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

Parenting College Kids: Does our Internet-connectedness delay their growing up?

For some of us, our kids are adults as soon as they leave our house to live elsewhere. We expect them to be able to manage money and relationships with their peers--to say nothing of us. If they're commuting to college and using our home as a base, we may consider them to be almost grown up. And if they move back home after a stint away at college, we have great expectations that they are adults now--they can vote; they can legally order a drink--even if they may be temporarily dependent on us financially.

Is it as simple as that? The issues of when a child becomes an adult is at the heart of a debate in psychological circles and behind the emergence of the concept of "emerging adulthood" to describe the half dozen or so post-adolescent years. There's a lively discussion about it at this New York Times site.

The discussion includes the role we play in setting our children on the path to adulthood. The professional addressing it is Barbara Hofer, a professor of psychology at Middlebury College and co-author, with Abigail Sullivan Moore, of "The iConnected Parent: Staying Close to Your Kids in College (and Beyond) While Letting Them Grow Up."

Turns out, some of us are doing our darnedest to keep our young adult children 'kids'--that is, youngsters who are dependent on us for more than financial support. "As a college professor who studies adolescents and emerging adults," Hofer writes, "I am particularly concerned that college students are not getting the opportunities they need to grow into autonomous, healthily connected adults when parents are still hyper-involved in their lives." 

The Hofer-Moore  research suggests that college kids are not being encouraged to make their own choices and decisions--to, in fact, make mistakes and figure out how to recover from them. Instead, Hofer writes that she sees parents hovering and helicoptering. "Parents who are using technology (calls, Skype,texting, e-mail, Facebook, etc.) to micromanage lives from afar may be thwarting the timely passage to adulthood." How bad is it? Hofer says one in five students in her study report parents are editing and proofing their papers. Her advice: "College parents can help with the transition by serving as a sounding board rather than being directive, by steering their college-age kids to campus resources for help, by considering long-range goals rather than short-term ones and by giving their “kids” space to grow up."

Back in the day--when my children were college students--Paterfamilias and I couldn't have edited or proofed, even if we wanted to. I hate to date myself, but my children left for college armed with typewriters--tho they did end up with computers by the time they graduated. The Internet wasn't around, to say nothing of WiFi. Not even FedEx. So there's no way we could have been so hands-on or hovering.

The new technologies keep us in touch with our grown children in many wonderful ways--don't get me started on Skype as a wondrous way to visit a grown child or grandchild who lives far away--but we can also take too much advantage of it. Just because we have an iPad doesn't mean we have to use it to keep up-to-the-minute (literally) tabs on our emerging adults. Let them try and fail and pick themselves up and try again. That doesn't mean we have to turn into techno-phobes. They can still text us all about it. 

It may be that the fault, to update a Shakespearean line, is not in our iPads but in ourselves, that we are too tied to the idea of our children as dependents. 

Great Expectations: The payback--or lack of it--when we help our kids out

When their daughter and son-in-law bought a house, the parents helped out--with advice and counseling (both solicited) on the building plans and by babysitting their grandson, especially on moving day. They also helped paint rooms and gave the young couple furnishings from their own house that they no longer needed.

Their problem, as they expressed it in a letter to Carolyn Hax, is one of feeling left out. The daughter planned a house warming party and didn't invite the parents. When the mom complained, the daughter told her she was "over the top" to be upset.The mom, who signed her letter, "sad and disappointed" expressed her pain this way: "It seems to us that we were good enough to do all the legwork but not good enough to be invited to the celebration."

Ah yes, The left out feeling. No one likes it. Being slighted is one of the least feel-good feelings in the world. And to be excluded by our own children! But as Hax pointed out, "when adult children live near their parents, they're faced with a small but sensitive puzzle: how to lead social lives that are both independent and inclusive."

Hax's advice to the mom, who said this was not the first time she felt like she was the "hired help rather than part of the family," was to look at the situation in a more positive light.Instead of saying "We're the hired help," the mom could tell herself, Hax writes, "We're already a huge part of their lives. I'm glad they'll have this time with friends."

In other words, we are often hurt when we get over-invested in our children's lives--and especially so when we expect them to repay our many "investments" with a coin from another country. We may love our children and they may love us, but we aren't --and shouldn't try to be -- their social life.

