenty of them. "The din of your foot stomping and harrumphing has caused you to miscalculate: You are throwing away a lovely family vacation at a 'popular tourist destination'...in a fit of pique over your grandkids' exclusion from a rubber chicken dinner they probably wouldn't enjoy anyway."

Beyond that point, Galanes notes that "Brides have more on their minds than other people's grandchildren. And making an exception for yours would probably rub others guests with children the wrong way."

It's a reminder, once again, that we are not the star of events--weddings or other occasions our children plan. lWe can ask for a favor but adult children (or nephews and nieces) will have their own reasons to say yes or no. As they should.

Grandparenting and the Generation Gap: Yes we can--understand teen language, music and video games

 

   I'm not sure if it's a game or a test. When my Boston-based, teen-age granddaughter comes to visit, she catches me up on the current lingo. She tells me an expression, and then instructs me on proper usage. I never could get the hang of "on Dogs" (it means "I swear"--go figure) but I seem to have mastered "As you should"--something you say to someone after they do something well. 

I love language and all its permutations, so of course I'm drawn to the latest in teen-speak. Also, as an editor who writes headlines for stories and columns, I need to be au courant. Of course, slanging it up with my granddaughter is not so much work as fun. She high-fives me when I manage to "get it" and I try not to be daunted by her eye rolls when my use of an expression marks me as an old fuddy duddy (my expression; not hers).

And now I have Carl Pickhardt, a therapist who specializes in adolescence, to pat me on the back and remind me that such games have a deeper meaning and are an important way to connect across the generation (or two) gap. His weekly column is written for parents, but his comments are relevant for us.

"To the degree that parents can bridge the generational difference with interest," he writes, "this can reduce its potentially estranging influence. For example, they can encourage a very powerful and esteem-filling power reversal in their relationship when they treat the adolescent as “expert” and themselves as "unknowing," with their adolescent as teacher and themselves as student. " Such "power reversals" could be asking them about their music or how to play the video game they've got under their thumbs.

Slang has not been my only entry point, though some are more fleeting than others. Last year, I was visiting my Albany-based grandkids. My grandson had spent the previous evening at a high school dance, sweating himself into exhaustion doing the Whip and the Ne-Ne. I asked for a demonstration. I tried it myself. He smiled politely. When I returned for a visit several months later and asked after the Whip and Ne-Ne, I learned I was quite "out of it" (my expression; not his). The Whip and Ne-Ne have been replaced. I didn't ask with what. I rested on my fuddy-duddiness. As I should.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Little Emperors: Complaints Chinese parents have about their grown children. It may sound familiar.

**

We've read a lot about our helicoptered kids. They're the one who, as young adults, have gotten used to their parents overseeing life's key decisions. Their parents have been spotted going on job interviews with them and even calling their bosses to complain when they believe their child has been treated unfairly in the work place.

We've also got our entitled young--and older--adults who think the world, to say nothing of their parents, should bend to their needs. These are the kids who expect--and are not particularly gracious about receiving--a parental allowance, even though some of them are grown up with children of their own. There are those who call this a "brat allowance."

Well, small world: Chinese parents have, according to a professor at China's Renmin University, "birthed a generation of freeloaders who feel entitled to leech off their own parents."

China's one-child policy is partly to blame, professor Zhang Ming writes. As he details his observations about these "Little Emperors,**" his commentary begins to sound familiar.

"Even after helping them find jobs and planning their whole lives out for them, a generation of so-called helicopter parents still feels compelled to help their kids buy a house. Lucky are those whose kids only ask for help with the deposit and don’t expect their parents to help them make their monthly mortgage payments, too."

In our country, recent surveys find that roughly one-third of Millennials hoping to buy a house will be relying on a loan/gift from a parent, grandparent or other relative to help with some or all of the downpayment.  There's been less follow-up on how many of us continue to help with the monthly mortgage payment.

Zhang Ming has more to report. When parents don't come up with the cash fast enough, the grumblings of Chinese adults

"are a fixture of social media feeds, where they whine about their parents having the temerity to suddenly go on a trip or moan about their in-laws playing mahjong instead of giving that money to their grandkids instead."

