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

Emerging Adults: Words of the wise from dads for their daughters

Kids are kids. We bring them up to be independent, accomplished and assertive adults. For our daughters, the leadership--the assertive part--sometimes gets lost in the mix. The new president of Simmons College--my alumnus--posted a piece on Huffington Post: Five tips for dads to pass on to their daughters to help them become leaders.

 

Here's a link to the full post. For those who'd like the short, edited version, here 'tis:

 Tip 1: Mistakes are good. Girls should not be afraid to make mistakes -- or fail; everyone does this and they will learn with each mistake how to grow and become better. When the opportunity arises, dads, you can talk to your daughter about what she learned from her mistakes and how she has grown from them. And you can share some of your own failings with her, too.

Tip 2: Build a sisterhood. Women need mentors just as much as men and these relationships are best created when girls are young. Dads can encourage their daughters to build strong relationships with other girls and to do so in a way that is supportive, not competitive.

Tip 3: Take up space. For a variety of reasons, girls are afraid to physically take up space. (Ask your daughter to sit or stand like a girl, and then ask her to reenact how a boys sits or stands. You will find the differences -- and the space required -- remarkable!) If girls are not comfortable taking up physical space, this can eventually translate into discomfort with their own thoughts, ideas, and opinions -- some the important building blocks of leadership.

Tip 4: Science is for girls. Right now, women make up only 25% of the STEM workforce, [STEM is an acronym for the fields of science, technology, engineering and math], which is expected to grow by nearly 20% during the rest of the decade. While girls have strong career aspirations, they continue to make choices based on gendered messages and often ignore emerging (and highly paid) fields such as STEM.  Dads, you can encourage your daughters to try out these STEM subjects at an early age. Why not take them to a science museum, or encourage them to read about architecture or math?

Tip 5: Boys can help too: We live in a culture where boys and men are encouraged to assert their authority. This oftentimes leads to aggressive behavior against girls or women. Dads  can influence behavior by encouraging their sons (and sons' friends) to challenge these traits and treat girls and women with the respect they deserve.

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College Costs: Are your kids getting your money's worth if you help pay the bill?

Many of us are called on to help out with the college bills for our emerging adults--and many of us agree to pay our children's way, no questions asked or raised. Or we may be asked or want to help--after the fact, as those college loans come due.

Our generation has operated under theory that a college education for our children is worth the financial sacrifice--hence the temptation and wide spread practice of helping with tuiltion as well as room and board if we can. Recent news stories have been surfacing that suggest some kids who have to borrow to go to college are questioning whether that higher education is worth encumbering themselves with debt only to find no job in their field when they get out of school. A sobering thought and one that has some reality behind it.

A recent study that relies on 2008 data reinforces our orginal beliefs. It finds that although college costs more in this country than others, the payoff is bigger. [See Sweden]. This graphic from Planet Money tells a good part of the story.

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Notes

*Data for Japan are from 2007.

Source: Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development

Credit: Lam Thuy Vo / NPR

A few notes:

The data come from a recently published OECD report looking at educational data around the world. The cost of education includes tuition fees and living costs paid by the student, as well as earnings that students forgo by not working while they're in school.

"Benefits" is the difference in lifetime earnings between someone with a high-school degree and someone with a college degree.

For more on the difference in earnings between men and women in the U.S., see this study from Indiana University.

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Food for Thought: A lesson from adolescence that carries over to grown children

Insights is insight. You take it where you find it. I just finished reading Carl Pickhardt's recent blog on adolescents and parental similarity--how we tend to favor the child who is like us and how the issue rears its head big time as our children go through adolescence.

What struck me about Pickhardt's column was how it applies as well to our relationship with our children once they have grown into emerging adults and beyond. How much more comfortable we are with adult children who share our values, likes and dislikes, temperaments. When adult children are very different from us--more a throwback to some grandparent or one of our parents--we may make them feel they are somehow failing us.

Pickhardt puts it this way: "In their children, parents see reflections of themselves. In their parents, children see models for themselves. To the degree that children appear to be like their parents, and parents appear how children want to be, a kind of harmony based on similarity can rule....

"In human relationships, when it comes to attraction and compatibility, perceived similarity can count for a lot. We tend to feel closer to others who seem like us. We tend to like those who believe and behave like us. We tend to assume other kinds of positive commonality from apparent similarities. We even tend to treat strangers better who appear similar to us. And we are often drawn to those people who we wish to be like."

All of which can explain a lot when we struggle with our relationship with a child whose values, temperament and outlook on life are just plain not the same as or even similar to ours--or are closer to those of a grandparent, uncle or sister that we happen to not like very much. Not that there's an easy remedy, but a little insight into why there are challenges can't hurt.

