What do you do when your adult child goes into therapy and lays blame at your feet.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It is always the parents fault and I am not being sarcastic.

Op here, I will say that DH was my most challenging kid. He was headstrong and demanding from the time he was a baby. He was rarely content and cried a lot as a baby. He fought potty training and putting on clothes. I would dress him, he would take it off. If we wanted him do his chores, he would argue about why it was unfair or he shouldn't have to do it - for a much longer time than the chore would take. He dropped out of college and blamed us because shouldn't have made him go in the first place. This is his personality.

Right up until my mother died she would throw in my face how I cried a lot as a baby and never wanted her to rock me. As if I was being mean to her, as if I should apologize for how I was as a BABY and TODDLER. Please do not do this to your son.

This is all I needed to read to know that OP was the problem. My mother does the same thing to me. I was colicky. She brings it up 40 years later. Like I owe her an apology for my inability to control my crying and be content with her as a baby.

So, a homeschooling, religious fundie who was annoyed that her baby cried is now not pleased that the baby grew up and told her she sucked as a mom. Poor guy. I hope he marries someone who is a better wife/mother than OP.

DP. Where did you get all this cr@p? Your fevered imagination? OP never said she threw her DS’ stubbornness his face—that was a completely different poster who was talking about her own mother. OP hasn’t told us how she dealt with her stubborn DC. OP also never indicated that she’s a fundie—you made that up. People homeschool for many reasons—ask our our atheist homeschooling neighbors—and you have no clue how much religion played a part because OP hasn’t told us all her reasons. Maybe she lived in a bad school district.

Geez, get a grip. We get it, you’re an anti-religion bigot. Can you stop posting this now?

OP did say, right above, that she wanted DC to go to college and now he’s mad about that. You didn’t address that in your rant. So tell us, is wanting college for your kids really so bad?

Wanting college isn't so bad, but altogether the picture painted for me is that: This mother never considered any input from her son about his life. She prescribed homeschooling, religion and college and didn't budge when he didn't respond well to those. It paints a picture of a mother who didn't know or care to know who her child was, did not value his individuality, and instead just marched him on to meet her own goals, as if he were a product and not a person. This would be traumatizing.

How do you know her son made his schooling and religion wishes known when he was still young but she just steam-rolled over them? OP never said that. It sounds very much like his claims about schooling and religion are new to her. What OP actually said was that they argued about him wearing clothes and doing chores—are you claiming she should have backed down on either of these to respect his “individuality”? Again, you’re fantasizing to fit some bizarre personal narrative of your own.

This is now a long thread but I thought OP came back and acknowledged homeschooling and her marriage were issues that affected her son negatively. And that she stood by college and religion?

OP here, we pushed DS to go to college because we hoped it would help him find a career path and also help him grow up vs living at home. DS went to the college but didn't go to classes or study so his grades were crap and had to leave. DS blames us to sending him to college but doesn't take responsibility for not going to class or studying. Now his college GPA is so low he feels like he can't enroll in college now if we wanted to. Not his fault, but ours.

After 18 we didn't force church on him, but did expect him to be a godly person in his behavior. He went a bit wild as a young adult.

Pp here. “Godly person”… lol I (and others that I’ve just seen) were spot on. Classic fundie. And for those of you who can’t see it, lucky you.

And fwiw, I’m Christian. Just not the kind that uses their God to justify emotionally immaturity and their rigid way of parenting.

As a Christian, do you consider yourself a Godly person, living your life according to Christian principles and keeping God central in your life?

^^^ if anybody has doubts that the cruelty to OP stems from her religion and the taunters’ own mommy issues, this post should put those doubts to rest.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It is always the parents fault and I am not being sarcastic.

Op here, I will say that DH was my most challenging kid. He was headstrong and demanding from the time he was a baby. He was rarely content and cried a lot as a baby. He fought potty training and putting on clothes. I would dress him, he would take it off. If we wanted him do his chores, he would argue about why it was unfair or he shouldn't have to do it - for a much longer time than the chore would take. He dropped out of college and blamed us because shouldn't have made him go in the first place. This is his personality.