Evidently, it's woe unto the grandparents as well.

"Many grown children remain reliant on their parents for financial assistance even after they’ve had kids of their own, thereby perpetuating the cycle of freeloading into a third generation — except the grandkids don’t turn to their own parents for help. Instead, both generations sponge off their grandparents together."

 It wasn't always so. Zhang Ming says he asked many parents of these Little Emperors whether they had turned to their parents for help and support. Just like many of us tell our children or friends, those parents tell Zhang they never asked their parents for anything, not even "for a single yuan" and then, like many of us, they reel off the the challenges they overcame to get where they are today, including supporting their parents— not the other way around.

 Zhang Ming's conclusion about what he calls China's "kidult" problem:

China’s young people are paying the price of the country’s rapid urbanization drive. The high costs of migrating and living in cities have drawn multiple generations into the financial orbit of their youngest relatives, exacerbating a psychological disconnect between what is appropriate to demand from one’s elders and what is appropriate to give. The resulting emotional tug-of-war often does more harm than good.  But these reasons do not begin to explain the degree to which parents are expected to support their kids, however, or how kids came to feel so entitled to their parents’ money in the first place.

 **‘Little Emperors‘ is a name that refers to only children in China after the one-child policy was implemented. Attributed most frequently to increased spending power within the family unit and the parents’ desire for their child to experience the benefits they were denied, the syndrome results from the children’s sole command of the attention of their parents and grandparents.

 

Observation: Seth Meyers on parents giving grown kids job advice

 

If his parents were our friends and rambled on about their son's brilliant career, we wouldn't consider them braggarts.  Seth Meyers has been a star on such comedic biggies as Saturday Night Live and the Late Night show and was host of the Golden Globes in 2018.

Maybe his parents don't talk a lot about their son--I have no idea; I don't know them. But Seth Meyers tells us (via comedian Jerry Seinfeld's Netflix series Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee) that his dad, whose expertise is finance, used to give him lots of career advice and critique his comedic approach--even when he was on SNL. Over the years, Meyers reported, his dad had some worthwhile  comedic pointers to offer. But sometimes the tips not only came too often but were unhelpful on many levels. 

Here's what Meyers told Seinfeld he told his dad about the advice-giving business, especially as it relates to child-parent relationships:

“I remember saying to him, ‘You’ve done a very good job of being a tough, honest critic with me. I no longer need it. So you have to shift from what you’ve been doing to a completely different role--of support.’”

Meyers and his dad have weathered the advice-giving shoals. You can see how well the family gets along on the above video, one of occasional Late Night segments called The Meyers Family.

 

Bank of Mom and Dad: What to do and how to do it when it's time to close the helping hand

 

Some of us tap into our retirement accounts or we delay retirement: We need the money to keep up with the relentless press of supporting our grown kids. Or grandkids. It may not be full support--just help with the rent, the cell phone bill or car payments. Sometimes it's a monthly stipend to defray their cost of living. For one of my friends, it was to pay for a major expense--the cost of a surrogate mother so a daughter could start a family. (The ensuing twins, priceless.) Another couple played venture capitalist and put money into their son's daring new business--which has since attracted real-life, Silicon Valley venture capitalists.

Whatever it is we're doing--and with whatever rationale we have for doing it--there comes a time when we want to or have to close the bank of mom and dad. The tipping point is different for every family; let us not judge our neighbor.

That said, when Closing Time comes, here are some tips from financial experts on how to tighten the fiduciary fist.

Set boundaries: One end of that boundary is to Just Say No. Make it clear that you will not provide assistance anymore. But if that isn't going to work for you--if it's too harsh or doesn't fit your situation--set financial boundaries, such as how long this will continue and how much cash will be involved. In some situations, you're doing yourself and your kin a favor. When support continues into a grown child's 30s and 40s, you may be an enabler: preventing your kids or grandkids from becoming independent and living within their means.

