SETTING LIMITS: WHAT YOU CAN OR CAN’T DO
I’m an accountant, so I keep track of all my expenses. I have spent close to $50,000 buying my daughter used cars when she runs a current car into the ground, and paying her rent, utility bills, and so forth. I’m okay now financially, but cannot give her any more without jeopardizing myself. I cannot let her ruin me financially. It’s really up to her now.
Laurie was in her third year of college at a large Midwestern university when the voices in her head started. At first she tried to drown them out by turning up the volume on her iPod. Then Laurie soon noticed that crowds made the voices much louder, so she stopped going to lectures. Her roommates also noticed that Laurie had changed. She had become angry and reclusive, and she slept most of the day, leaving the apartment at odd times.
Late in the semester Renee received a phone call from the campus police. Laurie had been found sleeping in the local cemetery, and she was brought to the university hospital to treat an unexplained gash to her forehead. Upon hearing the news, Renee rushed to the hospital. Her relief that her daughter was safe was tempered by the subsequent news from the ER doctor. Laurie was two months pregnant.
In another case, Peter started drinking heavily in high school. As his sister left for college and then a job and his brother excelled in professional hockey, Peter spent the next decade moving from job to job, from girlfriend A to girlfriend B, and so on. His parents knew that he was creative, but Peter shared none of their enthusiasm for using his artistic talents. By age nineteen, he had been arrested twice for drunk driving. By age twenty-one, Peter had already served six months in jail for petty larceny. As a condition of his release, he reluctantly agreed to participate in a substance treatment program. But Peter’s sobriety did not last long.
All parents hope that their dependent children will flourish into independent adults. But the Rolling Stones said it best, “You can’t always get what you want.” Being a good parent doesn’t mean that you will be rewarded with an easy child to raise.
Laurie’s sudden decline represents the opening salvo in a struggle with chronic paranoid schizophrenia. The vignette of Peter’s life is one of countless episodes of bad judgment and irresponsible behavior. The parents of mentally ill or otherwise debilitated adult children are left to synthesize a plan to cope with the ongoing dependency. At a time in their lives when they expected to see their children soar, they are forced to scrape them up off the floor.
Parents of adult children with serious issues think and worry about the long haul. How will my adult child be cared for? How do I pay for her needs? How far do I go to help him without hurting him? This chapter attempts to address these elemental questions.
Among the first realizations is that so little is under parental control. Your adult child, however vulnerable or self-defeating he may be, is still an adult and he makes the final decisions about his life. For example, Peter was offered all the perks of affluence, from the best schools to the nicest clothes, and when he needed it, the best mental health treatment. To his parents’ frustration, however, he never was resourceful enough to use these advantages.
Renee recalls the devastation of learning of her daughter’s mental illness right after the pregnancy was discovered. Immediately, Renee felt that she had to make decisive moves. She brought Laurie home to live and Renee read about schizophrenia, the diagnosis that Laurie had been given. Also Renee contacted Families Anonymous, a support group for families battling mental illness. Renee also helped Laurie find a caring psychiatrist. Another step that Laurie could have taken was to take a free twelve-week course on mental illness with the National Alliance for Mental Illness (NAMI). The course is called “Family to Family Education Program.” For more information, go to nami.org/template.cfm?Section=Family-to-Family&lstid=751.
Parents of troubled adult children often worry about ensuring their child has health care should they become ill. Laurie is no longer a student. Her family was grateful to learn that under the federal Affordable Care Act, adult children are allowed to stay on their parents’ insurance until age twenty-six.
Renee decided to help her daughter pursue Supplemental Security Insurance (SSI). Medicaid benefits are automatic for individuals who receive SSI payments.
Yet as strongly as Renee willed her daughter to get all better, Laurie’s progress was slow. Laurie’s hallucinations continued and her bizarre behavior grew worse. She also refused to get any obstetrical care throughout her pregnancy. Renee said, “I felt alone and overmatched. I was making most of the decisions, but I could not lose the fact that Laurie had sovereign rights. I thought she should have an abortion, but doctors were reluctant to perform the procedure on a psychotic woman.” Also, Laurie was ambivalent herself about having an abortion.
