I have a daughter that is a senior in high school. She just turned 18. She has put us in a situation where it is difficult for us to trust her through past experiences. She constantly is causing us a lot of anxiety through her actions such as procrastination, leaving messes, not taking care of things, not saving money, following through on things and driving around for hours with no purpose. She has an attitude where she just does not seem to understand or care. I am so worried she may not graduate because she just waits to take care of things or keeps saying “trust”. She has gotten accepted into a college in the Fall and she will be living out of state. In the meantime, It has caused a lot of frustration and I certainly don’t always respond perfectly. Just when I give her some leaway, she does something to dissapoint or hurt that trust. Recently she is saying that she is tired of getting yelled at and wants to move out. She does not have a job (other than picking up a middle schooler after school twice a week) or any after school activities. It is frustrating because she really does not do much other than hang out with one of her friends all of the time and drive around for hours. My husband and I are so tired. I know there are things that I can do better but frustration takes over and probably not always consistent. I just need some advice on how to parent an adult that we financially support. I am not looking for judgement as a parent as you will never know the full context. Just some ideas or things that worked for you that are realistic for this age. Thank you!
I’ve heard it suggested that before young adults leave for college, they have to act in such a way that you are happy when they go. I don’t think this is always true, but it’s something to consider.
She (and you) must have done some things right, as she has been accepted to college out of state, and it doesn’t sound like she is doing anything horrible. Messes, procrastinating, driving around, etc,….these things may be annoying to live with, but it doesn’t sound like she is hurting herself or others, and remember, her job now is to separate from you and get on with her life. Not everyone has a job or gets involved with after school activities in high school. If you think she is struggling with depression or anxiety that prevents her from getting more involved in things she has an interest in, then you can express your concern to her and hope and confidence that she could get help and do better. But she’s graduating soon, so now probably isn’t the time to get involved in high school. Do you have real concerns about how she will do in college? Does she have concerns about college? If she is failing classes now, it may be that she is worried about college, but isn’t really talking about that.
Try something other than yelling, and focus on ways that you can connect in a positive way before she leaves. No one likes to be yelled at. My strategy for messes was always something like, “sweetheart, I love you and I know you love me. I know this mess isn’t important to you, but it is to me. Do you think you could take care of this for me.” I learned long ago that the more loving I was in my approach, the more cooperation I got.
Hopefully, if you can back off on the less important things, she will have the space to communicate to you about the important things, and you can decide next steps together. Maybe she would benefit from counseling, Maybe you would benefit from counseling, together or on your own? The young adult years aren’t always easy as we have to learn to respect choices we don’t always like, and they have to learn how to be adults, which is also truly a challenge.
Great advice! Thank you.
I understand that you want to keep a fair amount of info private, and that’s fine. So I’ll ask this series of questions for you (and your husband) to ask yourselves: What are you most upset about? Is it cleaning up after herself, or seeming aimless or disinterested? Is it that she’s lazy, or are you upset that you feel you haven’t prepared her sufficiently for being on her own? Are you upset that she has all this freedom (a car, a phone, no real job) and you’re beating yourselves up about it? Or is she hanging on to the last bit of “being a kid” that she can while being reassured that you’re still there for her? Does she avoid activities because she has few friends, or does she feel that she’s accepted to college and doesn’t need to add to her high school record, and is she starting to distance herself from friends who are all going in different directions?
I agree with RN_L that, if there’s depression going on, she may need some professional support. If you feel that she’s really not ready to go off on her own, and if she balks at the idea of a counselor, how about considering a life coach? These are professionals who help people develop the skills they need to function away from (in your case) Mom and Dad. So, does she leave a mess because she doesn’t really know how to do laundry and dishes? Have you done all of that for her? Does she get herself up and out the door to school without you reminding her? Does she remember her job to drive the other kid? Are you paying for everything (car, insurance, phone, clothes, spending money)? Does she know how to manage money and set up a budget? Have you discussed with her how her expenses will be handled next year? Room, board, tuition, fees, books, clothing, fun money? If she’s expecting you to just fork over the cash every time she wants another sweatshirt or outfit, is that your plan? I think a life coach could help her set up a budget now, to practice managing it, and use one of the online tools that make it easy. My son uses YNAB (You Need A Budget) and they have great tutorials and good support, and we use it too so he can check our finances if anything happens to either of us. But maybe a life coach would have another suggestion. The idea would be that your daughter get some serious life skills. If you have to take the responsibility for not doing this, or for treating her like a “kid” vs. the adult she is, do so. Don’t grovel but do make it that she doesn’t feel she’s a failure. Let a life coach help her and make their relationship private between them. Let the pro do the job. Set a budget with the pro, dollar amount of number of sessions, and let that pro suss out what’s really on your daughter’s mind. Start now so she can continue through the summer - maybe every 2 weeks or 3 weeks. The point is for your daughter to try money management and her schedule without your involvement, not because you don’t want to help her, but because she’ll be relying on her advisor, the school doctor, the RA, and so on soon enough. Let the coach say, “You know, you have to think about a relationship with your future roommate and how you will negotiate tasks and chores in a very small room.” Let her practice without fear of failure - this is a chance to make mistakes and learn from them.
My son’s college roommate came with zero life skills, just strong academics. He kept asking when someone would come to the dorm room to empty their trash, take their recycling, etc., and was shocked that students do it themselves. He had never done laundry. He didn’t know how to use an ATM machine or charge any books at the bookstore; instead, his mother drove 3 hours each way every couple of weeks to hand him cash and a clean load of laundry she had done at home, and she took his dirty stuff home to her washer/dryer. It was a really hard adjustment and had an impact on my son’s friendship with him. So, give your daughter the skills even if that means someone else does it.
She does have life skills. She has been doing her own laundry since at least 11-12 and has been getting up on her own without my help since 14 at least. I taught her to clean up her own messes.
Dear @clontzem 18 is such an interesting age; legally an adult but generally still dependent on parents. Lots of helpful advice above and I will add my thoughts. Start with where your daughter is at. She is tired of fighting and is saying she wants to move out. Maybe a conversation could start with you hear her that she is tired of fighting and you and dad agree, it is exhausting and draining and taking away from the relationship. Once you have a common goal of less to no fighting, then the next step is how to get to that goal. Can you agree on some way to communicate about areas of conflict that does not involve fighting? Maybe she drives around so much because she wants to be out of the house to avoid a fight?
When it is too hard to talk about an issue, sometimes the best place to start is with how is it so hard to talk about important issues? Can we start with better communication that includes us listening to what you have to say? At this age, your best leverage is the relationship and the best way back to a good parent-child relationship is communication. May I also suggest this article that might be helpful? The Science of Perspective Taking: Building Better Connections – Mamapedia™
It may also help to invite this one friend over to the house. Keep the peers that are the most influence on your child close so that you are known to them in a positive way and they are known to you.
I remember being very worn out with parenting when each of my boys was around 17 and 18 and looking back I realize that a lot of the disagreements actually related to me being anxious about them going off to college, especially my first. And once getting accepted into college I also noticed a loss of motivation and procrastination, especially with my second. There was actually an email that went out from the principal who reminded students that college acceptances can be revoked if a core requirement is failed or would have to be made up in summer school which was a bit of a wakeup call that did not have to come from me thankfully. Also to be honest I got my younger son into therapy for a few months so he could talk about what was going on from his perspective and then the therapist gave us some helpful pointers including doing more listening than talking.