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PARENTING GROWN CHILDREN: The children may be grown but we still have our issues.

Sharing the Wealth: What do we owe our adult kids?

02/11/2025

Do we have to share our wealth–be it a dollop from our savings, income or investments–with struggling grown kids? If we don't have to, should we anyway?

Many of us have answered the latter question with a "yes." That is, we want to if we can afford it. (Never mind the Boomer, Gen X or Millenial nomenclature: We are the Wealth Transfer generation.) Some of us have said yes even if we can't quite afford it. But a woman writing to Slate's Kirstin Wong can afford it. A widow, she writes that her husband left her financially comfortable. She owns two homes, takes one or two cruise vacations a year and cares for two beloved French bulldogs that, in her words, cost more to maintain than a small child, which her only child has as well as a wife, a small apartment in a dicey neighborhood and health-related debts.

The grandmother/mother is in a quandry: Should she help them out if they have not welcomed her into their lives? Should she just write them off.

Before we rush to judgment, let's get more of the details she shared in her letter.

–She and her son have been "extremely distant ever since he graduated college," she writes, "and especially since he got married. He didn’t even have a wedding to invite me to, and I’ve never met my 7-year-old granddaughter in person."

–The granddaughter needed surgery shortly after birth and the parents have been paying that off as well as college debt. They would like to send their daughter to a more challenging school in a safer neighborhood but can't afford to do so.

–When she asked him recently why there was such a coolness between them, "I was shocked when he told me he and his wife have always felt that I don’t care about them because I’ve never helped them financially."

–Her daughter-in-law comes from a poor immigrant family, "yet they have a very close relationship with her parents, who watch my granddaughter every day after school. Apparently, if you can’t afford to give them anything, they won’t expect it!"

–She is thinking of leaving her worldly goods to her church instead of to her "greedy and materialistic" son.

The French bulldog reference pushed some hostile buttons for me, but Slate's Wong wisely moved away from the judgmental. Her advice revolved instead around the symbolic meaning of money and the importance of communication. Here are some relevant excerpts:

Money issues are rarely just about dollars and cents. Money holds symbolic value for all of us, and to your son and his wife, financial support could be tied to emotional support, care, or even love. It’s easy to characterize them as greedy and resentful, but consider another explanation: Maybe, given all their struggles and your relative ease, he feels unimportant and neglected.

Money is a resource, and it seems to be one that’s readily available to you, so I can see why your son is interpreting your lack of financial help as a lack of care. He and his wife might not expect the same from her family because they support them in other ways, using other resources, like time and child care—both of which are immensely valuable.

Talk to your son without holding judgment or making assumptions. Figure out what care means to him and what he needs from you to feel it. Chances are, it’s about not just money.

painting: "Bacchus and Ariadne" by Frank Auerbach
PARENTING GROWN CHILDREN: The children may be grown but we still have our issues.

Good Manners: Who’s to blame when grandkids don’t say Thank You? What if they’re step-grands?

02/04/2025

When we don't get a thank you for gifts sent–holiday presents, birthday gifts, Confirmation, Bar Mitzvah, whatever–resentment becomes an unpleasant visitor in our lives. Why should it be an effort for our adult kids or grandkids to text, email or phone in a "Thanks"–never mind penning a note on thick vellum paper. (That's a wish too far.)

We can also be quick to enter the blame game. If it's the grandkids who haven't responded, we often point a finger at the mom, especially if she's our daughter-in-law. When there are step-daughters involved, it can get even trickier. Here's the complaint of one woman who is grandmother to three families. She writes to Sahaj Kahur that two of the families not only say thank you but are interactive with her, often bringing her their artwork which is hung all over her home. It's the third family that's the problem. Her stepdaughter–her husband's child–is not, in her eyes, bringing up her children to have good manners. There are no thank you's for gifts or other treats from the grandparents and no offers of the children's drawings to hang in the grandparent's house. The stepdaughter complains that the grandmother is not treating her children equally with the others. The grandmother writes that her husband promised to talk to his daughter about the problem but hasn't. What is the grandmother to do to stop her resentment from growing worse?

Here are three of the suggestions (edited for space and clarity) Kahur makes, some of which may highlight issues many of us have in our relationships with the parents of our grandchildren.

ONE: If there are two parents in the picture, it’s not just on your stepdaughter to raise the kids with manners. Try to avoid zooming in on your stepdaughter being the problem.