Laurie received antipsychotic medications from her psychiatrist, who believed that the risk for extreme and self-destructive behavior from Laurie was greater than the risk of antipsychotics for a pregnant woman. Fortunately, the baby was born healthy and was later adopted by relatives who were both eager and able to raise a child and who were not worried about a possible genetic risk for mental illness that the child might have inherited.
Demanding Certain Things, Including Treatment
So little is under a parent’s control that you must maximize whatever influence you have. Previous chapters stressed the importance of treatment, and the same message applies to Laurie and Peter. Yet sometimes even the best treatment has its limitations. “Once Laurie started taking Clozaril, the voices went away, but she was still not the same person,” said Renee. “Our sweet teenager had turned into a distant and unemotional young adult. She didn’t like the side effects of gaining weight or being tired. Still I insisted that she take her medications and she did. She knew that there was no other acceptable way.”
In uncontrolled situations, parents need to do all that can be done. Peter’s parents, Craig and Nora, negotiated a common understanding with their recalcitrant son. Like many individuals with antisocial personality disorder, Peter did not pursue treatment because he saw little reason to change. Nora said, “We knew that Peter’s alcohol craving went way down when he took Campral. We were determined to get through his two years of probation without an ugly episode.” They made a simple agreement: If Peter would take his medications that week, then his parents would fill his car with gas. “It somehow actually worked,” said Nora.
Finding Balance
It is impossible to make it through life without getting rained on, but there are many different degrees of saturation. You may listen to your neighbors or coworkers complain about minor inconveniences or a temporary money crunch, but you know (although you keep the thought to yourself) that many of their issues are minor and will soon resolve themselves. In contrast, the parents of chronically ill children live their anxiety every day and often have little hope of relief. Each day brings new problems, which may grow more complicated with time.
Work with your adult child so that you and she can try to make solid decisions that are both good for your child and also fair to other family members. This is by no means an easy road to navigate.
Adopting a Hard-Line Approach
Jenny was a person who pushed everyone to the limits. She was adopted at age three and her parents Tanya and Joe, approaching age forty at the time of the adoption, never could keep up with Jenny. She exerted little effort in middle school and in high school Jenny assumed the position of chairperson of the mean girls. Jenny drank on weekends, and spent most of her time finding and then dropping boyfriends and excluding other girls from any social recognition. By her senior year, both the school administration and her fellow students knew of her malicious ways. Jenny was transferred to an alternative high school and barely graduated.
Many of Jenny’s former classmates, to whom she had been so malignant, went on to college, the military, or a family business. Jenny had few options and she withered most of them away. She started waitressing but was found stealing from the cash register and was fired. Her roommate, with whom she had been sharing an apartment, moved out after six months, leaving Jenny with a large debt. (She had neglected to have the friend co-sign the rental agreement and consequently Jenny had complete liability.) Jenny turned to her parents to cover the loss, and they did so.
Over the next five years, Jenny lived with three consecutive boyfriends, and worked three or four part-time jobs. As was the case through most of her life, Tanya and Joe had little influence on their daughter. After years of this chaos, Tanya remarked, “It’s sad that her only accomplishment so far is that she has not become pregnant.”
When Jenny was twenty-four, she asked to move home and Tanya and Joe reluctantly agreed. They were right to be reluctant. For most of the next two years, Jenny did not work and she regularly slept until noon. She would dress provocatively and party late into the night with no regard for her parents or younger siblings’ schedule. When Tanya and Joe discovered that some expensive jewelry was missing, they did not know whether to suspect Jenny or one of the many random people she had brought into their home.
“At that point, I was done,” said Tanya, “I was at the limit. We told Jenny that she had to leave. We could not be a part of her life anymore. It hurt us too much to watch her self-destruct, and we did not think we were helping her in any way. We had to try something new.”
Jenny resisted leaving home. However, soon she found a new boyfriend to move in with, but this relationship lasted only a few weeks. She called her parents asking for another try. “No” was the unified answer. Tanya said, “We told Jenny, yes, you will have to go to the homeless shelter if you have nowhere else to sleep. And no, we will not give you any more money.” The message was clear. Jenny had to show some progress before her parents would consider rescuing her once again.