Right up until my mother died she would throw in my face how I cried a lot as a baby and never wanted her to rock me. As if I was being mean to her, as if I should apologize for how I was as a BABY and TODDLER. Please do not do this to your son.

This is all I needed to read to know that OP was the problem. My mother does the same thing to me. I was colicky. She brings it up 40 years later. Like I owe her an apology for my inability to control my crying and be content with her as a baby.

So, a homeschooling, religious fundie who was annoyed that her baby cried is now not pleased that the baby grew up and told her she sucked as a mom. Poor guy. I hope he marries someone who is a better wife/mother than OP.

DP. Where did you get all this cr@p? Your fevered imagination? OP never said she threw her DS’ stubbornness his face—that was a completely different poster who was talking about her own mother. OP hasn’t told us how she dealt with her stubborn DC. OP also never indicated that she’s a fundie—you made that up. People homeschool for many reasons—ask our our atheist homeschooling neighbors—and you have no clue how much religion played a part because OP hasn’t told us all her reasons. Maybe she lived in a bad school district.

Geez, get a grip. We get it, you’re an anti-religion bigot. Can you stop posting this now?

OP did say, right above, that she wanted DC to go to college and now he’s mad about that. You didn’t address that in your rant. So tell us, is wanting college for your kids really so bad?

Wanting college isn't so bad, but altogether the picture painted for me is that: This mother never considered any input from her son about his life. She prescribed homeschooling, religion and college and didn't budge when he didn't respond well to those. It paints a picture of a mother who didn't know or care to know who her child was, did not value his individuality, and instead just marched him on to meet her own goals, as if he were a product and not a person. This would be traumatizing.

How do you know her son made his schooling and religion wishes known when he was still young but she just steam-rolled over them? OP never said that. It sounds very much like his claims about schooling and religion are new to her. What OP actually said was that they argued about him wearing clothes and doing chores—are you claiming she should have backed down on either of these to respect his “individuality”? Again, you’re fantasizing to fit some bizarre personal narrative of your own.

This is now a long thread but I thought OP came back and acknowledged homeschooling and her marriage were issues that affected her son negatively. And that she stood by college and religion?

OP here, we pushed DS to go to college because we hoped it would help him find a career path and also help him grow up vs living at home. DS went to the college but didn't go to classes or study so his grades were crap and had to leave. DS blames us to sending him to college but doesn't take responsibility for not going to class or studying. Now his college GPA is so low he feels like he can't enroll in college now if we wanted to. Not his fault, but ours.

After 18 we didn't force church on him, but did expect him to be a godly person in his behavior. He went a bit wild as a young adult.

Pp here. “Godly person”… lol I (and others that I’ve just seen) were spot on. Classic fundie. And for those of you who can’t see it, lucky you.

And fwiw, I’m Christian. Just not the kind that uses their God to justify emotionally immaturity and their rigid way of parenting.

As a Christian, do you consider yourself a Godly person, living your life according to Christian principles and keeping God central in your life?

^^^ if anybody has doubts that the cruelty to OP stems from her religion and the taunters’ own mommy issues, this post should put those doubts to rest.

PS. Everybody else seems afraid to do it, but I’ll go ahead.

DC 1 — in grad school in another state
DC 2 — working in computer science
Also, I text with both every few days, sometimes every day

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you comment on this thread please list how many kids you have raised. And their ages so we can understand your experience or lack of it.

You first. Please also note if your adult children are in any type of contact with you and if they come to you for support, guidance or advice. If they moved across the country or to another country, that is of interest, too.

Why is their location relevant?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:He is in pain and he is expressing it and you want to make it go away with a quick "I'm sorry if I anything I did contributed to your unhappiness."

Obviously that is not going to be satisfying for your son! He doesn't want a throwaway non-apology, he wants you to listen and validate his feelings. Why not actually talk it through with him, admit that you made mistakes (specific, not a general "sorry if I made some mistakes") and explain why you did the things you did? Not to make it go away, but so he can see you that you actually care.

I don't think he has doubts that we care. I will admit somethings were mistakes, like homeschooling - it didn't work for him, he fought it. Other things like church were not a mistake even though he doesn't attend church now. The opportunity to go to college was not a mistake. He didn't like it and his grades weren’t good, but he had the chance to try it, but dropped out. Our marriage was challenging and I wish we hid it better from the kids. We did the best we knew at the time. If these are the worse things we did, we should be forgiven.

