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Happy Tuesday!!
I hope your week is off to a good start. I had a nice lunch last week with 2 psychologists visiting from Vienna, Dr. Claudia Luciak-Donsberger and Dr. Mikael Luciak. They're doing very important international parent-adult child workshops, called
Generations. While they're not dealing with estranged adult children (since that would require their attendance) they are dealing with situations where there has been ongoing conflict and difficulty, or where the family wants more closeness and understanding. We have very similar philosophies and I would recommend their work to you for your non-estranged children, or if you can coach your estranged child into going. You can learn more about their upcoming workshops i
MISSED YESTERDAY'S
FREE Q AND A?!
Listen to the replay here
"
"Dr. Coleman. Your Methods
Just Enables Their Bad Behavior!"
One of the most common complaints or criticisms I hear of my work is that I'm either too hard on parents, or that my methods will just reinforce their bad behavior; that in encouraging parents to make amends, be empathic, and not respond defensively, I'm doing nothing to force the child to see the parent's perspective or to grow up. In addition, I'm reinforcing the distortions in the child's orientation to the parent.
There are times when that criticism is exactly right: Sometimes a parent's continuing to reach out, to be empathic, or to not push back does lead the adult child (or your DIL or SIL) to conclude that they have a bigger claim against you than they really do. They might respect you less if they're abusive and you continue to try to reach out to them without any push against the abuse. This is especially true with adult children (or their spouses) who have personality disorders, addictions, or other forms of mental illness. It may also be better, as I've written recently, to simply harden your heart more and stop trying.
I don't assume that a child's version of the parent is correct.
But I also don't assume that the parent's version of the child is correct. Therefore, you're betting off assuming that you have some blind spots as you begin this work. Making amends, showing empathy and taking responsibility is an act of humility, not humiliation. It's a position of strength, not weakness. It's the ability to say, "Well, maybe you're right. Maybe I missed something really important about you either in how I raised you or how I communicate with you. Let's look at that together and figure it out."
You may
never find out what your child's real complaints are about you if you don't start with where they are and accept that there be some validity to them. In addition, your humility communicates a willingness to communicate with your child as an equal, which is a requirement in today's parent-adult child relations.
Now it may mean that your child will want to grade you with an F for your parenting and you or any other parent might grade you with an A or a B. You still get to believe that you did a good job. You're not obligated to feel bad about your parenting. On the other hand, it's not useful to tell your child what a great parent you were when they're telling you the opposite. It will just escalate the situation.
Finally, allowing some time for your child to blame you may clarify for them what their real issues are. This is especially true for a child with some form of mental illness, as we'll discuss tonight. Sometimes blaming a parent is a first step toward figuring out who they are. It doesn't mean that they'll always do it or that it's their ultimate truth. It also doesn't mean that you're signing on for that forever. But, your child may need to be in some kind of dialogue with you where you show that you can take a long, hard look at yourself, if for no other reason, than to model that such a thing is a useful thing to do in life, That's not being an enabler. That's being a good parent.
If you're wondering whether your child has some form of mental illness that's contributing to your estrangement, join us
June 14th
530 PM Pacific, 630 PM Mountain,
7
30 PM Central, 830 PM Eastern
DOES MY CHILD HAVE A PERSONALITY DISORDER OR OTHER MENTAL ILLNESS?
Understanding Its Role in Estrangement
NEXT WEEK!
Tuesday, June 21
530 PM Pacific, 630 PM Mountain,
730 PM Central, 830 PM Eastern
MY ESTRANGED CHILD IS BACK: NOW WHAT?
Learning How to Navigate Early
Reconciliation
Each webinar comes with:
- Free study guide
- Link to the live webinar to listen to over the phone or computer
- Q and A during live webinar
- Complete transcript of lecture after it airs
- Link to the webinar recording after it airs
To hear what others are saying about the webinars, go
here
CAN'T MAKE THE WEBINARS AT THE TIME SCHEDULED?
No problem- you'll still get the full transcript of the lecture, the study guide, and the link to the recording.
WANT TO CONTACT OTHER
ESTRANGED PARENTS?
About Dr. Coleman
Dr. Coleman is a psychologist in private practice in the San Francisco Bay Area and a Senior Fellow with the Council on Contemporary Families, a non-partisan organization of leading sociologists, historians, psychologists and demographers dedicated to providing the press and public with the latest research and best-practice findings about American families. He has lectured at Harvard University, The University of California at Berkeley, The University of London, Cornell Weill Medical School, and blogs on parent-adult child relationships for the U.C. Berkeley publication, Greater Good Magazine.
Dr. Coleman is frequently contacted by the media for opinions and commentary about changes in the American family. He has been a frequent guest on the Today Show, NPR, and The BBC, and has also been featured on Sesame Street, 20/20, Good Morning America, America Online Coaches, PBS, and numerous news programs for FOX, ABC, CNN, and NBC television. His advice has appeared in The New York Times, The Times of London, The Shriver Report, Fortune, Newsweek, The Chicago Tribune, The Wall Street Journal, Slate, Psychology Today, U.S. World and News Report, Parenting Magazine, The Baltimore Sun and many others.
He is the author of numerous articles and chapters and has written four books: The Marriage Makeover: Finding Happiness in Imperfect Harmony (St. Martin's Press); The Lazy Husband: How to Get Men to Do More Parenting and Housework (St. Martin's Press); When Parents Hurt: Compassionate Strategies When You and Your Grown Child Don't Get Along (HarperCollins); and Married with Twins: Life, Love and the Pursuit of Marital Harmony. His books have been translated into Chinese, Croatian, and Korean, and are also available in the U.K., Canada, and Australia.
He is the co-editor, along with historian Stephanie Coontz of seven online volumes of Unconventional Wisdom: News You Can Use, a compendium of noteworthy research on the contemporary family, gender, sexuality, poverty, and work-family issues.
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