Six months passed with little contact between the parents and their daughter. Tanya and Joe worried constantly about Jenny’s well-being. Every time he put his head on the pillow at night, Joe wondered if Jenny was in a safe place. At times, Joe was critical of his wife’s hard line, but they agreed to not relent from their position.
They did not know that Jenny had finally connected with their message. At the woman’s shelter, Jenny noticed a posting for work in a United Way program. The head of the program, a gentle local pastor, liked Jenny and offered her a job distributing meals to poor families. Jenny became part of his organization and she quickly excelled. She learned the importance of teamwork and personal responsibility. Jenny stopped using her sexuality to manipulate people and instead she displayed her gregarious personality to spur more donations.
Several years later, Jenny was asked to lead the local program, and the family celebrated Jenny’s thirtieth birthday together. She was now functioning well. The only question is whether her transformation was due to the passage of time or her parents’ dramatic decision to back off and force her to mature. But the most important issue for them was the outcome: a happier and more successful Jenny.
Working the Deal with Peter: A Softer Approach
Many parents can swap stories about their adult child’s money mismanagement, but not all have Tanya and Joe’s firm resolve. Peter’s father Craig shared the following: “We could not control Peter’s spending. He was great at getting credit cards and spending them to the limit. I am a businessman, so I really believe in paying your debts. I paid his bills at first because I thought it was the right thing to do.”
His wife Nora was angry at her son and she was even angrier at her husband. She accused Craig of enabling Peter by covering for him all the time. Craig said, “My wife told me that if Peter had carte blanche, then he would never take any responsibility. I realized that this is true and that I gave him money to avert my own emotional pain that I felt when my son was deprived.” Craig had the conflicted emotions of being angry at Peter’s poor choices and sad that those choices left his son with so little.
In deference to Nora, Craig tried a harder line. He said, “We then went through a period where we paid for nothing. This was not so wonderful either. When he had no money, Peter did nothing and he just spent all his time in the basement. We were unhappy that he was always around.” The couple found no happiness with either indulging or depriving their son.
After several months of a cold war with his wife, Craig developed a guiding principle. “I decided to pay for things for Peter if they are in our best interests too.” As an example, Craig decided to pay for Peter’s car insurance, rationalizing that if his son had no transportation, then he could not get a job.
“I paid for basic coverage for his cell phone so that his work could reach him and I could contact him anytime I wanted,” said Craig, adding, “But I refused to get him the newest smartphone with the deluxe data package.” This pragmatic compromise worked for Craig and Nora.
To further improve their credibility, Craig and Nora insisted that all obligations be clarified. To avoid misunderstandings, a laminated list of weekly tasks and other expectations for Peter is taped to the refrigerator. They also demand he contribute to solving his own financial problems. For example, three years ago, Peter had an unpaid $20,000 credit card.
Nora said, “We agreed to pay half of the bill provided that he would make his contribution without disruption. We never missed a week and never let him free of his portion even at Christmas. He knew that this agreement was inviolable. Last week we paid it off.”
Financial Planning
Don was diagnosed with mild autism spectrum disorder early in middle school. The public school district provided Don with many resources. His principal put together an Individualized Educational Plan (IEP) that followed Don through high school. Don had access to a resource room and he participated in a tailored curriculum. He was assigned a teacher’s aide and also received regular psychological counseling. Don had difficulty making friends, but a kind teacher found him a place on the computer robotics team.
Don was handed a diploma at graduation but in exchange, he and his family gave up the beneficial school services. At that time, there was little community support for young adults with debilitating social anxiety and an awkward interpersonal style. In the depths of the last recession, Don was unable to find a job. He spent his days playing video games, and the bulk of his social contacts were virtual, such as fellow World of Warcraft players whom he had never met.
After several years of this pattern, it became clear that Don was not making progress. His family met to share their mutual concerns. His mother, a widow recently diagnosed with ovarian cancer, worried about who would care for Don in the event that her illness progressed. Don’s two sisters had similar concerns. Neither sister was prepared to bring Don into their home, and both worried about how to support Don and who would make decisions for him.
