We all know relationships are meaningful, but having an adult relationship with your parents is especially important. You’re always going to be your parents’ child.
Your experience and connection with the people who brought you into this world, particularly your first five years, affect how you are for the rest of your life. That’s just the nature of humans. It’s how the world works. These relationships can only be as valuable as you let them be. I subscribe to putting in the work. Why wouldn’t you want to have a deeper understanding of it all?
In the same vein, conflict is everywhere. It’s natural. Every person in the world is a unique molding of everything they’ve ever done, everyone they’ve ever met, and everything they’ve experienced. It makes sense that we all feel differently and have specific perspectives. We all come from entirely different worlds. I think life would be boring and concerning if everyone agreed on everything.
However, knowing where you come from, what made you you, and having a meaningful connection with your parents can be incredibly fulfilling. You’ll feel a sense of belonging in the world, unlock your potential and adulthood, and allow yourself to heal and learn from your childhood experiences. What happened to you growing up and between you and your parents as a kid is still part of your story.
Identify your comfort level
Before tackling this complex topic, I need to give a brief disclaimer. I am sharing my perspective on the importance and the process of developing an adult relationship with your parents. I only have my own experience, research, and the experiences shared with me to go off of. I’m hardly scratching the surface here. Please do more research as you see fit, and maybe try working topics like this into everyday conversation.
If your parents were abusive or severely neglectful during your childhood, a lot of what I recommend may feel backwards or impossible. However, I encourage you to keep reading, but know that you are never expected to put yourself in a situation where you feel unsafe. “The good news is that fear and other emotions are not permanent.”
I highly recommend talk therapy to work through any trauma you may have. As an adult child, you can and should learn to handle triggering situations and conflict with those with differing opinions or expectations. Once you can understand how to deal with situations where your body responds with fear or anxiety, approaching the relationship you have with your parents won’t feel as scary or risky.
“The parent-child relationship is always evolving, including negotiating — and renegotiating — power and control as children age.” These family relationships are extremely specific to the individual family. Try not to get caught up comparing aspects of your family or yourself with others.
Natural phases of parent-child relationships
Every parent-child relationship shifts as the child’s developmental stages unfold. Typically, parents do everything for the child because they are unable to care for themselves. After growing up a bit, the child develops a personality, interests, and responsibilities. This is where parents and children often start butting heads.
With the child’s newfound freedoms, parents come in with rules, curfews, and expectations that cause tension between them. This is all very normal. Growing up happens in phases. Parents hold expectations for their adult children that clash with their personal identity and world-building experience. “Parents need to get comfortable with a low level of control over what their grown kids do.”
All of this conflict, however normal, can become an obstacle that prevents a meaningful adult relationship with mutual respect between the two. You must learn how to regulate your emotions, respond to triggers, and accept that you can have a good relationship with your parents even if you disagree on any number of things: politics, religion, social and cultural ideas, etc.
The hopeful part is that once you’re an adult who’s been through the complexities of an early parent-child relationship, you have the freedom and responsibility to redefine how you engage with it. While you’re growing up, your parent has the majority influence over the nature of your relationship because you’re still learning how to be a person. However, becoming an adult shifts the responsibility and control of the relationship to both you and your parents.
Your relationship with your parents continues to develop as you reach different points in your self-exploration. There will always be ups and downs, but the important thing is to come together after conflict and still be able to tell each other you love them.
Childhood relationships build the foundation for adult relationships
Any potential for a relationship with my father tanked before my 10th birthday. He made poor choices and went to prison until my early 20s. He made no effort to make up for lost time, and frankly, I’m okay with that. I feel strongly that my quality of life is better without him around.
Even before he left my mother, siblings, and me to deal with the collateral damage of his decisions, his qualities were not those of a loving, supportive, accepting, or open-minded parent. I am queer, and he would never be okay with that. As strange as it may sound, I’m grateful my father was not a part of my life.