Make it legal: If you decide to be the mortgage banker for your grown child's home purchase, act like a bank. Have a lawyer draw up a contract  complete with dates when payments are due. Of course, you don't have to be the banker--for a mortgage or other large loan. You can walk your grown child into a bank--and even co-sign the loan (if you're sure you don't need to be paid back). That way, the bank is the debt collector, not you. Financial experts note that people are less likely to repay family members than they are a bank. Many of us do help out with the first-home down payment--not because are kids have been spendthrifts but because of student debt. Student loan debt seems to be the biggest obstacle standing in the way of young people buying their own home.

Use it to educate: However much money you decide you can afford to shower on your kin--a grown child or a grandchild--it should be a gift with no strings attached. Yes, they may squander it, but even grown children need to fall down and scrape their knees. Gifting them money that they may use unwisely is better than using your credit card to bail them out.

Get a second opinion: If you're lending money for a new or on-going business, don't limit yourself to your and your child's take on the business plan. Get an opinion from someone not directly involved in the business. And agree to specific terms--how much and when it will be paid back (if you hope to be paid back).

 

 

 

 

The Book Beat: What we want to know about the gifts we give our Grand kids.

The complaint was about whether a book given as a birthday present to a young reader had been properly read and appreciated. The complainant, writing to Philip Galanes (NYTimes, Social Qs) was an aunt who had given her niece a copy of a book that had been a childhood favorite of hers. But the niece showed no sign of having read it. The letter writer asked whether or not she should call this slight to the attention of the young reader's parents.

Many of us--especially those of us who are long-distance grandparents--are wandering in the same wilderness as the letter-writing aunt. Not only do we want to know the book we sent was received (and be properly thanked for it) but also that it is now a beloved favorite of the recipient. Actually, some of us are like me and we want more: We'd like to talk about the book with our Grand on Skype or FaceTime or even by text. A book--its plot, its characters, its setting--can be a helpful conversation starter, especially when we live far from our children and are out of the loop of their daily lives. It can be a chance to bond over a mutual love. Or, equally delightful, agree to disagree.

No surprise to report that Galanes does not condone pressuring parents to pressure the child to read the birthday-present book. Let me use his exact words:

"There's a difference between a book report and a birthday present: Your niece may read the book when she likes, but she's not required to....We all have our childhood favorites, but I'd let this one slide. Let your niece discover the book in her own time."

Galanes knows whereof he speaks. And yet I understand the aunt's disappointment. I, too, have sent books to various Grands, and now that some of them are young teens, the range of favorites I want to share with them has expanded exponentially. I send the book. I hear no more. When I go visit, sometimes I tell them why I chose a particular set of books--what it was about them that I found so intriguing. But if I may pat myself on the back (and gain some Galanes approval points)--I don't go any further than that. They'll either find time to read the books or they won't. Maybe two years from now they'll pick one up. Maybe they'll even text with a belated thank you for introducing them to the writer or the story.

Maybe they will. More likely they won't. But they have the books, they came with my imprimatur. That'll have to do.

 

 

Refilled Nests: When Boomerangers come back, we don't like it.

 

No less an authority than the London School of Economics tells us that we suffer when our adult kids return home to live with us. There is, the newest research finds, a decline in parental quality of life and well being when our adult children return to live with us.

This is based on research and surveys in Europe--not here. That said, roughly a quarter of young adults in the UK and throughout Europe are living with their parents -- the highest number since records began in 1996. The move home is driven by the unaffordably high cost of housing and job insecurity on the part of our adult kids.

When these adults return home to an empty nest--that is, no other children are still at living at home--our brothers and sisters over there experience loss of ‘feelings of control, autonomy and pleasure in everyday life’--regardless of the reason the children returned home.

How deep do those feelings run? Pretty far down. The scale for quality of life measures ranges from 12 to 48. When a child returns home to a previously empty nest (and it's not for the purposes of parental support), researchers found that the parental score went down by an average of 0.8 points. That's a big enough drop, researchers said, to be similar to developing an age-related disability, such as difficulties with walking or getting dressed. Oooph.

Here's the bottom line from Dr. Marco Tosi, one of the authors of the study. :

"When children leave the parental home, marital relationships improve and parents find a new equilibrium. They enjoy this stage in life, finding new hobbies and activities. When adult children move back, it is a violation of that equilibrium."