Let me spell this out for you. Your son grew up in an unstable, high-conflict household. On top of this, the two people in the dysfunctional, high-conflict marriage he was born into were also intensely controlling and gave him no opportunity to be exposed to a normal, non-dysfunctional environment (homeschooling, forcing a specific church on him).

And this is just from what you’ve told us.

Strongly suspect that your son was homeschooled for religious reasons. This feels so familiar- saying you know you weren’t perfect (but it wasn’t that bad), trying to explain everything away as him having been a challenging kid (and universally responding to it with an authoritarian style of parenting)… feels very old school evangelical and I’m not surprised that 1) your kid finally broke, and 2) you still can’t handle hearing- actually hearing- what he is telling you.

You’re a crazed loon. What are you smoking, and can I have some?

You make a huge leap from OP’s “Challenging marriage” to claiming she was in a “high conflict marriage.” These two are not the same. And your equation of church with abnormal disfunction says less about OP’s particular church and more about your rabid bigotry.

And where did you get the idea OP is “intensely controlling” and “universally authoritarian” and gave him “no opportunity to be exposed to normal, non-disfuncional environments”? Did you just go ahead and assume OP never let her kid choose his own clothing, musical instrument, hobbies, sports team, band, or play with the neighborhood kids?

You really need to get a therapist of your own and work out your mommy issues and your issues with trying to shoehorn others’ experiences into your own facts.

— pp who identified her two kids above

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:He is in pain and he is expressing it and you want to make it go away with a quick "I'm sorry if I anything I did contributed to your unhappiness."

Obviously that is not going to be satisfying for your son! He doesn't want a throwaway non-apology, he wants you to listen and validate his feelings. Why not actually talk it through with him, admit that you made mistakes (specific, not a general "sorry if I made some mistakes") and explain why you did the things you did? Not to make it go away, but so he can see you that you actually care.

I don't think he has doubts that we care. I will admit somethings were mistakes, like homeschooling - it didn't work for him, he fought it. Other things like church were not a mistake even though he doesn't attend church now. The opportunity to go to college was not a mistake. He didn't like it and his grades weren’t good, but he had the chance to try it, but dropped out. Our marriage was challenging and I wish we hid it better from the kids. We did the best we knew at the time. If these are the worse things we did, we should be forgiven.

Let me spell this out for you. Your son grew up in an unstable, high-conflict household. On top of this, the two people in the dysfunctional, high-conflict marriage he was born into were also intensely controlling and gave him no opportunity to be exposed to a normal, non-dysfunctional environment (homeschooling, forcing a specific church on him).

And this is just from what you’ve told us.

Strongly suspect that your son was homeschooled for religious reasons. This feels so familiar- saying you know you weren’t perfect (but it wasn’t that bad), trying to explain everything away as him having been a challenging kid (and universally responding to it with an authoritarian style of parenting)… feels very old school evangelical and I’m not surprised that 1) your kid finally broke, and 2) you still can’t handle hearing- actually hearing- what he is telling you.

You’re a crazed loon. What are you smoking, and can I have some?

You make a huge leap from OP’s “Challenging marriage” to claiming she was in a “high conflict marriage.” These two are not the same. And your equation of church with abnormal disfunction says less about OP’s particular church and more about your rabid bigotry.

And where did you get the idea OP is “intensely controlling” and “universally authoritarian” and gave him “no opportunity to be exposed to normal, non-disfuncional environments”? Did you just go ahead and assume OP never let her kid choose his own clothing, musical instrument, hobbies, sports team, band, or play with the neighborhood kids?

You really need to get a therapist of your own and work out your mommy issues and your issues with trying to shoehorn others’ experiences into your own facts.

— pp who identified her two kids above

the fact is - OP claiming that she is totally blameless, deserves to be forgiven, her son is “difficult” … then dropping parenting decisions that could have been dysfunctional (homeschool, rigid religous expectations, pressure to go to college) raises a TON of questions. Nobody knows what OP was like as a parent, but there is more than enough here to strongly believe in the possibility that OP is in denial about her parenting.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:He is in pain and he is expressing it and you want to make it go away with a quick "I'm sorry if I anything I did contributed to your unhappiness."