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Parenting Adult Children: Backing off when we don't like their choice of romantic partner

My friend Lee doesn't understand what is was about her son-in-law that made him attractive to her daughter--even though the marriage is now 15 years old. From the start, Lee didn't see what they would have to talk about--the daughter grew up in an intellectually demanding home; the husband in one where mechanical abilities were prized. She loves to read; he doesn't. She's become a professor of English; he fixes computers. She's slim and attractive; he's pudgy and sloppy. Lee would never have chosen him  or anyone like him--for her daughter. He's totally unlike her daughter's dad--Lee's husband. And maybe that's the irritation and, for her daughter, the attraction. 

We may not understand our children's choices for romantic partners and life long mates. Their choices may run counter to what we find appealing, important and interesting. But the best thing we can do is what Lee, despite her misgivings, has done: Kept her mouth shut and learned to appreciate what she can about her son in law. 

I was reminded of my conversations with Lee on this subject--it's one I've had with several other friends as well, friends whose children have hooked up with people the parents consider "beneath" their child or inappropriate in terms of earning power--by a recent Carolyn Hax column.

A mom complained about her daughter's boyfriend--under-educated, unable to keep a steady job, a lay-about. Her 25-year-old daughter, who owns her own home, has a master's degree and a good job, doesn't seem to have a problem with her boyfriend's lax ways. In fact, she has invited him to move in with her. The mother writes Hax to express her dismay. The boyfriend, she writes, "drives me crazy to the point where I don't speak to him anymore." The issues the mother finds so negative don't seem to faze the daughter. "She doesn't see the problems I see ahead, always being the main breadwinner, the lack of financial security, etc."

Carolyn's answer is a universal one for those who are unhappy with a grown child's choice of mates--especially when it comes to financial potential or other social issues. Unless the boyfriend or girlfriend is abusive (that's a whole other issue), Hax points out that "you squander any right to protest your daughter's choices when you bring such clear biases to the table. ...If you value your relationship with your daughter, then I strongly suggest you throw away your visions of the "right" mate for her and start looking harder for what she sees in this one -- and specifically what he brings to the relationship that isn't in paycheck form....Good partners come in more than one shape and size."

This is not necessarily an easy pill to swallow. It means relying on our grown child's good sense. We can point out "issues" in a neutral kind of way. One couple kept inviting the daughter and the boyfriend they found inappropriate to join them for a lot of family outings--so the daughter would see how poorly he fit in with the family . [The strategy worked.] But expressing contempt, dislike and cutting off communication with the significant other--well, it's not worth the diminished relationship we'll have with our grown child, even if he or she eventually sees the light.

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Changing of the Guard: Home for the holidays at their house

When Pat and Dick's children were toddlers, their home became Christmas Holiday central. Her parents, who lived in the Midwest, came and stayed for three days. Pat's brother and sister-in-law drove down from New England, Dick's brother flew in from California. Everyone made it to the little white clapboard church across the street where Pat sang in the choir. Pat made her veal stew a la Romeo Salta for Christmas eve dinner and otherwise stocked the refrigerator and larder for all the meals, snacks and food a large family would consume in three days. They decorated the tree and set the "rules" for Christmas gift-giving. By the time everyone left, Pat and Dick were exhausted and lived on leftovers and pizza for several days.

This year--36 years later--Pat and Dick gave up the Christmas ghost. At their son's suggestion, Pat and DIck, their daughter, her husband and 6-year-old twins (plus the cat) drove down to their son's house in a city some two hours south of theirs. The son's mother in law and her boyfriend came over for dinner. There was a full house--all of Pat and Dick's Grands (including the son's dog--Pat and Dick's grandpup). Pat and Dick stayed three nights. There was no white clapboard church across the street. Pat didn't sing in the choir (sigh). The twins did not dress up in cute little dresses for their appearance at Grammy's church.

Other than that, Pat and Dick have been remarkably sanguine about what is likely to be the new normal. Pat, on request, brought a huge pot of her veal stew a la Romeo Salta for Christmas eve dinner but other than that, she had no responsibilities. She didn't have to put up a tree; she didn't have to worry about filling the refrigerator with everyone's favorite nibbles or being prepared for three days of breakfasts, lunches and dinners. "I made the stew and that was all I had to worry about," Pat says. "My daughter-in law's mom helped with the cooking. It was very pleasant not to be in charge. It was a gift." A gift that, she and Dick say, they'll be glad to get next Christmas.

"The old order changeth, giving rise to the new," and there's a pleasure in accepting the changing of the guard--even when it's at our expense.

 

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