<p>You also can meet mentors by joining professional organizations in fields that interest you. Usually such groups welcome students, and have lower membership rates for students.</p>
<p>Another option - have you thought about volunteering for organizations like the Big Sister Association, homeless teen groups, etc. Right now you are looking to replace a hole or void in your life. You might find that by helping others you will end up helping yourself and you will become the role model you never had.</p>
<p>I think that before being a really good role model, it can help to have good role models in one’s life. It’s hard to be an excellent mentor when one hasn’t experienced good parenting. While doing volunteer work is a great way to develop confidence, skills and to make a difference in the world, I don’t think that volunteering as a role model fills the void of not having role models in one’s own life. Volunteering as a mentor, though, can be a nice way to give back when one does get mentors of one’s own (or if one has been fortunate enough to come from a supportive, loving family).</p>
<p>Northstarmom, I really like your post and suggestions. I’m an 50’ish adult and I treasure my friendship with a 72 yr old woman who is very wise and offers alot of good advice to me at times. I lost my mom so I don’t have that 2nd ear. She also gets to share things about her kids and asks for my perspective because of my age. We have lunch on occasion and we email ever so often. Boundaries are quite important. “Good fences, make good neighbors.” Your words ring true for a lot of people who just need to have people in their lives that can give support and information, where they may be a void because of circumstances.</p>
<p>I find book clubs to be a good place also for finding mentors. They are usually comprised of women of different ages and discussion can often lead to talking about real life issues. You get to know a persons take on things and many good friendships have formed.</p>
<p>My D has done quite a bit of live in nannying. She says that when people say they want you to become part of the family, what they sometimes mean is that you are on call for work 24/7. She also says some who hire a live in nanny are really wanting an indentured servant (I was going to say slave, and D would have, but I thought it sounded a little too harsh!). Couples who have two careers and make enough money to afford a nanny often have very hectic schedules. Sometimes they think that since the nanny is “just sitting around all day”, she should also do the housekeeping, the laundry, and the cooking. Oh…and the errands, too. While it’s true that a mom staying home raising her own kids does do all of those things, it’s just different when it is your own kids and your own house.</p>
<p>When a nanny gets up at 6 with the baby, then does all those things all day, and the mom and dad get home and eat the dinner she prepared and then expect her to also clean the kitchen afterwards because they are so tired after their exhausting day at work, she might become resentful. </p>
<p>A nanny job can be okay, but just be sure to have all expectations about working hours and duties spelled out in writing before taking the job. It’s similar to the good fences and good neighbors thing mentioned above. As long as everyone has the same expectations going in, things are much more likely to go smoothly.</p>
<p>There are some great suggestions here! Church groups are excellent and I liked the book club idea, too. I’d never thought of that one!</p>
<p>returningstudent: when I was 14 I “separated” from my parents. Your brief description of your parental life, sounds a lot like mine was (I’m 50 now). When I was 16 I became very close with my “boyfriend’s” parents (although far closer with his mother than father). It is now 33 years later and this woman is my best friend. Initially it was a loose variation of a mother/daughter relationship. As time went on we both grew and changed and developed a true friendship (perhaps that “is” what a mother/daughter relationship is, I don’t know).</p>
<p>I started slow, and it took a good 10 years (really) for me to lower every guard and wall I had built around me. Now I have virtually none. And I have a very wonderful friendship. </p>
<p>My best advice is to go slow. Build up little by little. </p>
<p>I do know that senior citizens in assisted living homes are often looking for some caring company. How would feel about volunteering at one and simply being a compassionate listening ear? Someone to play cards with, or complete jigsaw puzzles? Anything. </p>
<p>Best to you as step out of your comfort zone, and begin the exploration into a full life. You can do it.</p>
<p>Allow me to suggest that what you want are not “parents” nor “mentors” but “advisors”.</p>
<p>Allow me to clarify. Parents (should) love you regardless and think you’re wonderful no matter what–even as they guide you to adulthood. You’ve achieved adulthood, so that role is less important.</p>
<p>Mentors provide career advice and planning, generally, rather than life advice. </p>
<p>Advisors are experts in one area or another. When my kids were little, and I couldn’t follow the (terrible) model of my own parents, I went to several older friends whose children I like and asked them for help. But they weren’t the people who helped me learn how to buy a used car… </p>