TWO: Strengthen the relationship you have with her. Focus on the positives in the relationship you do have with her and her kids. If that doesn’t feel like enough, be honest with her. Just remember that you want to approach the conversation with care, not with the intention to “prove” that you treat all your grandkids similarly.

THREE: Kindly tell your husband that something needs to change and you would appreciate working together to create a realistic, yet more specific and time-bound, plan on approaching his daughter.

REMINDER: You’ve been stuck in limbo and the only way for something to change is for something to change. So take some time now to consider how you can approach your stepdaughter and her kids differently, or how to have a more structured plan in place with your husband.

painting: "The White Cat," Pierre Bonnard
PARENTING GROWN CHILDREN: The children may be grown but we still have our issues.

Talking Points: Chats with our grown kids about our sex lives.

01/24/2025

Are you thinking what I'm thinking? What could be more uncomfortable–and possibly more inappropriate–than a chat with our grown kids about our sex lives and theirs? This is not the sex education conversation that we may have dreaded when our kids were teens or pre-teens. Talking about our sex lives–isn't that socially and familialy verboten or close to it? And yet, two Brazilian filmmakers have videotaped parents and adult children doing just that. The filmmakers suggest that we parents and our adult children be more open about our sex lives and eventually about "other lost opportunities for intimacy."

As the lead to the NYT story on the subject put it, "Most of us would probably rather die than talk with family about our sex lives."

Before we dismiss the idea out of hand, the NYT writer notes that the point of such a chat is meaningful. Here's what she says:

This film begins with all the giggly, seat-squirming cringe you might expect. But once the awkwardness subsides, the film quickly reveals something more profound: loved ones sharing real, meaningful moments from their lives. Sexuality offers life lessons about confidence, trauma and happiness. The film asks the viewer to imagine other conversations left unspoken, from family finances to death.

In making the video, the filmmakers provided questions to facilitate conversation and filmed as their subjects took the plunge. As one of the filmmakers said:

Listening is not only what you want to hear about or don’t want to hear about. Across all strong friendships and relationships, you need to be able to say hard things. You need to be there to listen.”

Although many of us think of our adult children as people we're close to, the filmmakers point out that "people that should be very close are actually far away. You are more likely to talk about sex with strangers.”

Can you see yourself talking to your children about your sex life–or asking them about theirs? I did an informal survey of several friends: The answers ranged from the expected "never" to one friend, the mother of two 20-something sons, who said the only thing she thought her sons would be interested in was how old she was when she first had sex. She then referred me to the father of the boys for further discussion of the question.

So I'm asking you, dear readers. Have you ever had such a talk? Would you ever? How would you begin?

painting: Picasso
PARENTING GROWN CHILDREN: The children may be grown but we still have our issues.

New Year Blues: The pain of holiday visits with adult kids

01/14/2025

The holidays were barely over when the calls for help started pouring into Jane Adams help line. Parents of adult children had had a rough time during the "joyous" December celebrations. Adams, a social psychologist, reports that she had more inquiries for coaching "from parents whose grown kids disappointed them by not showing up, blaming them for their own problems, calling them toxic, or ignoring them completely."

Ugh. Holiday visits can be devastating, especially when those visits go on for too long and there's over-exposure to–and resentment of–the role each family member plays in the family dynamic. Many adult kids regress when they're home for the holidays. As one psychotherapist put it, "It’s not a question of if the regression is going to happen, it’s when." Or as a NYTimes writer, writing from the adult child's perspective, put it:

Psychologists even have a term to describe the way we fall back into predictable, maddening behavior patterns when we’re with our family of origin. It’s called family systems theory — the notion that families have an equilibrium, and each person has a fixed role that “is in service of keeping the family system intact,” said psychiatrist Pooja Lakshmin. So whatever your established role is — whether you’re the appeaser, or the family clown, or the petulant one — you’re going to be thrown right back there the second you walk through the door of your childhood home.

And that's only one piece of the difficult stuff that can surface when our grown kids come to visit for the holidays..

No wonder that for most families there's what Adams calls "a mismatch of expectations and reality." The silver lining in this reality–and the hope held out by Adams–is talking through the issues but with a particular perspective in mind. Here's Adams:

Starting the new year with a thoughtful, honest, conversation about how to heal the relationship instead of a blow by blow recitation about what transpired and whose fault it was makes it more likely that 2025 will be happier for everyone.

Here's to a New Year graced with family peace, love and joy.

