Failing to launch

I’m told there is a movie about a 30-something year old son, failing to leave the nest. He not only doesn’t “launch”, but also according to my slim research, doesn’t plan to. The parents have to take subversive and subliminal action to make the almost middle-aged man…get out and join adulthood.

This is probably a hilariously funny movie and I would most likely enjoy watching it, if it were not for a sneaky suspicion that it is a sad American reality. Kids aren’t leaving when they turn eighteen, or nineteen, or even twenty. Why should they? Mom and Pop give them plenty of spending money, set them up in a new car with all the do-dads, and pay their monthly credit card bills.

Every kid out there is toting a mobile communication device with features Captain Kirk wished he had (thanks Dad!). As their late model cars and trucks zip around town, heavy pounding bass rumbles out (thanks Mom!). New X-Box or PS3 just hitting the market? Don’t worry kiddos (18 to 30 age bracket), there’ll be one under the tree and if Santa can swing it, one of each…with games (thanks Grand-parents!). MP3 players, wireless Blue-Tooth gadgets, and Laptops keep Mom and Pop working till the cows come home. Our kiddos deserve it!

We claim we don’t want them to suffer or be without the things we didn’t have. The actual truth is harder to swallow and involves denial, suffering and a good dose of parenting. As parents, we should deny them things, as this motivates them to work and earn the things they want. As parents, we should let them “suffer” without every gadget that comes along, as this build character.

Years ago, a barber at the Trophy Barber shop told me “A kid will never grow up until they have to pay rent”. I did not have the foggiest idea how true that was when I heard it. I thought kids naturally left home after high school to pursue their own interests and be “free” of their parent’s rules. Off they went to college, the military, or moved in with a friend. Because young moral adults wanted “stuff”, they learned to work for it. They started acquiring furniture piece by piece and as time passed they began to change out old stuff, for newer, all the while experiencing the normal maturity process, replete with patience and denial.

I’ve often wondered what the next vehicle evolutionary step is for a 16 year old, when their first car is, say, a $26,000 Toyota Camry. Do they go to a Denali, or a Hummer H2? Oh, the shame of downgrading! Imagine their embarrassment and suffering if they had to drive the old Datsun, instead of that Maxima! We as well-meaning parents will not allow their self-esteem to be bruised by such deprivation, so we willingly give them what they rightfully, should earn.

They repay this generosity by staying at home; nursing off their parents for everything, without realizing their natural development process has been retarded. They have no need to leave the nest because everything they have ever wanted or desired has been handed to them. We, as parents are failing our children by not pushing them from the nest and the worst part of it is we don’t even realize it.

Throw into the mix; the parent(s) who are rediscovering their own youth and the “failure to launch” cycle starts anew. The parent becomes the child’s “buddy” who then also needs an MP3 player, a maxed-out motorcycle, breast augmentation and super-beefy stereo components in their own car and now we have kids being raised by adults acting like the spoiled kids they couldn’t be when they were teens.

Our school systems punch out carbon-copy graduates with no work related skills. We are so busy making as much money as possible so we can keep them “supplied”, that we forget the part where parents teach their kids a work ethic. Our high school graduate stands one foot from the podium and suddenly realizes the safest place in the world…is right at home and home is where many of them stay. We accommodate, care for, and placate them as we dream about their future.

The bottom line in all of this is simple. We are not preparing our children for adulthood by providing them with everything. To leave would be a giant step down and an 18 year old just isn’t going to give that up to start over.

A News commentator made an observation about Paris Hilton and Britney Spears cavorting all over town in less than acceptable social attire. They said “With these two celebrities acting like this in public, who can our children look up to for role-models”? The answer is simple.

It’s parents, parenting and that means preparing our kiddos to safely “launch”, not draining our bank accounts to keep them at home.