The meeting spurred the family into action. Don’s sister contacted Friendship Circle, a nonprofit Michigan-based organization that helps individuals with special needs. Many similar organizations have taken root throughout the country, and in some states, they have helped secure legislation mandating that insurance companies cover services for this population. The family was assigned a professional advocate who found Don a workshop program for socialization to prepare for a job. The family helped Don apply for Supplemental Security Income (SSI) and state Medicaid.
As importantly, the family mustered the courage to talk about their finances. The daughters knew that after their father’s sudden death, his estate had been transferred to their mother. They worried that when their mother died, Don would be left a third of the estate and both sisters feared that he would squander the money that he needed to last him a lifetime.
Guided by the family advocate, their mother agreed to hire a probate attorney who set up a living trust that ensured Don a monthly income but never gave him total control of all the funds. Both of Don’s sisters lived out of town and they were relieved that a legal guardian would be appointed to manage their brother’s daily affairs. The family rested more comfortably knowing that their money was being professionally invested and that Don would be left well positioned.
There are many ways that adult children can break your heart. Most heartbreak results from bad decisions. Your children may spend money impulsively, pursue poisonous relationships, or get into major legal binds. At each bruising turn, your child grows more frustrated as your faith in him erodes.
There are some basic rules to help your child make good decisions. These rules are fundamental for the parents of young children, but they also need to be reinforced in adult children who are intellectually limited or emotionally immature. These rules are most crucially needed by individuals with substance abuse problems or antisocial personality disorder, as those with these conditions often teeter on the precipice of disaster. Their general disregard for methodical approaches to problem solving makes implementing the rules quite tricky, yet their ongoing turmoil often demands your input.
Ask Basic Who, What, When, Where, Why, and How Much Questions
Begin by explaining that you will try to help by exploring your child’s major problems in a structured way. Sometimes by talking through the elements of a troubling situation, a previously ignored solution suddenly presents itself. This process, used by journalists trying to grasp the basic elements of a story, can be productive because the child has previously resisted thinking about the issue or is too overwhelmed by its magnitude.
Many times individuals with antisocial personality disorder understand that they have entered a problematic quicksand, but they are too impatient to explain all the details to you. Be clear to her that helping with her issues does not mean that you intend to heroically rescue her from responsibility. Your goal is to develop a structure for her to pay her bills, but it is not an offer for you to do it for her.
Whatever the problem, you can learn more by asking your adult child some key questions. Find out who is the person in the power position of the problem? Is it the boss, the bank, the landlord, the police? Then ask what the problem is, as far as your child knows. Will the electricity be cut off because a bill was not paid? Did a failed drug test trigger a violation of their probation?
When are the results of the problem going to occur? Will the consequence occur today, tomorrow, or next month? In many cases, there is a specific date by which some action must be taken. The “whens” are often ignored, yet these details are very important. Many complications can be avoided simply by paying a bill on time or by showing up for court on the right date.
Clarify where the event will happen. Is your child being arraigned at the courthouse? Is a state official coming to her house to investigate? And why is it happening? Yes, the eviction process may be starting because a bill wasn’t paid, but you may learn that your child was temporarily unable to work. This provides the why explanation.
Jackie’s son was recently released from prison, and he got a job selling merchandise at the baseball stadium. Jackie said, “He actually did well for a few months but there were several rainouts and he earned nothing for a while. The landlord was sympathetic when Jackie explained this to his landlord. Crisis avoided . . . for now.” Some businesses will extend the grace period of payment at least a few days if the individual calls and explains the problem, asking (politely!) for extra time.
You will also need to determine how much it will cost to resolve the problem. For example, if your child owes five hundred dollars and she cannot pay it at once, can she make a partial payment with a guarantee that the balance will be paid by a certain date? Again, if your child could not pay the bill because she was very sick or in the hospital, there is nothing lost in asking for a reprieve. The favor should be paired with proof (e.g., a doctor’s note) to avoid the suspicions that are naturally generated when an excuse is offered.
Once the scope of the problem is understood, you and your adult child are in a better position to work on a solution.