Obviously that is not going to be satisfying for your son! He doesn't want a throwaway non-apology, he wants you to listen and validate his feelings. Why not actually talk it through with him, admit that you made mistakes (specific, not a general "sorry if I made some mistakes") and explain why you did the things you did? Not to make it go away, but so he can see you that you actually care.

I don't think he has doubts that we care. I will admit somethings were mistakes, like homeschooling - it didn't work for him, he fought it. Other things like church were not a mistake even though he doesn't attend church now. The opportunity to go to college was not a mistake. He didn't like it and his grades weren’t good, but he had the chance to try it, but dropped out. Our marriage was challenging and I wish we hid it better from the kids. We did the best we knew at the time. If these are the worse things we did, we should be forgiven.

Let me spell this out for you. Your son grew up in an unstable, high-conflict household. On top of this, the two people in the dysfunctional, high-conflict marriage he was born into were also intensely controlling and gave him no opportunity to be exposed to a normal, non-dysfunctional environment (homeschooling, forcing a specific church on him).

And this is just from what you’ve told us.

Strongly suspect that your son was homeschooled for religious reasons. This feels so familiar- saying you know you weren’t perfect (but it wasn’t that bad), trying to explain everything away as him having been a challenging kid (and universally responding to it with an authoritarian style of parenting)… feels very old school evangelical and I’m not surprised that 1) your kid finally broke, and 2) you still can’t handle hearing- actually hearing- what he is telling you.

You’re a crazed loon. What are you smoking, and can I have some?

You make a huge leap from OP’s “Challenging marriage” to claiming she was in a “high conflict marriage.” These two are not the same. And your equation of church with abnormal disfunction says less about OP’s particular church and more about your rabid bigotry.

And where did you get the idea OP is “intensely controlling” and “universally authoritarian” and gave him “no opportunity to be exposed to normal, non-disfuncional environments”? Did you just go ahead and assume OP never let her kid choose his own clothing, musical instrument, hobbies, sports team, band, or play with the neighborhood kids?

You really need to get a therapist of your own and work out your mommy issues and your issues with trying to shoehorn others’ experiences into your own facts.

— pp who identified her two kids above

the fact is - OP claiming that she is totally blameless, deserves to be forgiven, her son is “difficult” … then dropping parenting decisions that could have been dysfunctional (homeschool, rigid religous expectations, pressure to go to college) raises a TON of questions. Nobody knows what OP was like as a parent, but there is more than enough here to strongly believe in the possibility that OP is in denial about her parenting.

OP never ever said she was totally blameless. She even said she made mistakes and listed a few, like the marriage issues. You use phrases like “could have been” and “raises question” and “believe” so it looks like you’re reluctantly admitting that WE JUST DON’T KNOW. Where you go off the rails is when you take your surmises and your beliefs and use that to justify your social media cruelty.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you comment on this thread please list how many kids you have raised. And their ages so we can understand your experience or lack of it.

You first. Please also note if your adult children are in any type of contact with you and if they come to you for support, guidance or advice. If they moved across the country or to another country, that is of interest, too.

Why is their location relevant?

Proxy on whether they are trying to escape you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:He is in pain and he is expressing it and you want to make it go away with a quick "I'm sorry if I anything I did contributed to your unhappiness."

Obviously that is not going to be satisfying for your son! He doesn't want a throwaway non-apology, he wants you to listen and validate his feelings. Why not actually talk it through with him, admit that you made mistakes (specific, not a general "sorry if I made some mistakes") and explain why you did the things you did? Not to make it go away, but so he can see you that you actually care.

I don't think he has doubts that we care. I will admit somethings were mistakes, like homeschooling - it didn't work for him, he fought it. Other things like church were not a mistake even though he doesn't attend church now. The opportunity to go to college was not a mistake. He didn't like it and his grades weren’t good, but he had the chance to try it, but dropped out. Our marriage was challenging and I wish we hid it better from the kids. We did the best we knew at the time. If these are the worse things we did, we should be forgiven.