Visiting Grown Children: The hidden gift in a grandchild's soccer game

No camera or cellphone at hand but the picture sits bright in my mind: There on a grassy field sit Paterfamilias and his 9-year-old Grand, their knees drawn up, their baseball-capped heads close together.

They have come to the little neighborhood park near Alpha Daughter's house so PF could show his Grand some of the basics about kicking a soccer ball. During our weekend visit to celebrate Alpha Daughter's birthday, we also had the pleasure of watching our Grand play soccer. She is new to the game and, not to put too fine a point on it, it showed.  PF, who's been playing and watching soccer all his life--a star on his college team, no less--saw her problem as a lack of technique. I, who know about soccer only by watching Uber Son and then his children play the game, saw things differently: She was clueless about the game--seemed to have no idea where to kick the ball once she stuck out her foot and got it on the ball.

So this moment in the park was found gold: a women's league game was underway--high school and college graduates who loved to play were running up and down the field trying to kick or head the ball between the goal posts. As Alpha Daughter, my grandpup and I set off for a walk, PF and Grand sat down to study the game. Head to head they sat, watching soccer. By the time we got back from our two-mile walk, PF had his favorite player picked out--#40--and was letting his little pupil know what #40 was doing that was outstanding, which passes were effective--and which were not and why.

We think our Grand came away from soccer in the park with at least a minimal understanding of what the game is about and what players--even players her size--are supposed to do when they are on the pitch. But more important than that was the bond between gramps and Grand--sharing knowledge, figuring things out together, sitting cap to cap and talking to each other.

Celebrating our daughter's birthday with her was wonderful--it meant a lot to us to be there for those few days.  But the real gift of the weekend was the soccer moment at the park.

Grandparenting: Baseball, soccer or lacrosse--are we ready to coach again?

When our kids were young and living in our homes, we either did or did not coach their sports teams; it was either a good or a bad experience--for them and for us. Now there our kids are, all grown up and thinking about coaching their own kids. Or possibly asking us to help out--or maybe even suggesting we volunteer to be the coach. 

This latter may be wishful thinking on the part of some of granddads--or grandmums--who fancied themselves athletes and great coaches in their younger days. But the idea of coaching a Grand's team is not just a return to our once-athletic selves. It's also a chance to spend quality time with a Grand and bond over an experience that lends itself to endless discussion and sharing of information. 

Should such an opportunity present itself, here's a 10-reasons list to review before rising to the challenge. The official title is "10 reasons dad may not want to coach a youth baseball team." But it applies to all sports and to moms and dads, grandparents and grand uncles as well.

In addition to the usual points about the difficulties of coaching your own child or grandchild--not showing favoritism; being a model of good sportsmanship--the list ends with this reason to keep your seat on the sidelines or in the stands: "One of the great joys of being a parent of a sporting child is watching that child play and grow within the game. As a coach, you might struggle with staying objective and keeping your emotions in check. Watching from the stands will give fathers the chance to enjoy their child’s play and not worry about the pressures of coaching."

For grandparents, there's the additional opportunity as observer to add our two-cents of advice to our grown kids about what we see happening on the field where their kids--our Grands--are playing. That, too, can be an endless source of discussion, conversation and bonding--a sharing of our love of the game and the wisdom we may have accrued about the subtleties of the sport.

We also serve who stand, cheer and keep an eye on the dynamics of the field of play.

 

 

Money Matters: A saving plan for the grand kids

We've been squirreling money away for our Grands. We started out by putting money into 529s, but the 2008 recession and the follow-on downturn in financial markets have discouraged us from plowing more money into that vehicle. I've opened savings accounts for each of them. The interest rate on those accounts is, like the rest of the investment firmament, discouraging. Those accounts are not even keeping up with inflation--but at least the money isn't melting away into the downs of the stock market.

The idea behind my and Paterfamilias' savings for our four Grands is simple: We want to make sure there's some money there for their education. Their parents will bear the bulk of that burden; maybe the Grands will have to take out loans to finance some of it. But we hope our little bit will take the edge off  the cost. Our parents did that for our kids--every birthday they sent a small check to put in an account for the kids. The wonder of compounded interest made those accounts a help when the college bills started rolling in. It's a role model we plan to emulate. But how to do it in today's difficult financial time?