Prioritizing Problems
Problem solving also requires some triage, so it is helpful to have your child list her ten most serious problems. Then have her prioritize these problems from the most pressing one (or the one with the most immediate consequences) to the least important issue. The plan is to work together on Problem Number One first, and then knock each one off in appropriate order.
If you think that your child has misjudged her list, then discuss it in a positive fashion. For example, it might be disconcerting to you if she gives the highest priority to her unpaid bill with the storage unit where she’s keeping her furniture, over the priority for her unpaid rent. If so, then ask her, and in a noncondescending manner, what is more concerning to you, having your old furniture confiscated or not having a roof over your head? She may not like the idea of losing her furniture, but the direct question forces a qualitative analysis of her priorities.
If your child continues to insist that the payment for the storage unit is her most pressing problem, then move on to the next issue rather than arguing over this issue. As you continue to go through the list, she may realize herself that her priorities should change. Do not easily succumb to offering your home, yet again, as a way out for her. She is an adult and needs to learn to live in the outside world, albeit belatedly.
What Has He Already Tried?
You also need to ask your adult child if he has had this problem before and what he did then to resolve the issue. He may surprise you and may have already tried to work something out. If so, you need to know what he offered and how the person in power responded. Said Lisa about her son Rick, age thirty-one, “We spent an hour talking about his latest conundrum when Rick told me that last year his landlord allowed him to paint the hallways in exchange for the full rent. I wanted to scream at him, ‘Why didn’t you tell me that earlier?’ But I resisted.” The more methodically your child can provide you the information and the calmer you are when you receive it (no matter how maddening the response may sometimes be), then the easier it should be for the two of you to work through the issues.
You should also ask your adult child to think of the landlord as a person who should be treated with politeness and fairness. Try to guide your child away from demonizing those to whom they owe money. Portray the landlord as a businessman who needs the rent money to pay his employees, and not as an evil exploiter not worthy of respect. In another example, if your adult child speaks disrespectfully about his probation officer, you should recast the officer as an average person who is enforcing the county policy, and not a personal enemy. Your child may not be empathetic by nature, but there is nothing to be gained if he hears you are also denigrating his foils.
You may be able to find other solutions for your child to try. In general, however, it is best that your child use your ideas as his own and then for you to back off. Be mindful that unless you let him implement the solution, nothing is gained. For example, if you communicate with the landlord directly, then you will be perceived as the solution by both your child and the landlord. If problems occur downstream the landlord will bypass your child and contact you directly for a resolution.
Brainstorming Solutions
Have a brainstorming session in which you and your child discuss possible solutions to the current issue. It’s okay if the ideas are silly. Even crazy ideas may be valuable because they may trigger thoughts of possible remedies to the problem. Write them all down and discuss all the strategies together. Your adult child may brainstorm that she loves her house and wishes she could buy it. Her sentiment should be shared with the landlord as he too probably loves the property and at least on this account, he and your daughter share common ground.
Obviously this is not a resolution; if she can’t make the rent, she has little chance of making the down payment. Not all the ideas will be winners, but the process of brainstorming is a fundamental means to resourceful thinking and should be encouraged.
A Willingness to Ask for Help
Many communities have social services available for those in need. Religious organizations and governmental agencies may provide short-term housing. Many of these groups sponsor or can refer your child to free health clinics whose mission is to serve the indigent. Most states offer generous benefits to pregnant mothers and their children through state Medicaid. Children born to poor mothers also have access to the Women, Infants and Children (WIC) program and other nutritional programs (nutrition.gov/food-assistance-programs/wic-women-infants-and-children).
But your child needs to be able to ask for help. When Monica called her daughter who lived a thousand miles away, Carla complained that she had no food in her kitchen. Typically this is when Carla would ask for money, as she had done countless times before. This time Monica was prepared to offer a more constructive response. She encouraged Carla to apply for Food Stamps. In the short run, suggested Monica, Carla should visit the local Salvation Army and ask for food. Carla responded with horror, and said, “Mom! Those places are for poor people! I’m not going there.” Monica assured her daughter that she was not too good to ask for help.