There’s potential for an adult relationship with my mom
However, I’m incredibly grateful to have salvaged a relationship with my mother. She struggled being a single mother of five while also trying to deal with the trauma she was left with after my father’s sentencing. Unfortunately, her hardship made it impossible to be there for me the way I needed.
I did not form a close bond with my mom while growing up. For years, while she was figuring out how to recover from my father’s trauma, my siblings and I relied on ourselves and each other to get what we needed. I had to learn an adult-like independence before I hit puberty, so I didn’t feel like I needed to lean on anyone as I started becoming an adult.
By the time I was graduating from high school and going to college, my mother was doing a lot better and tried to start being present for me again. It was difficult to start sharing anything about myself with her. That’s never been normal. I didn’t let her in, and part of me still feels guilty for that. I knew she was trying, and she has always loved me; I just wasn’t ready to be vulnerable with anyone yet.
To this day, my mother is overly apologetic, does not fully believe in herself, and has some lingering people-pleasing tendencies. She is also the most beautiful, loving, empathetic person I’ve ever met.
Growing up and learning about life as an adult
By my senior year in college, I had a bunch of life experience away from family that taught me how unpredictable relationships can be, particularly how much intention and action go into forming and maintaining a healthy, functional relationship. I grew from those experiences with new people because I wasn’t suffocated by the drama of the first 18 years of my life.
That year, I started calling my mother more regularly. Now, I carry so much love for her; I’m obsessed with her. I mean, we’re going on a trip together! I never, in a million years, would have guessed I’d be going on any sort of family vacation, let alone be excited about it.
It wasn’t easy getting here, but I can identify a few key ideas that set me up to rebuild my relationship with my mom. They may seem simple, and you’ve probably heard them before, but it took me a decade to really understand and accept them in any meaningful sense.
Parents are normal people
Part of growing up is understanding that your parents are normal people. Just like us, their childhoods messed them up in various ways. Their parents didn’t know the best way to be parents. They grew up with their unique circumstances that we can never fully understand.
Understanding and accepting that our parents are normal people is crucial to having a fruitful adult relationship with them. We can forgive them for how they fell short because we know that everyone makes mistakes. No one really knows what they’re doing; we are all learning how to live all the time. They didn’t hurt you because they don’t love you.
Once we can look at our parents and ourselves as the same in this way, we can level with them. We’re able to address them just as we do anyone else. This also means we can communicate and set boundaries with them like other adults in our lives.
Just because a certain behavior is normal in your family does not mean it’s healthy or functional. We spend most of our adult lives trying to unlearn everything our parents taught us. Many people don’t have developed emotional intelligence or productive communication skills, and you do not have to continue those qualities that don’t serve you.
You don’t owe your parents anything
From the minute you’re born until the end of your teenage years, your parents are responsible for your care. Even when you don’t like it, they’re there to guide you, teach you, push you, restrict you, and prepare you for a world without them by your side. I’d go as far as to say they’re still supposed to love and support you as their adult child, just without the authority or responsibility.
Sometimes parents will say things like “I’ve done so much for you. Why can’t you do this thing for me? I paid for you to play sports or go to college.” Even when you feel guilty in these moments, they are wrong. You did not choose to
You do not need your parents’ approval
This one is not so easy to acknowledge in practice. You don’t need your parents’ approval, and you don’t need to do anything to make them proud. Any parent should feel lucky to have an adult child who is trying to build a life for themselves while forming a unique perspective. The purpose of your life is to experience a unique version of the world through your own perspective, not to live out your parents’ dreams or expectations of you. Stop making decisions to please them.
How to influence the relationship with your parent(s)
1. Create distance
Becoming an adult doesn’t just magically happen when someone turns 18, or 21, or whatever age you consider the start of adulthood. Being an adult and having balanced adult relationships requires people to have developed some sense of self and independence from their parents’ influence. This is especially true for those who can’t or don’t want to have mature conversations with their parents about identity, opinions, fears, insecurities, etc..