<p>It takes time, but if you identify what you need to know, and work to identify experts in those areas, and develop your own expertise, you will have a circle of cooperation that brings out the best in everyone.</p>
<p>Teachers are often glad to be of help in a limited role rather than a larger “parental” role. You can take a teacher/professor a cup of coffee and ask for advice, really. People become teachers because they LIKE sharing knowledge.</p>
<p>Actually, mentors do provide life advice depending on what the mentors can offer and what one’s relationship is with them. Some mentors do become basically surrogate parents.</p>
<p>Some mentors do provide basically unconditional love. Whether this happens depends on how the relationship evolves.</p>
<p>My h and I have mentored a man since the man was a college freshman taught by both of us in 1994. The relationship did start with our providing career mentoring, but over time, it evolved, and now the man is like a family member.</p>
<p>We all are on first name basis. When he comes to town, we have him over for a meal, and if his fiance is with him, he brings his girlfriend. When we’re in his town, we also get together. We talk about much more than work, and it was clear that he wanted our opinion of his plans to get married. </p>
<p>This kind of closeness doesn’t happen with all mentor relationships. For instance, a friend of mine, who is a college prof, says she tells her mentees that she can give wonderful career advice, but since she never figured out how to have a good love life herself, they should go elsewhere for advice on their love lives.</p>
<p>While it is helpful to seek mentors who are experts in the areas in which one needs to know things, it also can be helpful to develop close, family-like relationships with loving people who have lived good lives and are wise in general. These relationships take time to develop, so finding mentors also takes patience.</p>
<p>Thank you all for your wonderful advice!</p>
<p>I think my problem with mentoring relationships in the past has been that I’ve been too needy — basically, I needed that parental unconditional love, and I was quite impatient with hoping that someone else would fill that void. I’m realizing that I didn’t give time and nurturing to let the relationships grow.</p>
<p>I think that if I spend more time with older people, I’ll meet someone with whom a mentoring relationship automatically clicks. (But I’ll keep in mind your caveats, Northstarmom.)</p>
<p>Thanks to everyone for your kind advice! (But do keep it coming if anyone else wants to post!)</p>
<p>returningstudent, unfortunately that kind of unconditional parental love probably isn’t something you will ever get from a mentor. As you have discovered to your great sadness, sometimes even a parent isn’t capable of giving that much. If that’s your expectation of a mentor/surrogate parent…I’m sorry, but it is unlikely to happen, no matter how slowly you take things. What you want is too large and too intimate for most people. If you keep trying to get what you crave your neediness may push away those who might otherwise be good friends, advisors, and mentors to you.</p>
<p>I’d suggest that you need to give yourself permission to grieve for what you never had from your parents, and possibly seek therapy to work through your feelings of anger and loss at the way they’ve failed you. </p>
<p>And remember, relationships of all kinds are a two-way street. You can’t go into it focused only on what you want from it for yourself. There’s also what the other person needs from you to make the relationship worthwhile. </p>
<p>Good luck to you.</p>
<p>I have a suggestion.</p>
<p>A volunteer group that interests you is a good place to find an older adult friend and guide. You may not find someone who is like a mother to you, but there are probably some wonderful aunts or married couples who could be like and aunt and uncle to you. </p>
<p>A paid job is not a great place to find someone whom you grow to love because they may leave or you may leave, and there may be bad feelings because of what happened (someone’s group got outsourced or moved to another city or the funding for a position was lost).</p>
<p>My two cents worth, anyway.</p>
<p>Well, speaking from someone whose parents did their best–but their best was awful–you have to heal those wounds from within. I think a lot of the people that struggle in personal relationships in life are out there trying to get the mother-love and father-love they missed;trying to fill up those holes in their psyche, but you never can. You have to learn to do it for yourself. Definitely get the book an earlier post mentioned, and consider support groups etc. because it helps to realize that there are lots of other people in your same situation.</p>
<p>That said, I think if you make friends you’ll have a good shot at finding a surrogate family. I strongly encouraged my freshman s to find people that needed somewhere to go for Thanksgiving. One of his friends senior year practically lived at our house. Turned out that his mom had been working out of town during the week, leaving him home alone five nights a week. I am always happy to collect the strays, and I know I’m not the only mom out there that does that.</p>