PBS's new Web site, Next Avenue, which aims to cover financial (and other) issues of concern to those of us moving further along the age continuum, currently has a video with the heady title, "Saving for Your Grandkids." You can link to it here. It won't give you answers to or even ideas for the investment questions we're all wrestling with, but Ric Edelman offers very generalized caveats and options for those of us who want to put money away for our grandkids.

My take-aways from the video:

You can set up ways to save for their education or to save for their retirement. Few of us think about the latter. (How to do it, he doesn't say.)

Whatever plan you create for the grandkids you have, be sure you can replicate it for grandkids that might come along in the future. Fair is fair, even if someone's a latecomer.

 

Money Matters: Our college grad's expenses are our expenses--our worry too

Will the surveys never stop? Here's another one--this time from Ameriprise Financial--on how generous we baby boomers are toward our grown-up children--and how worried we are about their future financial security and ours.  

A December 2011 survey of baby boomers with $100,000 or more in investable assets reports that nine out of ten--93 percent--say they have provided some kind of support to their adult children. Paying for --or lending money for--college tuition comes in at 71 percent; help in buying a car, 53 percent. Parents are also helping with the upkeep of life's many expenses, like helping to pay for car and health insurance, rent and utilities.

Where does the money come from? 45 percent take it out of their spending money; 35 percent hit their regular savings accounts (about 8 percent tapped into retirement accounts) and nearly 15 percent take out loans to help their kids.

At the same time, more than one-third--35 percent--are worried that their children haven’t learned to manage money responsibly. More than that--nearly half--say their children don’t understand what it takes financially to prepare for retirement--even as they report that they are spending what they should save on their adult children.

As to those adult children at the receiving end, the survey found that more than half of them point their fingers back at their parents: they say they rarely or never talked to them about how they budget the family’s money.

Should we be surprised that kids coming out of college today are drowning in student debt? Or what the New York Times recently headlined as A Generation Hobbled by the Soaring Cost of College

 

Parenting and grandparenting: A reminder to lead our own lives--and not through theirs

Over at the educated grandparent, a recent post admonished those of us retiring from our careers and jobs to remember to keep up with--or develop--interests beyond immediate family. It's not healthy for our grown children or us to live our retiree years through our children or grandkids.

The post headed with this attention-grabber

 

You can read the whole post here. For me, the important take-away was this:

"Many people define themselves by their careers. What then? Some grandparents become completely involved with their grandchildren, who become the focus of their lives. ...We cannot depend on our children to fill our lives. That is our job."

Visiting Privileges: We're guests--not parents--when we overnight at a grown child's home.

The travel section of a newspaper isn't the most likely place to find a story on a major parental adjustment. Dominque Browning  managed to turn a trip to Boulder into a tale of her first journey, as a newly minted empty nester, to her youngest son's new nest and her recognition that she was no longer the homemaker-mom but a guest in her son's home.

Her son moved from the east coast to Boulder. Boulder's a fun town to visit--I won't go into those details--but Browning had some thoughtful insights on the experience of realizing her youngest son was a grown up with a home of his own--a home that was wasn't hers and that was, moreover, half way across the country.

Her first point: "There is a moment of truth all parents must face, usually on a sofa bed. Children eventually make their own lives, entirely separate from ours, and we participate in them only by invitation. It is a wise mother, indeed, who remembers the lessons that once came out of her mouth about how to be a good house guest."

About that sofa bed. It was another wake-up call. As Browning and her son settle in for her first night at his apartment, he let's her know where she'll be sleeping. She won't, he tells her, "be taking my bedroom. That's the master bedroom. I am the master. I don't want to sleep out here. This is the guest room."  That was, Browning writes, "the moment. That was when I realized the earthshaking reality of having traveled to see my child, only to become a guest in his home. He was not my child, but my host, a grown-up. I could feel the tectonic plates of power shifting and grinding between us. A volcano of protest sputtered out, and I agreed that the living room, er, guest room, was the perfect place for me."