And then there's this from British therapist and author Andrew Marshall:

‘Living with adult children can be destructive for trapped nesters’ relationships. Lack of privacy means the biggest casualty is the parents’ sex lives – just when they were beginning to recover from years concentrating on the family – and the children can also take a lot of the emotional focus a couple should be giving to each other again.’

To say nothing of single parents with an eye on dating and putting a little more zip into their social life.

                             

 

 

 

 

Observation: Cheryl Strayed and Steve Almond on supporting grown kids financially

 

Writing on The Sweet Spot, Cheryl Strayed and Steve Almond tackle a question from a reader about financial support for their grown children and if it's fair to withdraw that support while they are still dependent on the parents. 

Cheryl Strayed:

You’ve been deeply generous because you wanted to provide your children with an education, security, comfort and ease. Well done. Now you must be deeply generous in another, seemingly paradoxical way: by giving your grown children the gift of independence and self-sufficiency.

They don’t pay for their own way in the world for one reason and only one reason: because you do. I encourage you to stop doing it. Allow your adult children to find a way to do it instead. And allow them to struggle with doing it.

By providing all that you provide your kids at this point in their lives, you’re preventing them from learning how to problem solve, sacrifice, persevere, and suffer and benefit from the consequences of their own decisions. In other words, from becoming adults.

Steve Almond:

The reason it’s been challenging for you to stop paying for your kids is because it’s a reversal of the way you’ve operated since your kids were born. They needed something, and you paid for it. That made sense for a time. But it doesn’t make sense now, and it hasn’t for a while. Your children aren’t children anymore and they don’t truly need you to pay for their lives, even if they find it convenient that you do.

 

Part of being a good parent is modeling healthy boundaries for our children, and this is ultimately that. In establishing yourself as a person who knows and states her limits, you’re showing them how to do that too.

 

Parenting Grown Children: Tips on keeping in touch and keeping that touch personal

    

photo: Palo Coleman

For those of us who don't see our adult children on a daily or weekly basis, whose children don't live in the same city, time zone or country, communication can be a challenge.

There's texting. Short and to the point, it's good for details--"I'm de-planing. Meet you at baggage claim in 10 minutes;" "Dad's birthday is tmw--I'm just saying." An emoji--a happy face, rainbow or birthday cake--can add a little flavor, charm or even humor. But texting is not a fulsome means of discussing anything that needs nuance or explaining.

E-mail is a longer form of texting. It feels like there's more space and time to write something meaningful. But like texting, it's flat and tone deaf. Stick in what you think is a witty line or a line of humor and it may come across as a scold.

There have been times when Paterfamilias and I have looked at an email or text from one of our kids and thought, "They're keeping their distance." It ain't necessarily so.

Facebook comments are a form of communication. But here it's parent beware: You may enjoy reading about what your kids are doing and thinking--and of advice they're seeking. But they are seeking it from their peers. There are some adult children who enjoy having their parents join in a discussion, but before you hit that comment box, bear in mind that most adult kids don't want to know their parents are reading along--or feel their parents are monitoring their lives.

That leaves the old-fashioned way: the telephone.

We're told by the experts (generally people younger than we are) that our grown children--whether in their 20s, 30s or 40s--do not answer their phones, preferring to hear messages or texts. We can verify. This is true. But one East Coast dad tells me he pre-arranges phone calls with his West Coast son via text-based appointment. As in, he'll send a text: "Can we talk tmw?" and he'll get a one-liner back setting a time.

The calls--whether it's a straight call, Skype or Facetime--do not lack for emotional tone on your part or theirs (unless one of you is a fine actor). But there are frustrations, especially when both the mom and dad are speaker-phoned on the line or sitting together in front of the Skype or Facetime screen.

Three-ways are a problem. You think you're going down one road with a conversation--maybe you even have an agenda or an issue you want to raise--but then the other parent horns in with a question or comment that takes the conversation in a different direction.