Move out. Don’t let your parents do everything for you. Learn how to communicate and have new experiences with new people. This doesn’t mean ditching or ghosting your mom; it’s more like making space for yourself to keep growing up. It’s not rebellion, it’s challenging ourselves to figure out how we want to live our own lives. You can’t simulate the life experience you’re forced to gain from living on your own and having a separation from your parents in early adulthood.
The experiences I had in college were catalysts for reconnecting with my mom. We were too close when I lived at home; it’s impossible to process tension with someone less than two walls away at any moment. The time away is how I figured out what I need. The distance is actually what brings us back together again.
2. Set Boundaries
Boundaries exist in every parent-child relationship, but many are unspoken. Your parents set boundaries for you at the start of your relationship, even though it was just part of raising and teaching you about the world. You can set boundaries for your parents as their adult child and expect them to be respected. It’s not too much to ask.
With that said, everyone learns everything on different timelines. Some people aren’t prepared to look at the situation from your side; they’re not always ready to empathize. You can’t force anyone to do anything. However, the cool thing about boundaries is that you get to what yours are, when to enforce them, and when to remove yourself from the situation.
Try verbalizing your wants and needs in the relationship in a manner focused on understanding, empathy, and acceptance. People tend to respect boundaries more when you communicate them clearly and can relate to the other’s experiences.
3. Tell them how you really feel
As I’ve grown up and learned about myself and my world, I’ve been able to share more and more of my real self with my mother. She’s catching on to some of what I’m trying to communicate, but our relationship massively improved when I started being vulnerable with her. Sharing my feelings about past events or how certain things affect me opens the floor for vulnerability to be reciprocated and relationships to develop.
Many 20-somethings say they don’t engage much in their relationships with their parents because “they don’t feel like a safe space.” It’s not your job to teach your parents anything, but if they don’t know how, they’ll never do it. Maturity is asking for help and asking for what you want.
Would it really be so bad to tell your parents what you love and what makes you sick just thinking about? The way I see it is this. You have to choose to be vulnerable to share your preferences, sensitivities, and insecurities with the people in your life so they can know how to be the best for you. You learn about each other’s things so you can be a safe space for each other.
4. Be curious and ask questions
Call your mom. Call your dad. Spend time learning about them. Your entire relationship with your parents has been centered around you. When you become an adult, that changes. Not everything is about you anymore, so you can contribute to the human experience and learn from people. Ask your parents how they are and what they think about. Showing interest and genuine care about your parents’ lives can open conversations to unexplored territory.
I was pleasantly surprised by how much my mother and I have to discuss. The seemingly random questions I asked or hypothetical situations I placed her in showed me how much we can relate to each other.
You can also ask your parents and family members about their expectations. Discussing each other’s expectations and perspectives “will provide opportunities to connect and find common ground.” Starting this conversation takes maturity; it may help your parents see you not only as their child, but an independent adult.
5. Be playful with them
When people laugh and have fun, their walls can come down, and bonds can be made. If having a mature conversation with your parents doesn’t go smoothly, try shifting your energy to creating a playful environment with your parents instead. Games can loosen people up and reduce stress in groups.
‘Parents Are Human‘ is a card game created by Joseph Lam. He didn’t know anything about his parents, so he made this game as a way to get closer to them while he still could. It’s a deck of questions and topic cards to start conversations and inspire us to share our lives with those in our lives.
There are a few different makers of intimacy decks like these, most focusing on developing relationships with parents, friends, partners, etc. I’ve used and recommend the card decks from ‘Parents Are Human’ and ‘We’re Not Really Strangers‘, but there are probably many other great options. ‘Parents Are Human’ is especially cool to me because they offer decks with translations for bilingual families.
At the end of the day, your family members are the only people you can possibly see change and develop for close to their entire lifetime. I’ve learned much about relationships and the world from experiencing them with my family. Even though I have a relationship with my mom now, I still struggle with some aspects of our relationship. Nothing’s perfect, but now that we have a foundation for a healthy adult relationship, tackling our conflict doesn’t weigh on me as much.
Get to know your parents. Connect after conflict, and seek to understand each other.
