It’s All About Choice
It is a fact of life that we all make choices because we CAN. It’s our RIGHT.
As parents, we try to teach our children not only how to make wise choices, but to help them to learn that there are consequences for the choices they make–and those consequences may be good or they may be bad. In time, the child reaches what is commonly known as the age of accountability, where the responsibility for their decisions ultimately falls upon their own decision-making skills and the parents can no longer shoulder the blame or burden.
Parents dread that day, and children often live in denial of it–wanting the freedom of Choice but not willing to accept the consequences of that freedom when a choice results in a bad situation. Nevertheless, the day invariably comes when our children must be allowed to experience the consequences of their decisions, for better or for worse, and we, as the parents, must allow them to.
Of course there is no question that we, as parents, want to swoop in and save the day, to protect our child when things go badly for them. This is natural. And in the beginning, it helps coax the child into maturity.
But allowed to continue, we can unintentionally deny our children their due right to experience Life under the guise of “protecting” them. They have the right to their own decisions, their own Choices. But they also have an obligation to own the results of those decisions–even if we disagree with the Choice made in this situation or that situation, and know that no good will come of it.
The situation becomes even more trying for us as parents when the advice and counsel we offer one of our children essentially falls on deaf ears: they nod and admit we are “right” while they are talking with us, but then go ahead and do their own thing when they’re away from us.
In some ways, this comes across as rebellion. Even betrayal. After all, why tell us that they know we’re “right” about our perception of a situation and our advice, and yet act completely counter to it?
And what do we, as parents, do when one of our children behaves in this way? In some cases, we maintain the relationship–and the child continues in their Choice, enjoying the freedom of being able to choose and yet believing that when things have reached their pinnacle and the time has come to pay the piper, that their doting parent will swoop in and rescue them or provide a way out for the bad situation the child has brought themselves in.
Now, I’m talking specifically about our ADULT children here–and not school-age children that haven’t reached the “legal” age of 17 or 18 years of age.
In the above-mentioned situation, where the parent decides to maintain the close familial tie, essentially enabling the adult child to persist in a course that the parent knows is self-destructive, disastrous, and, in some cases, morally and ethically wrong, the parent must assume responsibility for their part in the situation. They are failing to properly parent because they KNOW that what their adult child is doing is wrong and problematic, but they are using the excuse of parental “love” to deny the wrongness of their adult child’s course.
It says, in effect, that the adult child can continue in their course without really experiencing the consequences of their Choice–because the over-doting parent will help soften the harsh realities that result from unwise decisions, and be there for their wayward adult child when it comes time to “pay the piper.”
This is bad parenting because Life does not work this way.
Every day, each and every one of us makes a Choice, and things happen as a result of that Choice. Sometimes, those things that happen or beneficial–and sometimes they are downright tragic. But in order to become better in our decision-making skills, we MUST experience the full weight and burden of every Choice we make. It’s called being an adult–when we finally become responsible not only for ourselves, but the impact our Choice has on those closest to us, as well as Society at-large.
It becomes a testament to our Character when the Choices we make reflect our awareness that others close to us may be hurt, disappointed, or estranged through what we choose to do. Or, conversely: doesn’t reflect that awareness.
Unfortunately, some adult children reach a point where they could care less what anyone else thinks or feels about what the adult child chooses to do. They just want to do whatever it is that they want to do, and everyone else can just take a flying leap. The adult child’s self-indulgent attitude takes priority over everything else. Anyone that tries to reason with them is considered a “hater” or enemy or someone who “just doesn’t want them to be happy.”
In nearly every case, however, where the adult child insists that “everyone” else is just trying to keep the adult child from being “happy,” the reality is that the adult child is engaging in self-destructive behavior that will eventually result in disaster, and the adult child is in denial and defiance of the inevitable.
However, no amount of reasoning on the part of the frustrated parent will reach that adult child once they reach that level of rationalizing. In that situation, the parent’s best course of action is to step back and let things take their course–even though they already know where the particular path leads. The adult child MUST be allowed to experience disaster for themselves.
Even then, the adult child still may not admit that the Choices they are making are problematic. Instead, they will persist in the belief that everyone is against them, against their happiness. They will continue in the delusion that they are doing everything right, and honestly be confused why bad things continue to happen to them–when in reality those bad things are simply the consequences of the adult child’s Choices. They will be angry and resentful especially at those close to them when they need or want something, expecting it to be provided on the basis that they ARE family, after all–and do not get what they are asking for from family members or siblings.
Worse still, adult children caught up in the maelstrom of this course will habitually lie and resort to deception and half-truths in order to bolster the illusion they have built around themselves. Not intentionally, but because they have so thoroughly and effectively deluded themselves into believing that they are speaking absolute truth–even when the evidence contradicts it.
Too, these adult children will utilize emotional manipulation to secure sympathy and pity from others, to obtain support that subconsciously will reinforce their conviction that they are perfectly content, their life is essentially the life they want, and that everyone is out to get them or deprive them of happiness.
This is also evident in the relationships that the adult child enters into. While the adult child will be absolutely convinced that they are in “love” with someone they’ve managed to attract through sympathy, pity, or emotional manipulation, an objective assessment will confirm that what the adult child is calling “love” is actually DEPENDENCY. The adult child is actually dependent upon the other person in the relationship for support, affirmation, and the other person will invariably assure the adult child that they’re right about their skewed world-view in order to secure their own needs’ fulfillment.
This co-dependent situation persists until either the other person in the relationship realizes that the adult child needs more than can be given (and this need will increase exponentially as the relationship continues), or the adult child fails to secure what they crave from the relationship.
Relationships such as these tend to be short-lived, and each relationship that ends before the adult child is ready for it to end will lead the adult child into depression and frustration as they try to understand what it is that they are doing wrong–without realizing or acknowledging the reality behind said failed relationships. This depression and frustration will end, however, once the adult child as secured another symbiotic relationship–and so the cycle continues.
It is a sad fact of truth that adult children who live their lives like this rarely come around in their lives to realize just far off-course they are. In some cases when the adult child finally does come around, years and even decades can have passed them by and they suddenly realize that they’ve managed to alienate everyone that had ever been close to them–even parents and siblings. They find themselves alone, embittered, angry (at everyone else except themselves), and resentful–yet at the same time trying to recapture a time that has long since passed them by when things were simpler in their life, when they had people around them that truly loved and cared for them… people who had no choice but to let the adult child HAVE their Choice, to live the life that THEY wanted–even though it meant that there would be no room for them in that adult child’s life.
But in the end, it was all about Choice.