Our East Coast friend says that's the point of the pre-arranged call. It is a one-on-one. His son is calling him and only him. He and his wife--the mom--have a rule that only one parent at a time talks to their son or daughter. It leads to more satisfying conversations and feeling of closeness.

There is one hitch to the East Coast dad's system. Sometimes his West Coast son calls at the pre-arranged time and his wife--the mom--picks up and has a long, lovely conversation with her son while the dad taps his toe in frustration. The rule of the house is sometimes a harsh master.

                                                         

 

 

 

 

Bank of Mom and Dad: Five tips for handling gifts or loans to grown kids.

We are our children's bankers--at least we start off that way. When our children are young and living under our wing, we try to teach them the value of money and how the financial world works. How else will they grow up to make responsible financial decisions.

Despite our best parental advice, they may start their independent lives off fiscally wobbly--wobblier than we were at their age. They may have hefty bills to pay: college and car loans and smart phone services. The world we came to independence in may not jibe with the financial experiences our young adult kids are having today.

All of which begs the question: At what point should we expect our children to be self-sufficient? When does the Bank of Mom and Dad close? It's an emotional as well as financial question.

Financial planners and advisers generally stick to the fiscal side of the equation. So let's do that as well. First up is the question of whether we can afford to keep the bank open. That is, can we help our kids without impoverishing ourselves or stripping our retirement savings. If we clear that hurdle, here are some tips from the experts that we might not have thought about.

 Set clear expectations: Have a heart-to-heart with the bank's "client" about what we are prepared to help them with and to what extent. If it's ongoing support, the bankers should set a time limit for how long we'll keep doing this. We might ask them to make a contribution rather than giving them all of what they need.

Act like a banker:If our child went to a real bank to borrow money they would need to disclose their assets, debts, income and expenses so the bank could decide whether to lend or not. No reason why the bank of mom and dad shouldn't do the same. We need to understand why our child is in the situation they are in. If we expect money to be repaid, we need to know how likely it is that this will happen.

Get legal advice for large sums: Payback disputes happen. To avoid them , have a written loan agreement. If your adult child has a partner, there may be legal issues if the relationship ends. Will the loan or gift become relationship property? These are some of the issues that need legal advice.

Consider your other children:They ought to know upfront about what help we are giving their brother or sister and why. Sibling rivalry exists, and your other children can feel deeply hurt by being treated unequally unless they understand the reasons. You can address the equality issue by making adjustments to how you divide your estate, taking into account prior assistance.

Complications if there's a divorce: It's a remote possibility but a possibility nonetheless that if we consistently --that is on, say, an annual basis--gift our child money that improves the family’s lifestyle, it could effect support obligations if the marriage falls apart. In a Canadian case, a judge considered those gifts to be part of the son's income for determining support obligations.

 

 

 

March for Our Lives: Being there to support kids and grandkids in their cause.

 

One of the many things I loved about parenting when my kids were young and living with us was the opening up of new universes based on interests my kids developed. If they got involved in gymnastics--as my daughter did--it was up to us to get her to practices, cheer her on at meets and shuttle her to the orthopedist when the injuries occurred. But we also learned a whole lot about the world of competitive gymnastics. (Fortunately, this was well before the evils of sexual abuse at the elite level surfaced.) It was a fascinating world we never would have known about if our daughter hadn't had her heart set on the Olympics--a desire that faded when she turned thirteen and found she preferred the piano.

I thought back to those days when Paterfamilias (above) and I Metro-ed to Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington D.C. to rally for gun control. We were one of the 800,000. We believe fervently in the need to get military weapons off the streets, out of homes and far, far away from schools. But we also felt we were there on behalf of our grandkids--none of whom live in the Washington area.

They were equally--if not more--involved in the issue. They protested and gathered in their own cities with their friends. They didn't need us to show them the way, but we felt we were there for them--supporting them in a cause that effects them on a visceral and immediate level. #EnoughIsEnough.

Plus we got them tee shirts. That's also what grandparents do.

                

 

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Grown Children: Are we parenting them or are they taking care of us?

