Do Your Adult Kids ‘Block’ You or Call You ‘Selfish'?

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When my new boyfriend, Dan, met my daughter Kate, he wasn’t prepared for the emotional tsunami he was about to witness.

It was a summer of the pandemic in 2020. Kate was 32 and lived in Los Angeles, where she worked in the entertainment industry, which was shut down. She was scared and alone, so she drove with her three chihuahuas to Colorado, home of one of her five sisters and her two “guncles” — the married gay couple who have been dear to her since birth. She knew I’d be visiting soon.

When I got there, Kate hugged me — then convulsed with raw emotion. She sobbed, she shook, she accused me of caring more about Dan than about my own children. I listened. After 10 minutes of wailing, Kate said: “OK! Let’s get Bloody Marys.”

Dan was then 73, a widower with three daughters. The tearful torrent that had just poured out of Kate was more intense than anything he had ever seen. He thought she was attacking me — and, yes, I took a verbal hit.

But I knew her emotions weren’t about me. She had been holding this terror inside herself and I was a safe place for her to let it go. Once she released her fears and tears, she felt better. And I didn’t take it personally. I am far from a perfect parent, but I am not an “emotionally immature” parent — the latest buzz phrase among Millennials who think their Boomer Moms and Dads are big, selfish babies.

If I were emotionally immature, I would have reacted to Kate’s outburst with my own tears and accusations, something like “How dare you?! I am your mother! COVID’s not my fault! It’s your fault for yelling at me!”

Alas, many parents are emotionally immature and many are “toxic.” If you have no clue what a toxic mother looks like, search that term on TikTok.

More adult children are “blocking” their parents — partly because social media tells them it’s okay to avoid people who make you feel like crap, even if those people created you.

“Blocking is the ultimate boundary,” says therapist Kristin Kirk, who practices in Davidson, North Carolina.

Behind every “block” is pain or anger and unresolved conflict. “Self-aware people have tools to move through conflict,” she notes, “and it’s tricky when family members don’t have the tools or inclination to navigate it.”

The New York Times recently published a story called “It Wasn’t You. It Was Your Parents” — about adult children who cut off ties with their tantrum-throwing elders. The story noted a boost in sales of the 2015 book Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents by Dr. Lindsay Gibson.

Emotionally immature parents, according to Gibson's research, "refuse to validate their children’s feelings and intuition, have difficulty regulating their emotions and may be reactive, inconsistent and lacking in empathy or awareness." This behavior leaves little room for children to express their own emotions, so they grow up lacking confidence, or they may feel isolated or be emotionally shut down.

Selfish parents are nothing new. The difference now is that adult children feel free to take back control.

“Young people are looking at all of their relationships and realizing, ‘You know, this is voluntary.’ If I feel really bad after I’m around this person, then maybe being around them is not good for me,” says Kelsi McMartin, a therapist who practices in California and Arizona.

Also, the bar for what is considered trauma is lower now than it was when Boomers were children, says clinical psychologist Joshua Coleman, author of Rules of Estrangement: Why Adult Children Cut Ties and How to Heal the Conflict.

“Today, more than at any other time in our nation’s history, children are setting the terms of family life in the United States,” Coleman writes in his book.

Kids today might cut off parents, siblings or extended family members who disapprove of a romantic partner or disagree about politics. This is so common, Cornell University professor Karl Pillemer discovered in 2020 that 27 percent of Americans 18 and older had cut off ties with a family member.

I have six daughters, ages 44 to 28 — two stepdaughters, two biological kids and two “bonus daughters” I helped raise — and they get in scuffles with each other and with me from time to time. Our blended family is complicated, passionate and opinionated — we’d explode and clear the air, then get Bloody Marys before we’d simmer silently with resentment.

That’s our style, but every family has its own communication culture. If children grow up walking on eggshells, afraid to discuss sensitive topics with their parents, or if they feel they have to manage a temperamental parent’s tantrums, there’s probably “emotional immaturity” at play.

If that’s you, consider these strategies to help you reconnect:

Act, don’t react. “Emotionally immature parents are in reactivity mode,” therapist McMartin says. “They have never dealt with their own issues, and when their children try to talk to them, the parent reacts and takes up all the space. The child is not heard.

"After years of attempting to be heard, the child will often make a break. This is a chance for the parent to pause and say: ‘Let me look at myself. What am I doing to contribute to this rift’?’"

Own your part and work on yourself. Sorry, Mom, you don’t get to tell your kids what to do anymore. And, you must own your part in any misunderstandings between you if you want a good relationship. “Going to therapy and doing your own self-examination shows your child you understand: ‘I’m part of this conflict. I own my part in this conflict'," McMartin says.

I suggest the book The Four Agreements: A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom, by Don Miguel Ruiz. This 140-page book and its four guidelines for a happier life have changed my life. (“Don’t take anything personally” is one of the agreements.)

Ask: “What can my child teach me?” McMartin reminds us: Our children aren’t responsible for our happiness or our identity. They are our finest teachers — if we let them be. “Can you really hear your children and their perspective on the world?” she asks. “Our job as parents is to listen and learn from what our children can teach us.”

 
Are you estranged from any of your family members? What are you doing about it? Let us know in the comments below.