18+ does not equal "grown up"

Remember when you couldn't wait to turn 18 and basically run away from the control of your "horrible, overbearing parents". Yea, me too. Then I moved out and realized "Oh shit, I can't afford all these bills and juggle work and college too". No, I didn't move back home and continue on with my degree-that's for smart people! Instead I quit college, married an abusive a-hole and proceeded to royally 'F' up the next 10 or so years of my life. Then, newly single again, with 3 young kids and no real way to make a living, I went back to school and got my nursing degree. I sacrificed a lot of sleep for a few years so that my children still felt like a priority in my life by doing all my homework exclusively after they went to bed and I also did all my errand running on my only real day off, Friday, so that by the time I picked my kids up after school, we had all weekend free to play and hang out and cook and eat and watch tv and be silly.
I wanted more for my kids than they're getting now. Not that their lives are horrible, by any means. They certainly have a lot more than some kids. But I still didn't want them to have to struggle for things. I know, it makes them appreciate it more, or rather its supposed to. It actually just seems to turn them into whiny, immature brats, but that's beside the point, sort of. Anyway, I wanted more for them. I didn't want my kids to have to work their way through college or to end up with a ton of debt from it, like I did. Unfortunately, that's the way it's happening with my oldest son, at least. He was a straight A student, headed for Merry Scholarship Land, before he screwed around during his last couple of years of high school and blew his chances of getting said scholarships. Because I was still working part of last year, our tax return shows us as being "too rich" to not provide all this money to him for college. Funny, because with seven kids, what my husband makes does not put us anywhere near the "wealthy" category, and I made a lot less than him when I was working.
Because of all that, my son's working and paying for his own college. I feel a lot of guilt about that. Guilt I probably shouldn't have, but when I'm not laying it on myself, he's laying it on me, mainly because, as much as it pains me to admit it (since I'm the one who raised him almost exclusively) he's a selfish ass most of the time anymore. He's also reckless, inconsiderate, dishonest, immature and irresponsible with everything, though less so with regards to his jobs and his love interest.
The amount of stress I feel, daily, from having to continue raising my now 19 year old, rebellious son, is beyond words. He has the right to vote (and says he did in our most recent election), the potential to be drafted into the military, and the requirement of being legally responsible for himself. Yet, he lives at home, does no chores, spends all of his time either out of the house or holed up in his room, does not socialize with his family, has no regard for his overuse of electric and water supplies, pays no rent, pays for no food (other than what he chooses to buy) or utilities, has a free cell phone, leaves his room in a complete mess, and reminds me often that I said in September that I hoped to give him another $100 on top of the $250 we already gave him for his birthday even though I have not been able to pay for more than one treatment so far for the cancer I have been diagnosed with since July. My husband (who's been helping parent since my oldest son was 12) and I have spoken with him on numerous occasions. We've tried grounding him-that's fun, by the way, grounding a person who legally can walk away from you. However, most recently, we've had to speak with him about his plans to move out of the family home. He might possibly go live with my aunt, nearby, or he might live with my parents or a friend. I don't really wish his presence on anyone at this moment because even if he behaves in a considerate manner initially, he will eventually begin to treat them like shit too. Unless something in him snaps and he changes, and I would be glad for that. At this point, however, the only real solution is probably going to be him moving out of the house, and his slightly younger brother finally getting a room to himself.
He was given sixty days to prove, with his behavior, that he wanted to continue to live in our home. Its been about a month and he's cleaned his bathroom once and loaded the dishwasher a time or two. Meanwhile, there are empty containers of to-go food spread across his floor and desk. Many of my baking dishes sit, unwashed, in bags in his room because he "borrowed" (borrowing without permission equals stealing, yes, I know, Mom) them for one reason or another and did not put them back yet. Our home has become a hotel of sorts, except that we are not making any money off of our messy, disrespectful tenant. Unfortunately, its time to end his 'lease'.
Parenting is a huge inconvenience, the biggest one you'll ever know. The whole reason I began writing this blog is because the world is surrounded with people who seem to expect that parenting would be simple or convenient or that it even should be. It seems however, that beyond parenting being so drastically inconvenient, sometimes the most difficult thing about parenting is to stop doing it. I will always worry about my son and so will my husband. We will always feel a loss at not having him here, the same loss we would have felt had he moved to go to a college far away, the same loss we already feel since he has not, in most ways, been a member of this household for a long time, through his own choosing. We will always be there to emotionally support him and be his back up as much as possible, but with 6 other children in our home, it is unfair for us to allow him to be here, bringing so much negativity and anger into the home. Sometimes the best relationship you can hope for with your adult child is a long distance one. And that, my dears, is the most inconvenient part of parenting: you almost never get what you want from your child. And "grown up" legally almost never means "grown up" mentally and emotionally.

Tantrums are so inconvenient

Kids cry, we’ve all seen it-get over it

It’s a wonder that we aren’t all completely screwed up as adults. We live in a society that is embarrassed by our feelings, be those good or bad. We spend years trying to get our kids to express themselves vocally and then we squash their ability to do so by becoming disgusted with them whenever they do just that.

A five year old subjected to a 45 minute grocery store trip might whine and cry because she is frustrated, bored and tired, but though we, as the parents, force them along for these outings (often out of necessity and/or convenience to ourselves), we blame the child for their feelings and ask or oftentimes demand they reign those in, instead of accepting responbility and their emotions.

Groups of teenage boys often hoot and holler during sporting events and it is widely accepted, but put that cheering inside a hospital for a diagnosis of freedom from cancer and all of the sudden its not appreciated. Why couldn't you cheer along with them instead since obviously grandma kicking cancer's butt should be seen as a victory worth celebrating.

A fourteen year old who’s boyfriend just dumped her for her best friend walks in during a card game with your friends, sniffling with tears streaming down her cheeks. You’ve repeatedly told her you’ll be there for her and she can tell you anything, but instead of welcoming her into your arms for the hug you know she needs, you escort her to another room and attempt to clean her up so that she’s “presentable” to your guests. You then tell her you’ll talk to her when your company leaves.

Why are our emotions so subject to time and place? Why must we participate in being citizens of a society that sees unadulterated shows of emotion as unacceptable or taboo? Who says we need to hide our faces in embarrassment at the public displays of our children's (or our own) emotions?

We made these idiotic rules as a society and we can unmake them. We can choose to decide that a child's emotional wellbeing is much more important than any inconvenience caused by dealing with possibly private matters in a public place. You should not choose to only love your children at home, when you are alone with only them and other family, therefore you should not only accept their feelings as a perfect part of them only when you are home alone with them. 

No one ever really died of embarrassment and if they did, wow...that's just sad. I personally am going to welcome every emotional outburst, be it positive or negative and simply be happy that my children are capable of feeling. I promise to let them be who they are as I guide them toward how to be sensitive, productive, caring, helpful, wonderful members of this F'ed up world in which we live. I challenge you to do the same. You're children will one day thank you for it.