Credit: Pierre Bonnard
PARENTING GROWN CHILDREN: The children may be grown but we still have our issues.

Mind the Gap: When our child’s new love comes from a different background

01/07/2025

Some of us count ourselves lucky. Our children find their future Mr or Ms Right next door. Or within the same time zone. Or in the same country. Or from a similar culture. But what happens when none of that describes our child's important love interest. Instead, it's someone with a very different background and from a faraway country. If our child is living in that country and we're living here, that may complicate chances to get to know and embrace the person our child loves.

This is not just a thought problem. A reader of ask sahaj wrote to say her daughter is living abroad and is in a serious relationship with a man who lives there. He lives with his parents and the daughter has become close to the family. The reader feels an emotional gap growing between the boyfriend/daughter/second family and herself. She asks for advice on how to get to know the boyfriend despite the geographical and cultural distances.

Much of Sahaj's advice is specific to the reader's situation but it is also general enough to be helpful to any of us who are struggling to get to know our adult child's boyfriend or girlfriend from a seemingly different world. Here are some of Sajaj's tips, paraphrased and edited for brevity:

If you're worried about saying the wrong thing when you talk to the boy/girl friend: You can ask your child, “Are there cultural differences I should be aware of, or that would help me understand him or her better?” Or, saying something to your child like, “I feel nervous about saying the wrong thing and making things worse. I don’t want to bite my tongue because I really care about you. Can we talk about what I’m feeling?”

While it can feel like an unfamiliar situation, you want to be a support to your child. This may sound like, “I’d love to learn more about them. What are your favorite things about them?” And/or you might tell your child that you’d like to talk to the boy/girlfriend the next time you and your child have a call. Even if it’s just asking how they're doing, or learning more about them, this can build intimacy and comfort with them — and vice versa.

Regardless of if there are cultural differences, remember the values that are important to you — kindness, openness and so on. These can help you have empathy while also finding micro ways to continue to nurture your relationship with your child — and by default her boy/girlfriend. These smaller moments, questions and conversations can help build the foundation for something deeper, and bridge that gap you feel.

painting: Frank Auerbach
PARENTING GROWN CHILDREN: The children may be grown but we still have our issues.

Gift Giving: Bringing the warmth to cold cash.

12/26/2024

Young adult kids and teen-plus grandkids are well beyond the Toys for Xmas stage. The Holidays and birthdays bring more of a gift challenge. Could we possibly pick out a sweater or shirt that would be appropriate in their world? A tech device they don't have or we could afford? A book they would read? Probably not.

Fear not. There is a gift that is useful, always the right size and never needs to be returned. Cash. But there is a down side: Whether we're writing a check, handing out paper currency or sending the money via Zelle, a gift of cash can seem cold and impersonal.

Which brings up the question, are there ways to warm it up? With some suggestions/discussions I saw online, I found one that worked for me and– bonus points–made it oh-so-easy for my Grands to say Thank You with immediacy.

Here's what I did. I sent each of my college-age Grands a text that started with some doggerel, "Your Holiday present is coming by Zelle/I think you'll find that works out well." Then I personalized each text with an upbeat rhyme or two for how they could use the gift–no strings attached, of course. I tapped send, opened my bank account's app and Zelled each one their gift. They no sooner got the text and the Zelle notice than a return text came back with a Thank You, heart emojis and a loving comment.

Bottom line: Gift sent, thank you received, don't have to think about it anymore.

Did any of you go the cash or gift card route this year? Did you find ways to make it look like the loving gift it was? Comment below with anything you're willing to share.

Credit: Louisiane Saint Fleurant
PARENTING GROWN CHILDREN: The children may be grown but we still have our issues.

Grandparents and Holiday Gifts: Giving grandkids presents from our grown child’s childhood.

12/10/2024

Our social media feeds and retail websites are exploding with gift ideas for our grandkids–a dancing robot, AI Flying Orb, a remote-controlled spider. No wonder some of us are living a sentimental moment when we see in our attic or basement the adorable play kitchen our kids spent hours with or the 6-year-old-sized red roadster that once made its way up and down our halls. We've taken good care of these toys–even refurbished a dent or two–so why not offer them as holiday gifts to our Grands? Recycling raised to a delightfully nostalgic height.

The question is, can we–should we–unload the treasures from our children's childhood via holiday gifts to our grandkids? They might make for a magical moment–and they might not.

