Learning to Let Go: The Key to Parenting Adult Children

“I’m totally devastated! I just found out my son Jeff’s wife Ella has been having an affair with a co-worker for the last year,” my friend Janet wept through the phone. “It seems like yesterday that we stood at the front of that church and gave our blessing on their marriage. She seemed just perfect. He was my baby so I finally felt free to live my own life – my husband and I even planned our second honeymoon for shortly after they came home from theirs. And then a few years later they had those precious little girls – I thought they would be happy forever.

“And now this – I’m so shocked I haven’t slept for three nights, and I can’t stop crying. I don’t know which has me more upset, Jeff’s news or the fact that he won’t let me help him. He was sobbing over the phone, and I just couldn’t stand it. I jumped right into ‘mother mode’. I told him I’d get on a plane tomorrow, and he told me not to come. I wanted to call Ella and he said ‘absolutely not’. I offered to help him find an apartment or a therapist and he said he could do those things himself. Mothers are supposed to fix things when their kids are hurting. I don’t know what to do – I’m climbing out of my skin. I’ve just got to find a way to make things better,” she wailed. “What would you do?” she asked me.

“Well, in a perfect world, I’d stay calm, ask my son how I can help and then follow his direction. But, since it’s not a perfect world, my guess is that I would probably panic like you did and then throw every suggestion in the book at him hoping something would stick. When they were little and fell down and split their knees open, we could take away their pain by holding them and giving them Band-Aids and kisses. It seems like the hardest part about parenting adult kids is that there is so little we can do to make things better for them when they’re hurting. Even though we’re terrified, we have to let go.

“Since Jeff isn’t asking for your help, maybe you’d like to look for the opportunities here for your own growth. These might include calming down and accepting that he is an adult and can handle this challenge without your help. Another would be to write to him, apologize for panicking and jumping into fix-it mode and tell him that you would be honored to listen if he needs to talk, but that you won’t intrude and will do your best not to offer unsolicited advice. Then call it a day.”

Janet responded, “I know you’re right. Thanks for the reminder - I feel better already.”

In order to maintain peace of mind as parents of adults, we must let go and allow our children to forge their own paths, no matter where those paths may take them. 

Wendy Boorn, M.C., L.P.C.

www.MothersOfAdultChildren.com

Learning When to Hold ‘Em and When to Fold ‘Em

Wendy Boorn, M.C., L.P.C.
www.MothersOfAdultChildren.com

Sometimes I am baffled about what action to take, or not take, when it comes to addressing issues with my loved ones. Even when I feel totally justified about being upset, one guideline I follow is to resist the urge to act impulsively. I let some time pass so that my wounds can start healing before I say something I might later regret.

Then I think through the likely consequences of bringing up a difficult issue, and, if I realize that doing so will hurt or cause defensiveness, I wait until I’m certain that this is a risk worth taking. Meanwhile, I remind myself that seldom, if ever, do my dear family members intend any harm, and I stay open to messages that may offer me direction.

About a month ago, my young adult grandson Kevin did something that I found very hurtful. His action, or, rather, inaction, was part of a larger pattern not unusual for 21 year-olds, especially males, but it cut me to the core, especially since I have gone way above and beyond to make his senior year in college extra special.

At first, nothing but retribution seemed satisfying: I wanted to hurt him as he had hurt me, and I nurtured fantasies of not speaking to him and of withdrawing financial support. I fanned the fire of righteous indignation by compiling a list of all I’d done for him in recent months and how little he had done for me. Before long, I had dragged into my speech everything but the kitchen sink, and I was searching for a way to include that.

As the weeks wore on, my rage softened to hurt, and the hurt was tempered by my remembering that Kevin had a few things on his mind besides his grandma, including taking final exams, saying goodbye to long-time friends and preparing to leave the college cocoon to step into the glaring lights of Real Life. I became increasingly glad I had waited. And then, today, I received the message that helped me let this hurt go, in two haiku poems my precious brother-in-law Bob Mieger wrote during the past year, after he knew he was dying of glioblastoma, the most aggressive type of brain cancer.

CELEBRATE

Time’s short – let’s party!

Choose the best of each moment

Love myself and you.

 SET FREE

Find what’s important

Let go of everything else

And set yourself free.

 Thank you, Bob, for continuing to inspire me from the great beyond.

Brother Bob with granddaughter Molly, Seattle, 2011.

Bob showing off the crab harvest.

Our Children, Our Teachers

I just completed a lovely email exchange with a colleague who had purchased my book and wrote to thank me for “blessing all of us mothers with your insightful, wise book.” In this case, it was Carole who blessed and inspired me.

This kind and accomplished therapist had previously shared that she had been grieving the inconceivable: the recent death of her adult son. But the details she shared in her email brought tears to my eyes. After reading some of my book, Carole explained “I found myself waking in the wee hours of the morning thinking of all the lessons my deceased mentally ill son had taught me over the past 40 years.” Just one of the transformational lessons her son taught her was “how to offer unconditional love under extreme duress.”

Carole’s son’s serious mental illness brought untold heartache to himself, his family and others. She could have turned her back on him and no one would have blamed her. And, yet, somehow, she realized that her son could help her evolve as a human being. What she learned from him did not emanate from how he functioned or his treatment of her, but, rather, from how she reacted to how he behaved. She made the decision to learn to love him no matter what, and, as a result, he knew he was loved right up until his life ended.

