Tip 1: Assume your college kid needs your support – just on their terms
When we surveyed teens and young adults age 15-21 for For Parents Only and several other books, we discovered that high school graduation marked a stark dividing line.
Adolescents who aren’t yet adults are starving for freedom, and there’s all this tension around wanting it. But that goes away when they go away to college. In college, they no longer stress about freedom—because they have it!
At the same time, our college-age kids have a different type of stress: they know they’re in uncharted territory and they often do want our support. So, as parents, we go from being stiff-armed to being welcomed with open arms. (Well, kind of. With limits.)
We polled young adults (ages 19-24, some in college, some post-college) last year for a blog on what young adults need from their parents. While the poll was informal, many responses had a similar thread: Young adults want our support, but on their terms.
One 23-year-old described it this way: “Think of us like the toddler/kindergartners of adults. We need to start being independent and make mistakes on our own, but at the end of the day we just don’t know a lot (even if we think we do). So asking if we’d like advice on any topic would really help.”
Here’s the key: the same respondent said unsolicited advice is not welcome! So, parents, maybe we should trade barging in with advice on the roommate situation in favor of asking questions like these:
- Are you feeling better about your roommate (or finances or calculus professor)?
- Is anything worrying you right now?
- How can we support you?
- How can we pray for you?
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