Reply to Is it abnormal to seek emotional support from adult child?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Yes, yes it is. [b]Because it implies that the parent has no-one else to get emotional support from. Nobody starts demanding emotional support from adult children who has a functioning network of about same-aged friends and relatives/siblings, with whom they have kept up functional relationships.[/b] Sure, when there's an illness or grieving, it's normal to reach out short-term. The problem becomes when it's expected long-term and/or there's literally nobody else the parent can turn to. Also agree with PP and felt it myself (as did my siblings), that when we lost our dad, it all became about mom's grief. She didn't even realize (at least never verbalized) that we, the adult kids, were also grieving. [/quote]

The bolded is too severe. It can be hard to maintain a network of same-age emotionally, supportive friends and family as you age. What if your sister has Alzheimer's? What if your closest friends move away to be near their grandkids? People die, get sick, become more distant as they care for a declining spouse or a sick child, etc. Sometimes people wind up somewhat isolated through no fault of their own, especially as they age.

I'm not saying this would justify dumbing all your problems on your adult child, but I don't think it's unreasonable for functional adult children to be PART of an emotional support network, especially for people in their 60s, 70s, and 80s. Not doing all the heavy lifting, but being present, providing companionship, sometimes listening to troubles and providing validation and support. The idea that a person is going to be able to maintain a separate support system of same-age people their entire life is just not realistic.

I am sorry your mom has been unable or unwilling to support you in your grief. I have seen a similar dynamic with my MIL and my DH -- she never acknowledges that DH lost his dad and is grieving too. But in her case, she absolutely has siblings nearby and friends who can support her. She's just never been particularly emotionally supportive of DH, even when he was a child, and I think has narcissistic tendencies that lead to her always centering her pain and her experiences. It's not about her being isolated or failing to maintain relationships, it's about how she approaches her relationship with DH, specifically, and the dysfunction in that dynamic.[/quote]

I don't think it's unrealistic at all to keep or develop your own support system. What if you don't have kids? We all move around and have to find things to do and meet new people and develop new support systems throughout our lives. It's not like you made friends in elementary school and that's it. From my experience the ones who heavily rely on their adult children for emotional support have exhausted their other relationships with their unpleasant or personality disordered or somewhat narcissistic behavior: meaning everybody else has walked away and/or is not picking up the phone. Then the adult kids are there, because they are the last ones to walk away, and as some say, the phone gets blown up because they have no coping skills themselves. [/quote]

Until you die? And what happens when the members of your same-age support group start to die?

People who don't have kids do have to create other support networks, yes. They also do not spend 20+ years raising kids and don't have relationships with adult kids. So they devote the energy they would have put into parenting into other relationships, and ideally those relationships blossom into a support network. But for people who *do* spend a significant portion of their adult lives raising kids, and especially if they continue to provide emotional and other support to not only their kids but grand kids even after their kids are grown, it may be harder to create a broad network of other relationships to meet 100% of their emotional needs.

I think we all agree it is not okay to expect minor children to support their parents emotionally, and that no adult child should be the primary or sole emotional support for their parents. But I know plenty of functional, healthy families where the adult kids provide some amount of emotional support for parents, especially in their 70s and beyond, in part because it gets harder and harder for people to maintain support like that outside their families as they age.[/quote]

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