Some day, sooner or later, our children will be taking care of us, their parents. If we’re lucky. I won’t demand that my daughters take care of me, but I hope they’ll help out if necessary, because they want to.
I have two coworkers whose moms (one a few years older than me, the other one younger) have cancer and both coworkers are being great daughters, taking their moms to appointments and such. On the other hand, one of my ex’s brothers hasn’t visited their very sick, elderly parents in several years.
I’m pretty sure my daughters’ relationship with me is more like those of my coworkers’ with their moms, not my former BIL’s with his parents.
I a guess I was around 40 when we chatted like friends. We’d shop together, share a sandwich, etc. when we shopped, I was often helping her select and try on, which is different from what we did when i was younger.
Yikes! I obviously didn’t express this very well! We don’t have a bad relationship at all! I don’t think that being a mom and being a friend are mutually exclusive either. I was not a dictatorial parent, and we have always been close and gotten along pretty well. Lots of mutual respect. Really!
I appreciate the suggestions. I do want us to have a continued good relationship. I am working hard to curtail giving unsolicited advice. Maybe I am just wishing he would think I am smart enough to be worthy of asking! Lol - maybe some day. I have asked advice from him. My expectations, in general, are probably unrealistic.
I do think there is a big difference between sons and daughters with their moms. It’s interesting to me how some of you craved friendships with your moms while others of you cringed when your moms referred to you as their friend. I guess the answer is that we are all different and all want different things.
D and I shop together for her and then go out to lunch or dinner. We both enjoy it but don’t do it that often, especially since she lives 2500 miles away.
My sibs and I all help our folks in our own ways. I take them to the bulk of their medical appointments, as well as hearing aid visits. My D has come with me to see several of my Specislist MDs and provided good and thoughtful contributions. I’ve attended her appts as well.
S is more independent and 5000 miles away but we enjoy each other’s company as well and chat about financial matters more with one another.
@Hoggirl are you saying that while you feel close to your son that it feels more one-sided - that he isn’t showing the interest in you, your activities, a “friend” relationship??? You’re ready for that but he’s not???
You say your expectations may be unrealistic - expectations to be “friends”?
I have to ask again - define friends. I don’t expect to be a friend like their peers. I can’t be their peer when I’m 30+ years older than them! But I can enjoy similar activities, go out for a night or a vacation with them, talk and debate, share interests, etc.-
This is really interesting to me-I spent an hour today with my therapist discussing my dad (84) and his desire for a parent/adult child relationship. The past 5 or so years, he wants to be “close”, yet did not do the work when I was a child or young adult. My kids are 25 and 27 and it has just evolved naturally. I am a mom of adult children and I love our current relationships.
My kids still rarely spill the beans on this stuff, but their friends are another matter!
Like others, I’m not sure exactly what you are getting at. Our two sons are very different. The one who lives on the other coast is not Mr. Chitchat. We talk to him once a week, except when he doesn’t answer the phone. He visits us for Thanksgiving and Christmas and we usually see him for one day in the summer as DH has had to be in SF in June for the last few years. I worry that at some point he’ll decide the trip to see us is just not worth it, but so far he’s willing to keep the relationship going. We talk about books and tech issues mostly. When he’s with us we play board games.
Younger son has been much easier. He’s interested in politics and global issues as well as reading the same books and playing games. He’s got a girlfriend who has been based in NYC which means he has a second incentive to visit. While we’ve always enjoyed talking, I think college and the experiences he had there - travel abroad, jobs, made him measurably more interesting. I’ve really enjoyed the adult he’s become.
But both kids will also be kids. That means I can tell my oldest that he can’t just tell his uncle he’s “probably not” showing up for Thanksgiving. Clear answers, and a “thanks for the invite” are in order. I try to keep the nagging to a minimum. We say nothing about the state of his apartment. (Well almost nothing!)
I would also say birth also. We are parents and friends with our kids and in many cases the kids’ friends. When they were young our crowd always socialized with the kids and their friends and it was just that our primary day time free time activities were active and not age constrained so the kids learned how to be friends with people of all ages, younger and older. Now that the whole crew, kids and friends, are moving, marrying, starting jobs and switching jobs we still enjoy when we see the kids’ friends or they stop by, or call or send a message and of course our own kids are on their own so the togetherness has different dimensions. There is a difference between being a peer or parent and a friend in my mind. As our kids age the parenting piece wanes and the friend piece increases. The parent piece becomes more about the love and less about the nurturing and over-site.
@abasket - no I don’t expect to be like a peer. Maybe that’s the problem - I’m not sure what I’m supposed to expect?? Perhaps I am just over-thinking all of it and trying a bit too hard.
@Hoggirl , the “peer” statement wasn’t directed towards you - someone else mentioned friend = peer friend in one of the posts above.
I think you and your son will be fine!!! Just keep talking and reaching out to him. Share stuff. He might not respond to all of it but some will catch his attention.
@momofthreeboys - this! Thank you for expressing that so well!
We, too, have always done all ages/whole families together. The friend group and their parents were all very tight in high school - still are, really. Already looking forward to an annual NYE gathering!
To me, it is not a friendship. It is a parent to adult-child relationship, which is in a category all by itself. Friendship is only one aspect of it. It is much more. It is unconditional love and acceptance. It is continual guidance (when welcomed). It is all the ups and downs of an intimate relationship, but knowing that you will always still be there for each other.