Let me spell this out for you. Your son grew up in an unstable, high-conflict household. On top of this, the two people in the dysfunctional, high-conflict marriage he was born into were also intensely controlling and gave him no opportunity to be exposed to a normal, non-dysfunctional environment (homeschooling, forcing a specific church on him).

And this is just from what you’ve told us.

Strongly suspect that your son was homeschooled for religious reasons. This feels so familiar- saying you know you weren’t perfect (but it wasn’t that bad), trying to explain everything away as him having been a challenging kid (and universally responding to it with an authoritarian style of parenting)… feels very old school evangelical and I’m not surprised that 1) your kid finally broke, and 2) you still can’t handle hearing- actually hearing- what he is telling you.

You’re a crazed loon. What are you smoking, and can I have some?

You make a huge leap from OP’s “Challenging marriage” to claiming she was in a “high conflict marriage.” These two are not the same. And your equation of church with abnormal disfunction says less about OP’s particular church and more about your rabid bigotry.

And where did you get the idea OP is “intensely controlling” and “universally authoritarian” and gave him “no opportunity to be exposed to normal, non-disfuncional environments”? Did you just go ahead and assume OP never let her kid choose his own clothing, musical instrument, hobbies, sports team, band, or play with the neighborhood kids?

You really need to get a therapist of your own and work out your mommy issues and your issues with trying to shoehorn others’ experiences into your own facts.

— pp who identified her two kids above

DP. OP mentioned fighting and that she wished she hid her marital problems better. That does suggest high conflict household. She also said that if the issues her son identified were it, she should be forgiven, it wasn’t that bad, and her intention was good.

I’m curious on why you are so invested in defending OP. You are making up as many facts/reading into things as you accuse others.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:He is in pain and he is expressing it and you want to make it go away with a quick "I'm sorry if I anything I did contributed to your unhappiness."

Obviously that is not going to be satisfying for your son! He doesn't want a throwaway non-apology, he wants you to listen and validate his feelings. Why not actually talk it through with him, admit that you made mistakes (specific, not a general "sorry if I made some mistakes") and explain why you did the things you did? Not to make it go away, but so he can see you that you actually care.

I don't think he has doubts that we care. I will admit somethings were mistakes, like homeschooling - it didn't work for him, he fought it. Other things like church were not a mistake even though he doesn't attend church now. The opportunity to go to college was not a mistake. He didn't like it and his grades weren’t good, but he had the chance to try it, but dropped out. Our marriage was challenging and I wish we hid it better from the kids. We did the best we knew at the time. If these are the worse things we did, we should be forgiven.

Let me spell this out for you. Your son grew up in an unstable, high-conflict household. On top of this, the two people in the dysfunctional, high-conflict marriage he was born into were also intensely controlling and gave him no opportunity to be exposed to a normal, non-dysfunctional environment (homeschooling, forcing a specific church on him).

And this is just from what you’ve told us.

Strongly suspect that your son was homeschooled for religious reasons. This feels so familiar- saying you know you weren’t perfect (but it wasn’t that bad), trying to explain everything away as him having been a challenging kid (and universally responding to it with an authoritarian style of parenting)… feels very old school evangelical and I’m not surprised that 1) your kid finally broke, and 2) you still can’t handle hearing- actually hearing- what he is telling you.

You’re a crazed loon. What are you smoking, and can I have some?

You make a huge leap from OP’s “Challenging marriage” to claiming she was in a “high conflict marriage.” These two are not the same. And your equation of church with abnormal disfunction says less about OP’s particular church and more about your rabid bigotry.

And where did you get the idea OP is “intensely controlling” and “universally authoritarian” and gave him “no opportunity to be exposed to normal, non-disfuncional environments”? Did you just go ahead and assume OP never let her kid choose his own clothing, musical instrument, hobbies, sports team, band, or play with the neighborhood kids?

You really need to get a therapist of your own and work out your mommy issues and your issues with trying to shoehorn others’ experiences into your own facts.

