Young Adults are Sometimes Angry

I am a mother of six birth children, half whom are adults. I read this site because I have thought of whether it is right and good to adopt another child now that we have our own grown most of the way.

(I have a few) comments about angry young adults. Young adults are frequently angry at their parents. Indeed they seem angrier at good and successful parents then they are at jerky parents. A young adult has to establish himself as a separate person. It is hard for him or her to find out where their own values end and their parents begin. If the parents have very high values, and the young adult finds himself/herself living in a situation that is less, such as a lower income than expected, or lower moral values, more failure etc. the young adults are furious with themselves and blame everyone else. It is so important to encourage them without destroying them with overexpectations.

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I frequently tell my children that I am totally imperfect but I am their only maternal parental unit on the planet. They are stuck with me even if I am deficient. They should be grateful for not living in a cardboard box in Bangladesh. They sometimes hear me but most of the time are wishing for an exciting attractive TV land mother with circular driveways and maids. They have an overweight, out-of-style mother who has a sloppy house and is tired most of the time. Now I can see that adoptive parents may feel hesitant to lay out these facts to a child who was born in destitute circumstance. Facts are facts: your children have the life they have, not a fantasy life.

Yes, you have to have iron skin to go through it. Even more so when they lie about what they do, or swear at you, when they have sexual values different than your religion taught, or you practiced, when they join their peers in an age filled with dishonesty and lack of responsibility. Now remember your royal dignity, mom and dad. You do not have to accept infantile assaults by fully grown children. You need to be grown up yourself, as they will have tough things in their life, some of which you could have told them they could have avoided. So consider it a final effort at teaching dignity, restraint and politeness under fire. Love them.

Right now I have a daughter who says it is none of my business whether she ever gets married. I have a husband who swears he will never pay for a wedding "under the circumstances". In faith, in hope and with love, I am piling all extra cash in a savings account in a credit union, in my name, so it will be there when God works this out and we have the privelage of paying for a wedding. I have faith that my daughter will someday come to her senses, that father loves daughter, and that the young man chosen by my daughter obviously has the good sense to choose one of the best young women on the planet, even if he doesn't appreciate her perfection quite enough. HANG ON. It is not adoption that irritates these young adults, it is trying to be a new person in a very tough moral climate with holy high expecting parents. It is tough. God is tougher.