It is a shocker of a moment. I remember the first year when uber son and his family booked and paid for the vacation condo and, when we arrived, instead of commandeering the master bedroom--as we did lo those many years when we booked and paid for the condo--we were relegated to an upstairs bedroom that one of our grandchildren vacated to accommodate us. Not that we had any complaint. (Or that they hadn't graciously offered to move out for the three nights we would be there. They did offer. We declined.] It was breathtaking recognition that the tectonic-plate had shifted--we were no longer the masters in charge with all the rights and privileges that come with that master's degree.

Browning's blog follows up her New York Times travel piece, sharing with her readers the bits and pieces from her article that were left on the cutting room floor. Here's one item that struck home and that underlies my Note to Self about good housekeeping tips. Browning, it would appear, managed to find subtle ways to share such tips with her son, Theo: 

"Driving my rental car to Target for supplies, Theo discussed the challenges of living on his own. “I think the tub leaks when I shower.” We bought shower curtains. “Isn’t it hard to pour boiling water from the pot to a teacup without spilling most of it?” We bought a kettle. “I should have taken the vacuum cleaner you offered me from home.” We bought a broom."

 

 

Emerging Adults: Calling a halt to the helicopter parenting

When I was growing up, some of my friends had over-protective parents--parents who marched over to school if a low grade or negative report was sent about their child, parents who labored with their children over the homework or had their kids call home every hour or so if they went out with friends for the evening--and this was well before cell phones. With the haze of hindsight, I saw the hovering come to an end by the time my friends went off to college.

Today we call it helicopter parenting and many colleges report that it doesn't stop when the kids leave home and become college students. Now it's not just phone calls; it's also texting and Facebook and social media check ups. And in-person interference. Parents have even been spotted crashing Freshman meet-ups.

Studies from academia suggest the perils our children face when we hover, helicopter or otherwise over-protect. They may end up unable to make decisions for themselves, to accept responsibility for their lives, to adjust to the demands of the workplace.

A list of the 10 detrimental effects from helicopter parenting--along with notations of the academic studies--are in this blog. Read it and hope you don't see yourself there.

 

Misusing Social Media: Rules of etiquette with grandkids and grownkids

Will we ever get it right? The do's and do not's for interacting with our grandkids' and grownkids' Facebook pages and Twitter streams are tricky enough. But, turns out there is an etiquette to be followed with email. Susan Adcox, on her grandparenting blog, had a post on a letter a grandchild wrote to Miss Manners about her grandmother's barrage of forwarded emails--you know, those mass emails telling you not to eat banana peels or warning you of a dangerous computer-destroying virus.

In her letter to Miss Manners, the grandchild (a college student) wrote after her grandmother complained about her granddaughter's lack of response to the forwarded emails--one of which contained a nasty virus link that the grandmother clicked on. The granddaughter had to help her grandparent clean up her computer and the result was a cooling in the relationship. As the granddaughter put it, "I finally realized I didn’t have time to sit and reply to ridiculous forwarded e-mails when I have other priorities, such as keeping my GPA up. I saw my grandmother a few weeks ago, and I could tell she wanted to make a rude comment about my not responding to her e-mails. I still think it’s absolutely ridiculous to respond to a forwarded e-mail."

MIss Manners, in her usual droll manner, started out with this trenchant observation: "Before you make Miss Manners responsible for your GPA, allow her to suggest a less time-consuming way of handling the situation. That would be to deal with the underlying problem, rather than the surface one." She pointed out that the underlying issue was probably more about the lack of communication than the response to the mass emails and that the granddaughter might cure the problem by shooting her grandmother an occasional email, as in "I'm busy studying for chemistry exam. Thinking of you and hoping your garden is flourishing," or something like that. I would add to that: ditto to the grandparent. Mass forwarded emails are not a substitute for bona fide communication.

Susan Adcox goes a step further and offers grandparents two guidelines for email behavior, which apply whether it's in interaction with a grandchild, grown child or anyone else: "First, don't send forwards to people who never send you forwards. They are obviously not interested in receiving such information. Second, don't click on a link in any email that looks the slightest bit suspicious, even if it comes from a friend or relative.

"Being tech-savvy means constantly adding to one's skill and sophistication, but it's worth it to have a solid electronic relationship with grandchildren. Besides, it's good for our brains. Recent studies show that using the Internet well requires  decision-making and complex reasoning skills--the kind of skills that warn us not to click on a link in a spammy email."