— pp who identified her two kids above

the fact is - OP claiming that she is totally blameless, deserves to be forgiven, her son is “difficult” … then dropping parenting decisions that could have been dysfunctional (homeschool, rigid religous expectations, pressure to go to college) raises a TON of questions. Nobody knows what OP was like as a parent, but there is more than enough here to strongly believe in the possibility that OP is in denial about her parenting.

OP never ever said she was totally blameless. She even said she made mistakes and listed a few, like the marriage issues. You use phrases like “could have been” and “raises question” and “believe” so it looks like you’re reluctantly admitting that WE JUST DON’T KNOW. Where you go off the rails is when you take your surmises and your beliefs and use that to justify your social media cruelty.

OP never said she was blameless but she is in a rush to be forgiven and place blame elsewhere.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you comment on this thread please list how many kids you have raised. And their ages so we can understand your experience or lack of it.

You first. Please also note if your adult children are in any type of contact with you and if they come to you for support, guidance or advice. If they moved across the country or to another country, that is of interest, too.

Why is their location relevant?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:He is in pain and he is expressing it and you want to make it go away with a quick "I'm sorry if I anything I did contributed to your unhappiness."

Obviously that is not going to be satisfying for your son! He doesn't want a throwaway non-apology, he wants you to listen and validate his feelings. Why not actually talk it through with him, admit that you made mistakes (specific, not a general "sorry if I made some mistakes") and explain why you did the things you did? Not to make it go away, but so he can see you that you actually care.

I don't think he has doubts that we care. I will admit somethings were mistakes, like homeschooling - it didn't work for him, he fought it. Other things like church were not a mistake even though he doesn't attend church now. The opportunity to go to college was not a mistake. He didn't like it and his grades weren’t good, but he had the chance to try it, but dropped out. Our marriage was challenging and I wish we hid it better from the kids. We did the best we knew at the time. If these are the worse things we did, we should be forgiven.

Let me spell this out for you. Your son grew up in an unstable, high-conflict household. On top of this, the two people in the dysfunctional, high-conflict marriage he was born into were also intensely controlling and gave him no opportunity to be exposed to a normal, non-dysfunctional environment (homeschooling, forcing a specific church on him).

And this is just from what you’ve told us.

Strongly suspect that your son was homeschooled for religious reasons. This feels so familiar- saying you know you weren’t perfect (but it wasn’t that bad), trying to explain everything away as him having been a challenging kid (and universally responding to it with an authoritarian style of parenting)… feels very old school evangelical and I’m not surprised that 1) your kid finally broke, and 2) you still can’t handle hearing- actually hearing- what he is telling you.

You’re a crazed loon. What are you smoking, and can I have some?

You make a huge leap from OP’s “Challenging marriage” to claiming she was in a “high conflict marriage.” These two are not the same. And your equation of church with abnormal disfunction says less about OP’s particular church and more about your rabid bigotry.

And where did you get the idea OP is “intensely controlling” and “universally authoritarian” and gave him “no opportunity to be exposed to normal, non-disfuncional environments”? Did you just go ahead and assume OP never let her kid choose his own clothing, musical instrument, hobbies, sports team, band, or play with the neighborhood kids?

You really need to get a therapist of your own and work out your mommy issues and your issues with trying to shoehorn others’ experiences into your own facts.

— pp who identified her two kids above

the fact is - OP claiming that she is totally blameless, deserves to be forgiven, her son is “difficult” … then dropping parenting decisionAs that could have been dysfunctional (homeschool, rigid religous expectations, pressure to go to college) raises a TON of questions. Nobody knows what OP was like as a parent, but there is more than enough here to strongly believe in the possibility that OP is in denial about her parenting.

OP never ever said she was totally blameless. She even said she made mistakes and listed a few, like the marriage issues. You use phrases like “could have been” and “raises question” and “believe” so it looks like you’re reluctantly admitting that WE JUST DON’T KNOW. Where you go off the rails is when you take your surmises and your beliefs and use that to justify your social media cruelty.

OP never said she was blameless but she is in a rush to be forgiven and place blame elsewhere.

