I’m Thinking About Abandoning My Family and Starting Anew. All to Get Away From My Adult Son.

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My wife, “Leann,” and I have a 28-year-old son, “Jacob,” still living with us, and the situation has me at the end of my rope. I retired four years ago, and Leann was a stay-at-home mom. Jacob is very intelligent and articulate, and got good grades throughout high school. He had a free ticket to a degree thanks to my job at a state university, but he floundered his way through and graduated with a bachelor’s degree in a field he really has no interest in.

Jacob very much considers himself an outsider; he scoffs at the idea of a career and expresses disdain for his “normie” peers. His poor hygiene and physical appearance are limiting his job options. Jacob has bounced from one dead-end job to another, never working more than three days a week, and shows no signs of progress toward independence.

He has been on anxiety medication for almost 10 years, but is currently in the process of tapering them off, so we’re trying to be extra patient right now. He pays nothing to live here and doesn’t do any household chores other than his own laundry.

Leann and I have an otherwise good marriage, but we strongly disagree about how to help him. I go through life biting my tongue because I feel he needs some tough love, like a deadline for getting a full-time job or contributing to room and board, whereas she wants to control the narrative and make everything as easy as possible for him. I don’t know how much longer I can live like this. His presence limits our ability to move and to travel as much as we’d like. I’m constantly on edge, waiting for the inevitable phone call with the next job problem or car problem. I’m in my early 60s, and this is not how I planned to live my golden years. I spend a lot of time fantasizing about leaving, and we’re financially secure, so I know I can. I don’t want to break our family up over this, but I honestly think I’d be happier living on my own if this doesn’t improve. What can I do to break this logjam?

Dear Can’t Wait Forever,

You’ve known Jacob since he was born. Be honest with yourself: Is he floundering in life because he, for whatever reason, just prefers living at home to the things he’d have to do to have a steady income and get his own place? Or could there be another explanation that explains his inability to keep a job, but also his feeling of being an outsider, his poor hygiene, and his anxiety?

Raise this question with Leann, too. As a stay-at-home mom to him while you were working full time, she probably has more data, and it’s possible she hasn’t shared it all because she suspects you’ll say he just needs to pull himself up by the bootstraps. Was there a specific time when he began to feel he was different from other “normie” kids? What have teachers,  counselors, and doctors said about him over the years? Does the provider who decided anti-anxiety medications were right for him know that he’s tapering off of them, and do they have ideas about what might work better? What does he say about his experience in college and working those jobs that didn’t last? What is he feeling when he doesn’t buckle down and study or perform to a manager’s expectations?

Jacob is an adult now, and I’m well aware that you don’t have the power (or patience) to rally around him that you would if he were 8. But it’s possible that a diagnosis that was missed back then, compounded by all the shame and self-doubt that comes from failing to live up to expectations, could still be shaping the way he lives to this day. It would be nice if you and Leann could have a meeting of the minds about the potential source of Jacob’s struggles. If you can get him on board and arrange for a professional to weigh in, that would be even better. But for the sake of your marriage, I think it’s important that you have a shared perspective on why your grown son can’t seem to leave the nest. Whatever it is, the way forward is not going to be tough love or endless coddling, but something in between that involves trying to get him to solve the underlying problem. Because I do think there’s a problem, and right now both of you, as much as you disagree on how to treat him, are acting as if it doesn’t exist.

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Last year, our son announced that he had eloped with “Karina.” This was not even nine months after his divorce, and it rang all the alarm bells. Karina is a single mom to a teenage boy and girl. She has a criminal record and has been married three times before. We tried to give the benefit of the doubt and paid for all four to join us at our other daughter’s Christmas celebration and bought extensive gifts for the teens. We didn’t even make it to Christmas.

These kids were little snakes that played sweet to our faces and then turned around and were vile to our younger grandchildren. They were caught filming our teenage granddaughter and making fun of her stutter and her younger brother, who has a neurological disorder that affects his face. At this, Karina basically rolled her eyes and excused it as kids being kids. Then the teens were caught on camera going onto the upper porch where the home office was. That room is usually locked inside, but our son-in-law forgot to check the outside door. Several hundred dollars in cash, plus the expensive bracelet our son-in-law bought to surprise our daughter, went missing.

