How Clinging to Mommy and Daddy Is Ruining a Generation.
As children grow up and venture out into the world, the transition from a bustling household to an empty one can be difficult – so, why not skip it all together? That’s what millions of families are doing, not just in the U.S., but across many developed countries. In Italy, the culture of “mammismo” or mamma’s boys, is widely accepted – today, 37 percent of men age thirty have never lived away from home. In Japan, “parasite singles” are chastised in the media for depending on mom and dad, but having few other options, they do it anyway.
What happens when the significant other doesn’t measure up to mama or papa later in life?
In the U.S. the proportion of people age 30 to 34 living with their parents has grown by 50 percent since the 1970s, and the recession has only made things worse. In 2010, over 5.5 million young adults moved back home with their parents, a 15 percent increase from 2007. The shift is so widespread, parenting guides for this stage of life are even starting to crop up, like the recent How to Raise Your Adult Children. Author Katherine S. Newman explores the effects of this growing phenomenon in The Accordion Family: Boomerang Kids, Anxious Parents, and the Private Toll of Global Competition, and talks with The Fiscal Times about the troubling future consequences of this new family structure.
A book on how to raise an adult child? In my day, that meant your adult child had a functioning IQ of 100 or less. If I hadn’t read this, I would have sworn it was a humor book written by some witty comedienne.
Today 85 percent of college graduates have either come home or have stayed home.
Yes, life is harsh. To which I would ask any of these “parasite singles,” would they move back in when their parents needed a caregiver and the roles were reversed? It should work both ways, right?
February 23, 2012 at 8:09 pm
McN,
Your concluding point says it all.
Does it sem at all likely that if parents cared for their toddlers at home instead of unloading them onto a nursery school, those children wouldn’t be clining to the parents bt whom the felt abandoned at age 2 or 3?
February 23, 2012 at 11:12 pm
edit by mad typist of her last 2 linea:
“clinging”
“parents by whom they felt abandoned”
February 24, 2012 at 8:31 pm
Mary, no wonder we got
“Mommy Pants” Barry Hussein Obama
for White House Resident.
We always knew these “O-Bought” (and paid for) Zombies where basement dwellers!
February 24, 2012 at 9:36 pm
They reek of cheetos-in-the-basement, B.
February 24, 2012 at 6:36 am
It goes deeper than that. The selfless sacrifice that one must make for children is not regarded as a priority for many parents. Some don’t even understand what that child means in the scheme of life. Not that I know everything, but I can’t fathom how a 13 year old could ever possibly understand what giving life to that child means. It’s a life long endeavor not a toy for the moment as many see children today. That mutual bond is either solidified or broken early on. As a teacher, you have seen it all.
February 24, 2012 at 9:44 pm
I know it, McN. And earning $ for the load of material things they impose on their children is their excuse for neglecting the child’s spirit. I’ve known couples ehose excuse for not having children is that they can’t afford all the nice toys.
This is in reality part of the leftist brainwashing of women to think that working in a cibicle is more noble than having and caring for/about children. .
February 24, 2012 at 9:45 pm
Destroy the family and the society falls.
February 25, 2012 at 9:08 am
Mary, so much effort in providing toys and so little in nurturing makes for some very spoiled, self indulgent adults. I suppose that when the parents land in the good ole retirement home and they get a note once a year, they might understand why that is.
February 25, 2012 at 7:51 pm
McN,
Since what the children want is not the toys but the parents’ attention, approval, and love, the scenario you paint is inevitable, but I doubt that the aged parents will ever admit the superficiality of their relationship with their children. “But I gave them everything,” they’ll moan. “How could they repay me like this?”
Maybe it’s because all the giving of material things is not about the child but the parent. Remember, today’s parents are of the ME-I generation.
February 25, 2012 at 7:53 pm
Of course, there are many exceptions to the sel-absorbed parent, such as McNorman, our good friend Somebody, and others whom I don’t know about.
February 27, 2012 at 9:04 pm
Thanks for the compliment Mary, sorry I missed it……been doing the parenting thing!! Hit a little bump in the road with some late side effects. So we’ve had some testing and I’ve been researching, hence I haven’t had much time for recreational surfing. Tomorrow we get all the results. I’m keeping my fingers crossed we’re looking at only minimal issues and not major ones……but initial testing didn’t look so good.
BTW little somebody has some bright shiny objects…..video games and the like. I swore up and down she wasn’t ever going to have any……..but they were gifts from well meaning friends and family right after her diagnosis. It kept her mind off some pretty crappy stuff, so it served its purpose……but that was then and this is now……and I’m reigning that stuff in. It’s tough being a parent sometimes!!!!
February 27, 2012 at 9:17 pm
Somebody, those little bright shiny objects don’t qualify. They had a purpose. They weren’t had because they wanted to up one over the next friend. Somebody, little Somebody is held in light. We hope that this is just another tiny bump in the road.
No one ever warned any of us that parenting would be one tough job.