A RUSH to be forgiven??? If adult children hold a grudge against a parent who gave their best efforts toward raising them they are delaying their own growth and healing. Best parental efforts means the hard work, love and pure intention was poured into raising their kids - the best that they knew then. It doesn't mean zero mistakes, zero fails, 100% perfection. Few parents have kids and intentionally screw up their kids. Parents aren't perfect robots, it's a hard thankless job a lot of the time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you comment on this thread please list how many kids you have raised. And their ages so we can understand your experience or lack of it.

You first. Please also note if your adult children are in any type of contact with you and if they come to you for support, guidance or advice. If they moved across the country or to another country, that is of interest, too.

Why is their location relevant?

Proxy on whether they are trying to escape you.

Or maybe that's where their job is.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:He is in pain and he is expressing it and you want to make it go away with a quick "I'm sorry if I anything I did contributed to your unhappiness."

Obviously that is not going to be satisfying for your son! He doesn't want a throwaway non-apology, he wants you to listen and validate his feelings. Why not actually talk it through with him, admit that you made mistakes (specific, not a general "sorry if I made some mistakes") and explain why you did the things you did? Not to make it go away, but so he can see you that you actually care.

I don't think he has doubts that we care. I will admit somethings were mistakes, like homeschooling - it didn't work for him, he fought it. Other things like church were not a mistake even though he doesn't attend church now. The opportunity to go to college was not a mistake. He didn't like it and his grades weren’t good, but he had the chance to try it, but dropped out. Our marriage was challenging and I wish we hid it better from the kids. We did the best we knew at the time. If these are the worse things we did, we should be forgiven.

Let me spell this out for you. Your son grew up in an unstable, high-conflict household. On top of this, the two people in the dysfunctional, high-conflict marriage he was born into were also intensely controlling and gave him no opportunity to be exposed to a normal, non-dysfunctional environment (homeschooling, forcing a specific church on him).

And this is just from what you’ve told us.

Strongly suspect that your son was homeschooled for religious reasons. This feels so familiar- saying you know you weren’t perfect (but it wasn’t that bad), trying to explain everything away as him having been a challenging kid (and universally responding to it with an authoritarian style of parenting)… feels very old school evangelical and I’m not surprised that 1) your kid finally broke, and 2) you still can’t handle hearing- actually hearing- what he is telling you.

You’re a crazed loon. What are you smoking, and can I have some?

You make a huge leap from OP’s “Challenging marriage” to claiming she was in a “high conflict marriage.” These two are not the same. And your equation of church with abnormal disfunction says less about OP’s particular church and more about your rabid bigotry.

And where did you get the idea OP is “intensely controlling” and “universally authoritarian” and gave him “no opportunity to be exposed to normal, non-disfuncional environments”? Did you just go ahead and assume OP never let her kid choose his own clothing, musical instrument, hobbies, sports team, band, or play with the neighborhood kids?

You really need to get a therapist of your own and work out your mommy issues and your issues with trying to shoehorn others’ experiences into your own facts.

— pp who identified her two kids above

DP. OP mentioned fighting and that she wished she hid her marital problems better. That does suggest high conflict household. She also said that if the issues her son identified were it, she should be forgiven, it wasn’t that bad, and her intention was good.

I’m curious on why you are so invested in defending OP. You are making up as many facts/reading into things as you accuse others.

I’m not jumping to ANY conclusions. Unlike you.

Why don’t you go ahead and tell us whether you have kids. And if so, what is your relationship with them like? I already told you about my good relationship with my own kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you comment on this thread please list how many kids you have raised. And their ages so we can understand your experience or lack of it.

You first. Please also note if your adult children are in any type of contact with you and if they come to you for support, guidance or advice. If they moved across the country or to another country, that is of interest, too.

Why is their location relevant?

Proxy on whether they are trying to escape you.

Or maybe that's where their job is.

Or their grad school (like my kid)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you comment on this thread please list how many kids you have raised. And their ages so we can understand your experience or lack of it.

You first. Please also note if your adult children are in any type of contact with you and if they come to you for support, guidance or advice. If they moved across the country or to another country, that is of interest, too.

Why is their location relevant?

Proxy on whether they are trying to escape you.

Or maybe that's where their job is.

Or their grad school (like my kid)

Too bad there are no high paying jobs for young graduates here in the DMV...wait a minute!