The "might not" falls under the heading of communication, as in, ask the parents if they think the gift might work. For instance, some toys may not trigger the happy feelings we think they should. Our kids may have had unpleasant experiences with neighbors when they took that roadster out for a ride on the sidewalk. Or they may think a toy they loved is not right for their child. Or their cramped city apartment may not have the space to house a play kitchen; there may be no storage space for large items.

There's another point that toy historian Chris Byrne makes. That is, the toys our children played with when they were small children–and the way they played with them–helped form them as adults. Stephen Sondheim, for instance, loved word games as a child. Playwright Terence McNally played constantly with a puppet theater. Byrne himself loved Matchbox cars. Does that mean the toys we saved from our children's youth are right for their children? Moreover, is there something to be said for keeping up with trends? Here's an excerpt from a Ted talk Byrne gave on the subject of toys and their ties to our personal history:

Widely popular toys are sometimes the first shared cultural experience many children ever have, and they can become cultural events as well. Think back of the fads of the past decades. We had Rubik's Cube, we had Cabbage Patch, Zhu Zhu Pets, Pet Rock, right? And now we're in the middle of Squishmallows.

But I truly think that when we look back at what we loved, we can see the seeds of who we were going to become,

personally and professionally. Now I grant you, this is much more an art than a science, but I believe that each of us has an inherent play style that's as unique as our fingerprints.

So before we tie a ribbon around it and lug the play kitchen over to our adult child's living room, we might want to talk to the parents about whether they want to impose their fingerprints on their child (our grandchild)–or just let them play with their mom's or dad's toys when they come to visit us.

painting: Picasso
PARENTING GROWN CHILDREN: The children may be grown but we still have our issues.

Gift Giving: Grrr. The frustration when a Thank You is not forthcoming.

12/04/2024

Gratitude never goes out of season and yet, when it comes to our kids and grandkids, acknowledging a gift may not be "on trend" for them or, as the French so stylishly put it, pas au courant. The formal, hand-penned Thank You note has become outmoded for younger-than-us generations but neither an email, text nor cellphone call should be. Many of us have learned to accept the techie shortcuts. And yet, too often they too don't appear. It's particularly aggravating when it comes to kids and grandkids to whom we've sent monetary gifts. Since cash, gift card or Zelle are always the right color and fit, it's hard to accept that our grown kids or grandkids couldn't find a mini-minute to voice mail a Thanks for our largesse or text a Thx or TY.

It's a long-running frustration. You can read my previous posts on the point here, here and here.

I'm addressing the issue again because of an additional perspective I came across in a Michele Singletary (The Color of Money) column in the Washington Post.

Singletary starts off by standing by tradition: "Some gestures," she writes, "are timeless, such as sending a thank you note." But she also bows to the new reality and goes all-in for the teaching moment and the gentle reminder. Here are five of the suggestions Singletary offers for taking on a beloved giftee who has forgotten or failed to say Thanks.

Don’t compound the etiquette breach with a scolding. But it is appropriate to share your feelings.

Watch your tone. Approach it as a teaching moment, not a reprimand.

Also, explain that you’d like to know whether they received the gift. Postal mishaps and poor delivery might mean the gift never arrived.

If straight talk doesn’t work, be bold. The next gift could come with a box of thank-you cards.

Okay, maybe a handwritten note (or typed letter) or card isn’t necessary. But let the person know you still would like a call or even a text message.

Singletary ends with a droll take on the issue by Miss Manners (aka Judith Martin).

Reader's query: “I have heard that it is not proper to thank people for Christmas gifts. What is the official rule of etiquette about Christmas gifts?”

Miss Manner's reply: “Generosity and gratitude are permanently paired. Those would-be etiquetteers who declare expressing thanks to be no longer required have done only half the job. They must also then abolish the custom of giving — or, what always turns out to be the case with them — accepting presents.”

credit: painting by Frank Auerbach
PARENTING GROWN CHILDREN: The children may be grown but we still have our issues.

Surviving Holiday Feasts: Getting the help you need

11/25/2024

At a coffee with my friend C a week before Thanksgiving, she put her head in her hands and said, "I'm already tired." Now, C's husband does most of the Thanksgiving cooking but C does the cold dishes plus all the prep work–the constant shopping trips to supermarkets and farm markets and cleaning the house and the chef's spills–plus she sets up the table to accommodate a dozen guests (including two toddlers and one newborn), searches out the requisite number of plates and chairs for the crowd then arranges flowers and greens to beautify the table and the living room. Her bottom line: why couldn't her son and daughter-in-law take over the next holiday meal? They have a bigger house and more room for guests who are under five.