Two years ago, a friend's son advised his parents to stop skiing. As a doctor, he'd seen too many broken hips among his older patients; he didn't want his mom and dad to be among them.  This year he wanted then to stop bicycling.

A number of our friends say their kids want them to buy new cars with lane-change warnings and other driving aids. Or they don't want their parents to take  adventure vacations in less-trod parts of the world.

When we were living in our three-story house on a hill in suburbia, our son had a chat with us.  "You guys ought to sell the house," he said, listing lots of positive reasons why we should dump the house where we raised him and his sister. Then in tones that hinted at the deeper core of his message he said, "Then there's the driveway." It's a long one, steep and curving. It's hard to shovel when it snows and treacherous when black ice pools on its lower rungs. He didn't want us to deal with its dangers anymore.

Our kids are not just coming up with reasonable suggestions, they are starting to "worry" about us--just as we worried about them when they were toddlers or fifth graders. Is there a tipping point when our kids become our advisers instead of us being theirs? We clearly do not yet need them to manage our finances or make decisions about our welfare--we're not old or fragile--but we sense the first tilt in the balance of care.

The shift is a subtle part of a continuum. We've gone from being parents who controlled their lives ("No, you may not put your finger in the electric socket.") to ones relegated to advisory. ("Have you checked with another insurance agent?) That's the role we play as they marry and have  children of their own: Advisory parents but ready to leap to action if we sense danger, disaster or some other set back. That's what parenting grown children is all about: We sit in the back seat until there's a need or request to grab the wheel.

Now comes this tipping point. They mature, become heads of households, have careers and live multifaceted lives. We are aging as gracefully as we can, staying active but retiring from full-time jobs and unwinding careers. We can't quite keep up on the annual hike to the waterfall; we need a hand to get over some of the rocks. It seems in the nature of things that there would be a subtle switch in who the advisory adult is and who may have to take control if we face unexpected danger, disaster or a minor setback in our health or emotional well being. Should we be so surprised that they worry about us almost as much as we used to worry about them?

Even as we gamely send them selfies of ourselves forging ahead on the bike trail, our kids see us as growing frail. When Paterfamilias told his son a supposedly amusing story of how a pothole almost threw him off his bike, our son's face became a study in shock. We had to admit the story wasn't so funny as much as it was a recognition that we weren't the athletic and well balanced bikers we used to be. But we weren't--and aren't--ready to give up our bike rides. Our children (neither are doctors) aren't suggesting that, either--just that we buy hybrid style bikes that are easier to balance than our thin-wheeled road bikes.

We consider ourselves lucky that our children care enough to take notice. But it's a little like being offered a seat on a crowded bus: A relief to sit down but a shock at being seen as eligible for the offer.

 

 

 

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Your adult children are getting fat. Should you say something?

 

Years ago, when my brother and I were in our early 40s, my mother asked me to talk to him about his weight. He'd put on quite a belly and was carrying more poundage than was either healthy or attractive.

I turned her down. My rationale: I doubt he gets up in the morning, looks in the mirror and says, 'Dang, I look good.' No need for me to pile on.

It is years later and, as the mother of grown children, I have stuck with my convictions. Now comes Carolyn Hax to put an even finer point on it.

A father of "several adult daughters" in their late teens to early 20s writes to Hax to say he is worried  about their weight gain. (30 pounds each over the past year or two.) The dad says he doesn't want them to feel body-shamed but could he "express my concerns--once and only once?"

You know Hax is going to nix the idea. In fact she advises the dad to  "Lay off the health-coaching idea, no matter how tempting it gets." But the money quote is this: "If a concerned talk could turn weight gain around, America would be thin."

What goes for weight gain applies to a whole slew of appearance issues--how our grown kids dress, how they cut (or dye) their hair, pierce their bodies or flaunt tattoos. No matter how our children's appearance is eating us up inside, no matter how concerned we are for their health (my brother was recovering from cancer treatments; he may have seen the weight gain as affirmation of his recovery), all we can do is accept and love our dearest ones for who they are and not what they look like. They'll adjust their looks if they want to.

 

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The Bank of Mom and Dad: Who pays your grown child's rent?