Remember that for a guy his frontal cortex is not developed until 27 or so. My S is not a talker. However, I really have seen him mature since about 26. He is 28 now and will be 29 in May. He now reaches out on Mother’s Day and such.
He is never going to be a talker but he seems happy to visit and makes a true effort. Friend? His idea of a friend is not the intimacy that D has at all. I do think he would turn to me in an emergency (and has). His relationship with his Dad is less as H is clearly critical. S is married with an S of his own. The best thing we have done with them is to take first a mini trip and last year to San Diego and going this yr again. I am trying to build some shared memories which also gives us things to talk about together.
My adult relationship with D has been no easier but very different. She is more dependent on us now that she married, has a baby and is in a residency. What she wants from us right now is not realistic so we are navigating as we go.
We just learned, to our surprise that S has just purchased a gently used Altima and we told him we have put a deposit down on a new Prius Prime.
I am pretty content with my relationships with my folks and both of our adult kids. Our kids know we can agree to disagree, candidly express opinions, and just be ourselves.
I won’t get into the friend vs. parent thing because it’s not a distinction I made when my kids were small.
Then I was the adult and also the person who had responsibility for meeting everyone’s needs. But my kids had lives and interests as well, and we could share and enjoy things together.
But I think the transition of the relationship took place as my offspring took on adult responsibilies and established their own homes in different cities.
My home in California stopped being the “home base” for family holiday get togethers. Now that both are married and one also has a child, it makes more sense for me to travel to their homes.
They both are well established in their respective jobs/careers, earning far more than I do – so it has been many years since I have been funder-in-chief of anything. They often call me and ask for input on life decisions-- weighing whether to accept a job offer, asking for input on a work-related problem, making choices for an insurance option or investment option, issues that come up related to raising my grandson — but now it is as young independent adults who value the opinion of an older, more experienced adult.
Part of the parent/child relationship is one of control. It starts out with the parent in control, and over time there is a transition to where the adult children have control. I think I am currently on pretty much equal footing with my offspring – but their father is disabled and has needed their help financially and with finding housing – so I have seen a different shift in that relationship.
I think 21 is too young to expect much of a change. It’s not really an age thing so much as a life experience/status thing.
I can tell you that you can expect a significant change if and when your role shifts from parent to grandparent.
My relationship with my kids are changing, but I don’t think my kids would say we are more like friends now. There are things we share with our own friends that we wouldn’t share with each other. I would say the “control” and “power” are shifting. I no longer feel like I need to or can tell them how to navigate through life. We are moving to where D1 may advise me about some challenges in my life. At the same time, my kids know they can’t speak to me like they do with their friends. They know I am their mom first, who would love them no matter what and accept them for who they are.
This discussion has been very helpful to me. I think my own lack of having parents myself once I was an adult-child has cause me to be unaware of what to expect. Dh really has not had a close relationship with his parents. His dad passed away in August, and he has since gotten closer to his mom, I think. His dad was a very controlling and critical person, and we kind of purposely limited our time with both of them because of that. So, I think all of this is playing into why I am pondering things and asking myself what kind of parent/friend/role I am to be/have. I didn’t really have any or good examples, if that makes any sense.
I appreciate everyone sharing their thoughts and experiences.
I feel a lot of this is related to when your children truly establish their own home. It was very obvious this past Thanksgiving that my home is no longer my daughter’s home.
It is more of an adult to adult relationship when you discuss with your child the high cost of vanilla or the lack of choices in the 2019 health plans being offered - the same kind of stuff you discuss with your adult friends. This doesn’t mean you don’t guide or help when asked or needed (dealing with medical issues is a big one that comes to mind).
I do consider my daughter one of my best friends (my husband being the other) and I think the feeling is reciprocal. My most important criteria for this is enjoying spending time with them and wanting to share stuff with them (who do you think of telling first about some new thing you learned or experienced). Neither myself or my husband ever had this type of relationship with our parents.
My adult daughter is one of my very best friends. Although she lives 500 miles away, we text daily and talk multiple times per week. Like @kiddie, we talk about stuff that any two adult friends might talk about - the best ways to cook a turkey, clothing styles (“does this make me look fat?”), new authors to read, politics, religion, and so on. Important stuff and silly stuff. She told me once that she considers me a best friend who also loves her to the moon.
That being said, she wasn’t always my friend. When she was in middle school she ignored me mercilessly. She was the queen of the eye roll, and I think my worries about her grades and college prospects didn’t help our relationship. We started getting closer in late high school/college, but we definitely became better friends around college graduation. I’d say this “adult-friendship-ness” happened around age 22-23 but definitively accelerated when she moved further from home and bought a house.
She’s still the one I call with breaking news and she seems to come to me first (well, after her husband). We give and receive criticism and advice from each other. We like taking trips together, and she’s trying to convince me and DH to move nearer to her when we retire because…grandchildren.
Does it matter that she’s a daughter and not a son? Probably, but I wouldn’t know (she’s an only child.) I also know that neither my husband nor I had this type of adult relationship with our own parents. Like so much of parenting, we seemed to just have stumbled into this. No complaints, though.
"You’ll know when you’re there when they start telling you about all of the things they did when they were younger that they were keeping a secret from you. "
My dad’s 96 and while I think we’re on the “friend” level–telling him a few of the things I’ve done just is never gonna happen!
