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<blockquote data-quote="BusynMember" data-source="post: 609102" data-attributes="member: 1550"><p>In serious defense of detachment...</p><p></p><p>Suz, I love you, but your difficult child does not put you through 24/7 angst due to his continuous criminal behavior and the spit in our eyes. At least, you have not said that he is like that. Most of our difficult children who abuse us and do not make any money, who refuse help and do nothing but create trouble on top of trouble do not benefit from our caregiving them. You are fortunate that your son respects you and I'm happy for you, For sure your son has issues, but not at the level most of us face. At least, I am assuming he has never struck you, defaced your property, sworn at you with regularity, stolen from you or ended up in the hands of your police. Now I could be all wrong here as we don't know a lot of your son's story.</p><p></p><p> If I'm wrong, I apologize. If I am right, I don't believe you should detach from a loving adult child with mental illness. Your child is not the type of child who you need to detach from as he is not causing you 24/7 distress because of his willful behavior and he has a job (his sport is his job to me) and he seems to be trying to help himself. The last statement is huge. <em>He is trying to help himself.</em> If your son defaced your property repeatedly, told you what a B*% you are all the time, stole money from you for drugs, ended up in jail a lot, and was only nice to you if you went along with that kind of crazy world, you may see things differently. It is very hard to live that way. Most of us have or still do. </p><p></p><p>Are we supposed to still be loving and supportive? While you are going to a shrink because of him and a doctor for when he hits you and crying when he doesn't show up for that psychiatric appointment you paid for? When he tells you he isn't going to listen to any of your rules and shows you blatant disrespect? Sometimes I feel you think we are not right for detaching from this or, at worse, are bad people. What should we do? Die young trying to help them when they won't accept the help? When they lie to us, openly defy up in our own home, call us foul names, put us in danger, even hit us? Threaten to hurt us or even kill us? What is the alternative to that sort of adult child to detachment? I'd like to know so I can apply it to 35. </p><p></p><p>by the way, remember that he lied to my ex to get money for therapy? Well, he isn't taking back the lie and the offer is still there from ex, but (shock) he gave me ten reasons why he CAN'T go for therapy anyway. Hmmmmmmm...kind of makes it hard to help him, doesn't it? Yes, I tried to reason with him, but didn't expect to get anywhere and didn't. Am I bad for getting off and putting him aside in my mind because I can't fix him?</p><p></p><p>I am trying to get a handle on Dancerat's son. The bottom line is that he has his loving mother extremely upset a lot of the time...possibly has the rest of his family in turmoil as well. In his situation, I still think it is best for her to detach because he is causing the entire family distress and it seems as if the distress is almost constant. I don't know how old she is (I forgot), but those of us older adults really can not stay healthy on that sort of stress, lack of sleep and sadness over a legal adult, even if it's our own child. I often wonder what these adult kids will do when we are gone...they abuse us, but depend on us to abuse and to soften up and hit for things.</p><p></p><p></p><p>As always, JMO, and I do think you are a good person with a good heart. But you have not dealt with this level of abuse from a grown child. You either detach from it or you go down with it. In the end, however, I am sure some posters have left because they felt they had to continue to be caretakers to their forty and fifty-something kids and give up their golden years. This happens all the time.</p><p></p><p> I am not referring to Dancerat at all, but defending <u><em><strong>detachment</strong></em></u> with every fiber of my being. Many of us are in our 50's and 60's and some in our 70's and not all of us want to parent abusive, ungrateful, entitled grown children forever. We all have loved ones who are nice to us. Why should the difficult child, by virtue of his terrible behavior, stop us from enjoying them and our spouses or our hobbies or our groups of friends? </p><p></p><p>Many of our grown kids are antisocials, or narcissists, or borderline. They do not listen to anyone and without extreme desire to get well (which most don't have) they are really unbearable and, worse, completely concerned with themselves only. This applies for adult kids who were not that way when they were young, but are now substance abusers. SA's act the same way. Many won't even admit there is a nything wrong with them.