I say all of the time that there are not enough books written about parenting twenty somethings. You can buy books about babies from sleep habits to feeding, from sensory introduction to socialization. You can buy books about toddlers from tantrums to tippy toe walking. You can buy books about school aged and teenage children to work through bullying, lack of motivation, back talk, and a hundred other topics. There just aren’t really enough books about parenting twenty somethings.

Maybe the assumption is that once your kids have reached eighteen, they no longer require parenting and there might be some truth to that. Parenting evolves as they age, for sure. When they’re infants, they require everything from you. As they begin to develop independence, we’re charged with teaching them how to tie their shoes and get dressed on their own. When they’re older, you’re teaching them how to drive and how to apply for their first job. There seems to be a misleading assumption that once they’re old enough to vote, they’re old enough to no longer need guidance and I disagree.

What I’m finding as my children (and stepchildren) age is that their needs are very different and it’s less about “you need to” and more “Here’s what I recommend.” You can no longer tell them what they have to do (if you ever could) and, frankly, if you’re still trying to do that when they’re in their twenties, you probably need a whole different set of books about finding yourself. Parenting in their twenties is a period of watching them figuring things out. Sometimes it’s heartbreaking because they want to do things the hard way and you have to watch them struggle and figure it out. Sometimes it’s the most rewarding thing ever when you watch them decorate for a holiday or find the love of their life.

So what’s the best advice I can give?

1. If your child is young, let them learn through their phases. What they learn as toddlers is meant to prepare them for pre-k. What they learn in pre-k prepares them for elementary school. What they learn in elementary school prepares them for middle school, and so on. Don’t coddle them. Let them learn the hard lessons they need to learn in that age range so they don’t go into the next age range unprepared. Let them learn the consequences of not doing their homework and failing a class (and maybe attending summer school). Let them experience the consequences of choosing a friend that treats them unkindly. Guide them, of course. Protect them where you can, but at the end of the day, let them make those mistakes while there’s still a safe place to fall.
2. Teach them skills and teach them young. Let them grow up learning that certain things are just part of sharing a household. Cleaning your room or cleaning up after yourself, helping with the dishes, and taking out the trash aren’t chores you get paid for; they are part of sharing a household and we all contribute. (And parents stop the “the kids are responsible for everything” nonsense. You should all be pitching in together, even if you work….and yes I’m a working parent and have been pretty much their whole lives.)
3. Be more concerned about how they are treating themselves and others than you are about whether they have A’s instead of B’s and whether they are involved in 20 different activities. Believe me when I tell you that teaching them early on to respect their own bodies and minds (and learn to protect them early on) and respecting others is going to go a lot farther than the A+ they got in Geometry. Of course learning is very important and I would never downplay the importance of education, but whether they get an A or a C in Algebra is going to matter far less in life than whether they learned how to respect authority figures, do hard things that they don’t like (i.e. homework, work, etc), and that they need to work from the bottom up at a new job instead of having things handed to them.
4. Stop rescuing them. If there were three words I would tell all parents of twenty somethings (and above), it would be to stop rescuing them all of the time. There is a stark difference between providing guidance or maybe giving them a hand when they get laid off and rescuing them because they overspent every single time or rushing in to bail them out when they’ve burned a bridge with someone in their life. Advise all day long if you want (and sometimes they might even listen), but stop jumping in to save them. The more you do this, the less they learn to thrive on their own and the more you hinder them in the long run. Let them learn, even when it’s hard. Acknowledge their feelings that it hurts and it’s hard and it makes them sad. Acknowledge that they have the right to feel that way and then ask them the big question, “What are you going to do to fix it?” It’s even fine to say, “What can I do to support you in fixing it” but if the answer is to give them money or buy them things to fix it, the answer is “no, but I will help you find a way to save for it yourself.”

Generation X and Millennial parents are finding very quickly that their gentle parenting and trying to make everything “better” than they had it is backfiring and it’s backfiring hard. Why? Because we’re not letting them learn the hard things or do the hard things. They’re getting privileges way too early and without any work. They’re growing entitled and then we’re complaining about how entitled they are. But that is an entirely different post of its own.

So take a deep breath, mama/dad. Say it with me…. “I won’t do it for you, but I’ll be here to talk to while you’re figuring it out.” Be the soft place to land, not the scaffolding that is constantly supporting them so they can’t ever fall. Let them learn.