What a great gift this mother gave to her son. Carole believes her son offered her the gift of learning what a mother’s love is really about. Still another contribution has benefited many besides her son: “Because of his life challenges, I decided to get my Masters in Clinical Social Work, and that was the smartest decision I could have ever made. His death has deepened my understanding and sensitivity and opened my heart so that I can guide those who lay their suffering before me.” And so this son’s gift to his mother keeps on giving.

 

Searching for what we can learn from our children and their life experiences empowers us and prevents us from feeling like victims.

The Lanyard – an ode to his mother by Poet Laureate Billy Collins

The other day I was ricocheting slowly
off the blue walls of this room,
moving as if underwater from typewriter to piano,
from bookshelf to an envelope lying on the floor,
when I found myself in the L section of the dictionary
where my eyes fell upon the word lanyard.

No cookie nibbled by a French novelist
could send one into the past more suddenly—
a past where I sat at a workbench at a camp
by a deep Adirondack lake
learning how to braid long thin plastic strips
into a lanyard, a gift for my mother.

I had never seen anyone use a lanyard
or wear one, if that’s what you did with them,
but that did not keep me from crossing
strand over strand again and again
until I had made a boxy
red and white lanyard for my mother.

She gave me life and milk from her breasts,
and I gave her a lanyard.
She nursed me in many a sick room,
lifted spoons of medicine to my lips,
laid cold face-cloths on my forehead,
and then led me out into the airy light

and taught me to walk and swim,
and I, in turn, presented her with a lanyard.
Here are thousands of meals, she said,
and here is clothing and a good education.
And here is your lanyard, I replied,
which I made with a little help from a counselor.

Here is a breathing body and a beating heart,
strong legs, bones and teeth,
and two clear eyes to read the world, she whispered,
and here, I said, is the lanyard I made at camp.
And here, I wish to say to her now,
is a smaller gift—not the worn truth

that you can never repay your mother,
but the rueful admission that when she took
the two-tone lanyard from my hand,
I was as sure as a boy could be
that this useless, worthless thing I wove
out of boredom would be enough to make us even.

The Lanyard – an ode to his mother by Poet Laureate Billy Collins

The Power of Encouragement

My 44-year-old client Ruben went through his fourth chemical dependency treatment program a year ago and has been clean and sober ever since. A drug addict since his early teens, at no previous time has his sobriety lasted longer than six months. He freely admits that his totally willingness to do whatever is suggested to him by his sponsor and the professionals involved in his care has made all the difference. “I tried it my way long enough to know that doesn’t work – now I’m finally learning to follow directions.”

 For the first time, Ruben has added individual therapy to his 12 Step membership. He is working on family concerns, previously unresolved grief, and the self-esteem issues related to physical and sexual abuse. He attends daily meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous; does service work at his church; works the 12 Steps with his A.A. sponsor; spends quality time with his daughter; receives glowing reviews at his job; recently became a non-smoker; and is whittling down his debt. He smiles broadly whenever I see him and feels deeply thankful to have another chance at life.

Recently I asked Ruben what brought him back time and again to treatment, when each time he had started out committed to sobriety and then lost his recovery. Many people in this position become so demoralized and discouraged by their failures and the people they have hurt that they simply give up on getting better.

Ruben answered immediately, “It was my ex-mother-in-law Ella – she was the only person in my life who never gave up on me. She always told me that she believed in me, that I was an amazing guy and that I was smart. She said that my addiction wasn’t the real me, and that she knew I had what it took to get and stay clean and sober. I played her words over and over in my mind a lot, and, eventually, when I got really sick of myself, her belief in me, when I had none, would lead me back to treatment. I am forever grateful.”

 

Never underestimate the power of encouragement to help our children become their best selves.

 
Conversations with Cinthia:
Guest: Wendy Boorn, Psychotherapist and Author of I Thought I'd Be Done by Now, which is written for mothers of adult children.

Listen to the live interview on-line today, Monday April 22, 2013, at 6 pm

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/conversationswithcinthia

The Courage to Be Vulnerable

Today I’d like to share a story about the small miracles that can occur when two people have the courage to share vulnerably.

First, some background: Because he’s always lived within a mile of me and, along with his mom, even lived with me for a time, Kevin, age 21, feels more like my son than my grandson. From pre-school through high school, I attended his games, recitals, competitions and concerts. I helped him through the downs of middle-school angst and the ups of playing his French horn in the All American Marching Band during the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. I have done my best, with notable lapses, to model honest and authentic communication and have always encouraged Kevin to do the same.

Now – moving on to our recent Spring Break at the beach. We watched gorgeous sunsets over the ocean, visited an art museum, ate fresh fish, and went whale watching. Exhausted, I was glad to get a break, since I have been maintaining my full-time practice while getting “I Thought I’d Be Done by Now” ready to publish.

I did follow up with Kevin about the many projects he has in the works as he completes his senior year of college. I do know that sometimes I let my fear about his future drift into a need for control. Though aware of some occasional tension, I brushed it off until my precious grandson told me that he was feeling as though he couldn’t say anything to please me, that I was coming off as Ms. Perfect, and that he really loved the two times I had admitted a flaw and would really like it if I would acknowledge some others.

Though it wasn’t easy to admit, I realized then that I had been coming off as a drill sergeant, minus the cussing. I gradually became aware that, afraid of the increased exposure accompanying my book’s publication, I was feeling quite vulnerable, and, rather than express my feelings, I hyper-focused on Kevin. I apologized and agreed to do better, and – here’s the small miracle – he forgave me and the tension was gone.

The rewards are great when we have the courage to be vulnerable in our relationships.

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