Karina denied that her kids took anything and refused to have them searched, even though her daughter was caught red-handed wearing the bracelet! It was at this point that they were asked to leave. Our son basically stood around silently while his wife ranted and raved as they were shown the door. We don’t know where they went; our son later called asking for all the gifts we bought. My husband informed him that everything was to be returned and given to his sister to reimburse her family.

Now, Karina and her kids are permanently persona non grata to our family. We have never been so insulted and hurt in our lives. What do we do with our son, though? He basically has denied any wrongdoing, despite being in the room when we found the girl wearing the stolen bracelet, and he lives several states away. We know he was severely depressed during the divorce, but this is beyond the pale.

This experience sounds awful, and I’m sure you’re still vibrating with all the feelings that come with being stolen from and seeing your grandkids hurt. Despite all that, you don’t have to do anything with or to your son. There’s no need to force him to admit wrongdoing, or to see Karina and the kids the way you see them.

Their out-of-control family is not a threat to you at this moment. He’s in a rebound relationship, and it will likely end soon. Just wait. Your job right now is primarily about soothing your own feelings (it must be very hard to feel your son is making bad choices, connected to a toxic person, and not behaving like the person you thought he was) rather than saying anything to him. And obviously, they won’t be invited for a spring break visit.

For a forthcoming advice column, we want to help you navigate modern dating. Did your date ghost you 10 minutes before your dinner? Are you stuck in first-date purgatory? Ask us!

My friend’s son has cut off contact with her. About seven years ago, he met a lovely young girl, and they started dating. (He would have been about 22 at the time.) He brought her home and introduced her to the parents (the parents had been divorced for many years at this point). Mom liked her, and they both love and own horses. Mom approved.

After a couple of years, there was a rocky breakup. But Mom did not want to give up her friendship with the girl. Son was sort of OK with this until he started seriously dating someone else. Mom was still very close with the original girl and boarded her horse at their ranch. I am friends with her now, too.

Personally, I think the tipping point was when the former girlfriend started seriously dating someone else. Someone arguably better than him. Son demanded, on several occasions, that his mom cut ties with Girl #1. Or, he threatened, he would never speak to Mom again. I am just a friend of the extended family. Mom remarried a few years ago. Mom and the new husband have raised Son from about 10 years old into adulthood. They are great people. This disconnect has happened over the last six months. He still refuses to acknowledge his mother, even when they’re in the same room. He’s mad she did not wish him happy birthday, even though he blocked her six months ago. He told her, “I unblocked you on my birthday.” Really? He is 30 years old!

Any advice for Mom on how to try to repair her relationship with her son? She is devastated, but he has his own life and wants nothing to do with her as long as she retains her friendship with the girl. He still talks to me, the stepdad, and the rest of the extended family. They are close. (Even though the stepdad and I are also close friends with the original girlfriend.)

I’m sure you’re heartbroken for your friend, and it must be wrenching to watch her suffer over the loss of her relationship with her son. But hold off on giving her advice. First, she hasn’t asked. Telling you she’s devastated isn’t the same as saying, “What do you think I should do?” Moreover, I suspect there’s more that’s shaping their relationship (or lack thereof, at this point) than her strange insistence on being friends with Girl #1.

It might be that her son still holds some lingering resentments over the divorce. Or any other number of things that have happened over their lifetime together. I don’t have a complete theory, but I suspect that, totally separate from the conflict over Girl #1, this family wasn’t ever completely free of heightened sensitivity or hurt feelings. Your friend’s decision to choose the girl over her son raises questions for me. Why did she insist on this? Even if her son’s demands were unreasonable, it seems surprising that she’d make a choice that she knew would alienate him.

All that to say, there’s too much going on for you to suggest an action that would fix these fraught family dynamics. Whether she made the right decision or the wrong one, your friend is sad. You won’t fill the hole left by her son, and she’s not going to follow instructions she didn’t ask for. The best you can do is to be a source of support and companionship that makes the (hopefully temporary) loss feel less painful.

My husband and I are driving six hours through the snowy mountains in a rental car with two other couples who are close friends to a wedding in a practically unreachable place (that’s a story for another advice column). One of the men in another couple went ahead and reserved the car rental for us as he travels frequently for work. The problem is we are all terrified of him as a driver.