Surveys on parent-child financial relationships are often run by or at the behest of banks or other financial institutions. They've got a particular reason to understand what's happening financially to the generation that should be forming households and buying homes.

That's what makes this most recent study so interesting. It's by analysts at the New York Times (informed by a data set known as the P.S.I.D. Transition to Adulthood Supplement.) It found that almost half of the people in the data base in their early 20s reported that their parents help them pay their rent. Among those who get help, the average amount is about $3,000 a year.

For some, the dependence stems from difficulties in finding a stable career job. For many others, it's a Big Expensive City issue. Skilled work is increasingly concentrated in high-rent metropolitan areas, and salaries aren't in sync with rents. Help from the Bank of Mom and Dad is a means to staying on the job in order to move ahead.

 Some data bits from the study:

The average amount of parental help for the 20-somethings — roughly $250 a month — covers 29 percent of the median monthly housing costs in America’s metro areas.

Twenty-somethings who work in farming, construction, retail and personal services tend to get the least parental assist; those in the art and design fields, the most--an average of $3,600 a year. In part that's because of the high barriers into fields like art, education, health and law.

Young people in metro areas with a million or more people are 30 percent more likely to receive rent money from their parents--almost twice as much money-- than those in smaller cities.

In the 1980s, fewer than half of 20-somethings received any parental support; by 2010, nearly 70 percent did.

Living expenses account for only 20 percent of the help that parents give their children. According to the survey, the bulk of the support comes in the form of lump-sum gifts for things like a down payment on a house or capital to start a business.

Little did we know--and a point the survey makes--is that being able to reassure our kids that the Bank of Mom and Dad would be there for them influences the  decisions they make--from what to major in in college to the career they choose. It's also a reminder that economic advantages begin at home and continue as kids grow into independence.

 

Thoughts on Being Thanked: Pen on paper or cellphone text, often or is once enough?

Some of us don't like our kids or grandkids to thank us via email or text. We'd like our gifts acknowledged the old-fashioned way: with a handwritten note. There's something polite and etiquette-right about pen (or crayon) set on paper--and the time it takes to do so. When young grandchildren embroider those notes with their very own drawings (see above), we're in orbit. But we live in a digital world. Our older grandkids and grown kids are happier using their thumbs to let us know they appreciate a gift we've sent. They're more likely to send a note--full of their immediate enthusiasm--if they can pick up their smartphone and tap it out. It's up to us to decide how "traditional" a reply we're willing to accept. Insistence on tradition may come with a cost--a delay of thanks or a less spontaneous response.

Whether or not we say Yes to the Text, some of us can't be thanked often enough. Sometimes we ask how, say, a grandchild enjoyed a book we sent. And we may ask several times, even though we've already gotten an answer. One grannie defends her practice of asking for thank yous over and over again, saying, "Hearing that what we do is appreciated and liked brings a smile to my face."

That said, the constant "request" for a thank you can be annoying, even irritating, to the receivers of those gifts--not so much the little grandkids but the parents, aka our grown children.

When a reader posed a question along these lines to Carolyn Hax ("We always thank her for gifts, and these comments feel like she's asking for thank-yous over and over again"), Hax offered several ways for the grown child to deal politely with the recurring queries from her mother about a gift. (One approach: deflect the query with a question, such as "Oh, did you not get our thank-you note?")

But Hax wasn't the only one to respond to the issue. Several of her readers did, addressing not so much the grownchild's question as the grandparent's need for the reassurance that multiple thank-yous bring.  One reader suggested that if the grownkids take repeated inquiries as pressure for repeated acknowledgements of your gifts, "then tell your kids you ask these follow up questions because it makes you so happy to bring the grandkids happiness. Say that's all you mean by it and hope you aren't misconstrued."

There's also this: If you've received a thank you--by phone call, email, text or in-person hug--enjoy the expression of enthusiasm and bask in the satisfaction of it. The additional pleasure in hearing a thank you again and again may not be worth the annoyance factor.

(Link to Hax column:Carolyn Hax: I can never thank you enough. No, seriously, it’s become a problem.