Launchpad Parenting: 6 Core Ideas - Extended Video 

Best wishes. Note that it may not be essential in every family for all to be involved. As the video discusses, this situation is usually very much a dance between two or more partners, all of whom are determined to change each other’s steps and having little success. Often parents working together can see that it may be enough to shift their own support - from filling in the young adult’s gaps to supporting their forward motion. My course The Parent Trap emphasizes this approach: ramping down the conflict, criticism, and advice-giving; ramping down the support for dependence behavior (funding the withdrawal, expecting no household contributions while making many themselves, ensuring 24 hour WiFi availability); and ramping up supports for the journey to adulthood (funding or subsidizing courses; working together on meal prep; helping the YA learn how to do household maintenance; helping with rent or basic groceries). The book Failure to Launch by Mark McConville is a great resource as well.

Gotcha! I can't stop my husband's advice giving but I can act to my son more like my mom did to me when I was grown. The 6 concepts video gave some good solid ideas to think through. The course looks good. @@RandyPaterson

Sometimes launchpad issues can be handled by a parent gently stepping back and allowing the young person's capacity to take over. Sometimes, however, another factor merits attention. Where unresolved grief seems to be an issue, counselling can be a very good idea. There can be a self-corrective influence of simply having to take over one's life management when parents step back, even in cases where there is an underlying issue - but sometimes this is simply not enough to resolve things.

In the 1980s there was a popular book called Iron John. It was one of the main books associated with the "Men's Movement" of the time - essentially a push to have men acknowledge their emotions and look at their goals and values in a deeper way. The core of the book is a mythical story about a powerful king who captures a feral "man of the woods" and keeps him locked in a cage. His young son is intrigued by this man and wants to free him, but cannot get his parents to hand over the key. Eventually he realizes that the key will never be given to him; it must be taken. The man of the woods represents the boy's adult self, and the key represents the permission to move from boyhood to adulthood. He wants to sit passively and have his parents declare him "ready" but that day never comes. He realizes that his life is his own responsibility and that becoming an adult is HIS job, not his parents' job. Many young adults are waiting for their parents to say "Now you can do your own laundry" or "Now you can earn your own money" or "Now you can take on a share of responsibility for this home we live in" - and until the parents do that the young adult feels stuck - waiting for the golden key to be handed over. Instead, they can benefit from asking "What is a reasonable level of responsibility for a **-year-old?" and then taking action. "No thanks; I can do my own laundry." "No, I'll pay my own cell bill." "Today I applied for work."

We don't advocate taking things away from dependent young adults. Their possessions are their possessions, and an equal relationship between the adults in the home dictates respect for one another's belongings. What we advocate is a ramping down of what we might call "overparenting" - providing the kind of services that we might offer a much younger child. In effect, we are talking about a transfer of supports - from behaviour that enables and promotes dependence (in the process inadvertently communicating a lack of faith in the young adult's abilities) to support for independence (assistance with enhancing adult capabilities). In effect: Help learning to cook, rather than delivering prepared meals.

We often work with major life shifts in therapy, and always convert these to a series of gradual steps, just as we would do with any form of anxious avoidance. The sequence is always tailored to the individual and the anxieties they have. When an isolated individual is aiming for eventual employment, for example, some steps might involve being outside the home for a defined period of time, using transit, walking past businesses advertising job openings, rehearsing job interviews with the therapist (said therapist initially being pleasant, then acting out a harder edge), swapping and rehearsing job interviews with another therapist they don't know, learning interview strategy, applying for volunteer positions, applying for jobs the person doesn't actually want (eliminating the hope element), applying for jobs they are guaranteed not to get (deliberate rejection exposure), and so on. Part of the rehearsal involves the development of skills to handle challenging situations. But part of it involves exposure to uncomfortable emotion. If an individual cannot tolerate anxiety or overwhelm, for example, this plants those emotions in the driver's seat, handing them control. "I feel anxious/overwhelmed so I can't do what I'd planned, instead I have to escape/avoid." Obeying the emotion produces a short term reduction in anxiety (a rewarding outcome that reinforces the avoidance) followed by a longer term upswing in anxiety sensitivity. Although many isolated young adults spend much of their day in anxiety management activities (pot, alcohol, retreat, distraction), they are usually far more anxious (or their anxiety is much more easily triggered) than their peers who are out and engaged with the world. Avoidance is the surest way to grow an anxiety problem. Part of the mission is to encounter (at a gradual level) that which makes us anxious, and part is to cultivate a tolerance of anxiety/overwhelm itself. Not because we want to be fine with being anxious all the time - but because anxiety resilience results in less anxiety overall.

Siblings often have a difficult position in this dynamic. They can often see what's going on, but have little control or influence. They are neither the person receiving more help than their limitations require, nor the person overproviding that help. If they advocate that parents pull back and engage in "gradual parental retirement", the dependent sibling will often feel resentful and undermined. Siblings can, however, provide their perspective to parents on what is happening. They have a unique position within the family, having access to the "inside story" and the objectivity (especially if they are independent themselves) to see the family patterns. For example, they can notice when parents are inadvertently undermining the dependent sibling's independence (buying gaming equipment for him, staying home to cook when he is able to do this for himself, providing cash on demand, talking about all the dangers of public transit, criticizing his small efforts). When the dependent sibling has a good relationship with an independent one, there is the opportunity for more. The independent one can have input into the activities they do together. "Hey, let's go to the pub/park/hiking trail/store together" rather than "Let's sit at home watching TV together." An independent sibling can provide a window into a larger world, plus the messages "this is achievable and available" and "if I can do this, you can." As well, it's best for a more independent sibling NOT to enable or engage with a dependent sibling's distraction/addiction/avoidance habits. If you had a brother with alcoholism you likely wouldn't be willing to sit drinking with him. If one has a brother who spends 10 hours a day gaming, then engaging in that behaviour with him would not likely be advisable either. If movies are an interest, for example, you could make it a productive policy to go out to movie theatres regularly together, but not to sit at home watching Netflix. It's generally best to get past the temptations of all-or-nothing thinking: "Either I do what he does, or I give up and pretend I no longer have a sibling." The life of a dependent young adult is a small one, and often tedious for someone who has expanded their horizons. But accepting and tolerating small steps (hey, let's walk the dog) can be the road forward both for the stay-at-homer and for the relationship between you.

@@RandyPaterson i realized i forgot to thank you for such a quick and thoughtful reply. i am meeting with my dad soon to come up with some ideas of how to get him out and about with me. wish us luck. have a great weekend!