She is not alone in her forward thinking. In a November column Caroline Hax reported that she had just been on a video call with "multiple middle-aged women who all would preempt the holidays for exhaustion recovery."

Personally, I handed over the Thanksgiving dinner "privilege" to my DIL (and son) several years ago. It was for practical reasons having to do with travel. But, whether it's practicalities or exhaustion, there comes a time when we pass the torch. In doing so we may find our kids simplify the festivities or change things up in a fun way. Our beloved traditions–the way we cooked the turkey; the heirlooms we used to set the table–may take hits but the world is changing and maybe the next generation's new way will take root and become a tradition.

A newsletter from Axios a week before Thanksgiving noted four ways to the week "a little less stressful and a little more joyful" –without veering too far from tradition or handing over the reins. Here they are:

Shortcuts are fine — and delicious. Store-bought pies and dinner rolls are great, canned cranberry sauce is a classic, and Butterball even has a new cook-from-frozen turkey that comes pre-brined, so all you need to do is unwrap it and cook it.

Make it up! Don't feel limited by the traditional Thanksgiving lineup. If there's a side dish you often prepare and that feels easy and comfortable, add it to your menu. Tweak tradition.

Summon the troops! Whether you throw a BYOB dinner, ask guests to bring appetizers, or put them in charge of reheating the sides, lean on them to make your job easier. If you're a guest, ask what you can bring or if you're needed in the kitchen during crunch time.

Focus on the fun. If you're hosting Thanksgiving, there's probably one or two things about it that you especially like — maybe that's roasting the juiciest turkey, making a favorite family dish or decorating the table. Put extra care into the parts of Thanksgiving that make you happy, and use tips and tricks to get through the rest.

Hope these tips help ease your way. Happy Holidays.

painting: Cezanne
PARENTING GROWN CHILDREN: The children may be grown but we still have our issues.

Surviving Thanksgiving Togetherness: 5 boundaries to keep the family in line during the “holidays”

11/19/2024

Here they come again: The holidays and their feasts. As parents of adult children (and possibly as grandparents as well) we have our expectations of how joyous Thanksgiving dinner or the long weekend of togetherness will be–or how stressful and difficult. Whether we're hosting or another family member is, our grown children have their concerns too and they might be very different from ours. One thing we've got in common, though, is the need to set boundaries–about how much time we'll spend together, what are appropriate topics to discuss at dinner and how to deal with overly personal questions. No one wants to be asked how much weight they've gained or why their face looks so tired.

Psychotherapists suggest that setting a few boundaries ahead of time can help keep the celebrations wherever they take place pleasant and peaceful. In that spirit and hope, here are five suggested ways on how to work those boundaries into your family get-together. They are paraphrased and edited from this article in Bustle.

1. Set Conversation Limits: Talk around the table or pre- or post- dinner can turn tense when politics, religion, money or queries about the love life of a family member arise. Set limits on what's permissible and if anyone objects, remind them that everyone is here for a happy visit and we want everyone to have a good time. "Framing it as beneficial to them might inspire them to be more understanding."

2. Personalize Time Limits: Thanksgiving and the Christmas Holidays often come with various other family events or parties. It's easy to get overwhelmed, burnt out or stretched thin. So, decide how much time and energy you’re willing to allot to family events — and stick to it. The same goes true for understanding how much time and energy your adult kids want to expend.

3. Prepare Newcomers: If your kids (or you) are bringing a new partner or a guest, remind them to fill the newcomer in on family dynamics and traditions–things like dress code, topics of discussion and sleeping arrangements. The more you share with them, the smoother things will go.

4. Pre–Script Retorts: If you know the awkward questions specific family members might ask, be prepared with simple answers, such as "Thanks for asking, but I’m focusing on enjoying dinner.” Or if you know some family members are likely to comment on other family members' (or your) weight, body shape and/or eating habits, you can be prepared with a universal rejoinder, such as "Please do not comment on anyone's body.”

5. Take a Break: All of us need a breather when we're surrounded by more people and for longer times than we're used to. Give yourself permission to step away if you start feeling overwhelmed–and recognize that your adult kids, grandkids or other family members may have the same need. No need to take their stepping away personally.

painting: Norman Rockwell