There are lots of books written for the parents of young babies, but few -- possibly none -- for parents of adult offspring
The woman opposite me in the restaurant leaned over and started to tell me about her daughter's wedding. The girl was getting married next summer and there was to be no expense spared. That is the way with young people now. They spend a fortune on the wedding, and it's all over in a day.
"I wouldn't mind," said the woman, whose name was Anita, "but I don't really approve of them getting married."
I asked why. Were the couple too young?
"Maybe," said Anita. "She's 24. He's 27. I mean, why can't they just live together? But she wants to marry her boyfriend. She's in love with him. Completely potty over him."
Well, isn't that the best start?
"I'm not sure he's right for her. I took a big, big risk, actually," Anita continued. "I took her aside and I told her so. 'Sally,' I said, 'I have to speak my mind. I don't think Mark is right for you.' Of course, she hit the roof."
Of course. This is the biggest taboo among parents of adult children today. You must never tell them what to do.
"It was a big, big risk," Anita repeated, nervously fingering the stem of her glass of Chilean red. "I might have lost her for good. She might have turned around and said she was never going to speak to me again. But I just had to speak my mind. I mean, if she is making a mistake ... "
The words hung in the air. Anita was about to breach the next major taboo among parents of adult children: the words that can never, ever, under any circumstances be uttered after a predicted calamity -- "I told you so".
There are lots of books written for the parents of young babies, but few -- possibly none -- for parents of adult offspring. The pros and cons of early potty training versus prolonged use of nappies, or the rights and wrongs of discipline versus permissiveness are as child's play next to the dilemmas which keep the parents of adult kids awake at night.
What to do or say if they are running around with the wrong crowd? Entering into unsuitable partnerships? Abusing their health or even developing an eating disorder? Using drugs? Overdoing alcohol? Struggling with a sexual orientation?
In all cases, the correct approach now is to say nothing. Do not enable or facilitate these adult kids in what you consider to be a wrong course: but, otherwise, keep your lips buttoned. Of all the generational changes that have occurred over the past 40 years, this, I think, is the biggest. "Do you remember," a cousin of mine said to me, "how our elders were forever telling us what we should and shouldn't do, where we were going wrong, how we should dress and behave?"
Indeed, I do. Sometimes it seemed like a continuous lecture from morning till night, ending with the phrase forever employed by benign (or even malevolent) dictators: "I am only saying this for your own good."
And did we take any notice? Even when they were right? Or especially when they were right? Not a blind bit of it.
Possibly for these reasons do the current experts on adult parenting counsel the opposite. Let them make their own mistakes. Step back and accept. If they are going into a disastrous marriage or relationship -- let them. And then let them face the consequences of their actions.
If they are on a course of destructive behaviour -- don't intervene -- and don't rescue them, ever.
If they are starving in an Indian hovel because they have imprudently miscalculated the costs of their gap year, tell them: "You got yourself into this, now get yourself out."
If they are arrested for illegal conduct, don't cover up for them. The most important lesson in life has to be lived through: you face the consequences of your actions.
To be fair to our lecturing, hectoring, and this-is-for-your-own-good elders, they would go to the ends of the earth to help, rescue, finance or otherwise get you (and the good of the family name) out of trouble.
But that is not the way now. You don't criticise and you don't interfere. Whatever they do, it's their choice.
"Yes," said Anita, nervously. "I nearly lost my daughter's love in telling her what I thought. But eventually she said, 'Well, Mum, that's your view, but this marriage is my choice'.
"So we left it there and things are fine between us again. But it was a close-run thing."
And Anita accepts that whether the marriage will succeed or not is up to the young couple themselves. No one else can live their lives for them.
- Mary Kenny