</p><p></p><p>Peace <img src="data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7" class="smilie smilie--sprite smilie--sprite1" alt=":)" title="Smile :)" loading="lazy" data-shortname=":)" /></p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="BusynMember, post: 609102, member: 1550"] In serious defense of detachment... Suz, I love you, but your difficult child does not put you through 24/7 angst due to his continuous criminal behavior and the spit in our eyes. At least, you have not said that he is like that. Most of our difficult children who abuse us and do not make any money, who refuse help and do nothing but create trouble on top of trouble do not benefit from our caregiving them. You are fortunate that your son respects you and I'm happy for you, For sure your son has issues, but not at the level most of us face. At least, I am assuming he has never struck you, defaced your property, sworn at you with regularity, stolen from you or ended up in the hands of your police. Now I could be all wrong here as we don't know a lot of your son's story. If I'm wrong, I apologize. If I am right, I don't believe you should detach from a loving adult child with mental illness. Your child is not the type of child who you need to detach from as he is not causing you 24/7 distress because of his willful behavior and he has a job (his sport is his job to me) and he seems to be trying to help himself. The last statement is huge. [I]He is trying to help himself.[/I] If your son defaced your property repeatedly, told you what a B*% you are all the time, stole money from you for drugs, ended up in jail a lot, and was only nice to you if you went along with that kind of crazy world, you may see things differently. It is very hard to live that way. Most of us have or still do. Are we supposed to still be loving and supportive? While you are going to a shrink because of him and a doctor for when he hits you and crying when he doesn't show up for that psychiatric appointment you paid for? When he tells you he isn't going to listen to any of your rules and shows you blatant disrespect? Sometimes I feel you think we are not right for detaching from this or, at worse, are bad people. What should we do? Die young trying to help them when they won't accept the help? When they lie to us, openly defy up in our own home, call us foul names, put us in danger, even hit us? Threaten to hurt us or even kill us? What is the alternative to that sort of adult child to detachment? I'd like to know so I can apply it to 35. by the way, remember that he lied to my ex to get money for therapy? Well, he isn't taking back the lie and the offer is still there from ex, but (shock) he gave me ten reasons why he CAN'T go for therapy anyway. Hmmmmmmm...kind of makes it hard to help him, doesn't it? Yes, I tried to reason with him, but didn't expect to get anywhere and didn't. Am I bad for getting off and putting him aside in my mind because I can't fix him? I am trying to get a handle on Dancerat's son. The bottom line is that he has his loving mother extremely upset a lot of the time...possibly has the rest of his family in turmoil as well. In his situation, I still think it is best for her to detach because he is causing the entire family distress and it seems as if the distress is almost constant. I don't know how old she is (I forgot), but those of us older adults really can not stay healthy on that sort of stress, lack of sleep and sadness over a legal adult, even if it's our own child. I often wonder what these adult kids will do when we are gone...they abuse us, but depend on us to abuse and to soften up and hit for things. As always, JMO, and I do think you are a good person with a good heart. But you have not dealt with this level of abuse from a grown child. You either detach from it or you go down with it. In the end, however, I am sure some posters have left because they felt they had to continue to be caretakers to their forty and fifty-something kids and give up their golden years. This happens all the time. I am not referring to Dancerat at all, but defending [U][I][B]detachment[/B][/I][/U] with every fiber of my being. Many of us are in our 50's and 60's and some in our 70's and not all of us want to parent abusive, ungrateful, entitled grown children forever. We all have loved ones who are nice to us. Why should the difficult child, by virtue of his terrible behavior, stop us from enjoying them and our spouses or our hobbies or our groups of friends? Many of our grown kids are antisocials, or narcissists, or borderline. They do not listen to anyone and without extreme desire to get well (which most don't have) they are really unbearable and, worse, completely concerned with themselves only. This applies for adult kids who were not that way when they were young, but are now substance abusers. SA's act the same way. Many won't even admit there is a nything wrong with them. Peace :) [/QUOTE]
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