Is Monica’s decision not to send her daughter money an example of shifting a family’s responsibility to a charity or government? To some degree that is true. Still these social service agencies exist to help the downtrodden. Once your child reaches out to them for food or shelter, most agencies will work to reinforce behaviors that promote independence.
Why Is It Different This Time?
Even after you insist that your child go through the process of brainstorming and problem solving, you might, once again, decide that there is no other alternative but for you to intervene and assume the financial and emotional burden. If at the end of the process you are again paying the bill, why even go through the painstaking process?
For several reasons. First, your child should be aware that he needs to reciprocate. If you are good enough to pay part of his rent, he should clean out the messy garage. If you take care of her children because she has not planned well, she must agree to paint the bedroom.
More importantly, your adult child must understand that his behavior is unacceptable, and although you are responding to her need, it is not business as usual. You may encounter some resistance from your adult child. The pushback will be more severe in emotionally immature adult children, particularly if your previous approach was complete wish fulfillment.
You will, no doubt, hear some familiar refrains from your adult children if you don’t respond favorably to their requests. All individuals deserve to be heard and active listening is essential to a productive relationship. But to avoid a repetition of old arguments, formulate your reactions and try some novel responses. Here are some examples:
He Says: It Isn’t Fair
Thinking About Your Response:
When children are five or six, they often complain that “it isn’t fair” if they don’t get what they want when they want it. This regressed thinking needs to be abandoned by adults because frankly life isn’t fair. People get injured in accidents and succumb to horrible diseases. These fates are random and “unfair.” However, it is not unfair to refuse your adult child money, the chance to live at your home, or the right to use your car. Inform your child that as his parent you are committed to his well-being, but there is space between you and it’s important for healthy adults to recognize that boundary.
He Says: I’ll Get in Trouble If You Don’t Get Me Out of This Mess
Thinking About Your Response:
No parent wants his child to return to jail because of an outstanding fine or face violence because of an unpaid street loan. For this reason you might choose to help in this crisis, but you must communicate that you didn’t cause the problem and it is not your responsibility to fix it. If you perpetuate the premise that you are always there to save him, he will surely repeat his mistakes. It’s important for your child to hear from your mouth that the rules of engagement have changed.
There might be another situation that arises that does not carry immediate or dire consequences. Your child might need money for a superfluous purchase or another impulsive decision. In that circumstance, prove your point and do not reward self-defeating behavior.
She Says: You’re the Only Person Who Can Help Me
Thinking About Your Response:
If you hear that you are the only person who can help, it’s more likely that she means that you are the only person who will help her. Amy’s daughter repeatedly turned to her in crisis. Amy says, “One of the hardest things I did was say no when she was in trouble but not in crisis. I saved her many times but most recently I resisted and she had no other choice but to pawn some of her special jewelry. I think this had an impact on her.”
He Says: You Helped My Brother When He Got into Trouble
Thinking About Your Response:
Siblings constantly measure if they are getting their share of your attention and resources and this ad hoc accounting does not end in adulthood. Assume that you did help another adult child with a financial problem recently.
It’s best to deal with this emotional blackmail quickly and honestly. Do not badmouth the other child. The amount may have been small and perhaps completely unsolicited. It may have gone to a child who rarely requests help. You only must reveal the details of the transaction that suit you and you cannot let their objection alter your course. What you and your spouse do with your money is no one else’s business. Simply declare that you will not discuss the issue any further.
Standing Firm with Your Partner
Spouses and partners who work well together will be further challenged by the pressure of coping with a troubled adult child. You will need to fortify each other. No matter how dedicated you are to your child, your spouse is the vital person of your later life. A child might identify one of his parents as the softer target and will approach her repeatedly until he gets the answer he seeks. The job of the other spouse is to be supportive and to help her stand firm against the onslaught. The couple may need to stop speaking to their child for a while until the assault passes.
A unified approach is essential if your partner is not the child’s biological parent. He may develop sympathy for your child, an interesting development if it happens. It is more likely, however, that he will take a harder line. It is easy to fall into the trap of confiding to the nonbiological parent that you are now adopting new tactics only to fall back to your previous ways. Don’t allow such a situation to develop. Instead, if you don’t agree with each other, then agree to disagree on this issue.
Key Points in This Chapter