Adult Problem Children

     I saw the movie Everything’s Fine on Saturday and wept. I have an adult son with a problem and I know many other people do too. I canceled my date to the Electric Light parade, in downtown Phoenix, because I could not put on a happy face. I know more people with problem adult children these days, not because there are more than other generations, but rather because we’re more open about it. When I was growing up, there were always “the black sheep” in families, a term which is politically incorrect these days. Most of the time I had no idea somebody’s relative did to deserve outcast status. Looking back, I can recognize the one in my family because he betrayed my father when I was an adult. He embezzled money from my father’s business although I was told few details. If the incident had happened when I was a child, I doubt I would have known about it at all.

     I have lots of friends adult children with problems. Certainly are unemployed and struggling financially. Two of my three sons are out of work. I have a friend who’s raising her three year-old granddaughter because her son and his wife are drug addicts. I have friends whose adult children live with them due to the economics of divorce. I have friends whose son has Asberger’s and they financially support him in his own place in another city. I have a friend whose forty-five year-old son is a paranoid schizophrenic and in and out of hospitals. Mental illness and drugs are so heartbreaking. The kids are fine until their late teens then all hell breaks loose. We put our hopes and dreams into our children. They break into a million pieces and it’s a miracle if they get it back together. So when do you stop being a parent? Never? How much help is too much?

     I know all about this. My daughters, ages six and thirteen, were killed in an airplane crash. I won’t go into detail, you can read about it in my memoir As One Door Closes, available on amazon.com. They represented my best and brightest but their potential was snuffed out.

     I have three sons now. The older two gave me a few scares and heartaches in their teens, but they’re now married and doing well. Well is a relative term. They’re well adjusted and happy though one is unemployed.

     My youngest son has big problems. He was a heroin addict for two years. During those dark times I refused to let him live with me or give him money. It was so hard! I went to China for ten weeks to work as a volunteer to get away from the situation. Now he’s sober but on probation for trying to buy drugs. They charged him with twelve felonies! This is Maricopa County, Arizona, with the toughest sheriff and an equally tough prosecutor. The police car bumper stickers say, “Do Drugs, Do Time.” My son was lucky enough to get into drug court. He has an “undetermined felony” which will be put down to a misdemeanor if he graduates from the program. He’s still sober, or at least I think so, but he hasn’t been going to court, taking his classes, or going for tests. Last week I turned off the utilities in his apartment. Why would I pay for him to do the wrong thing? He stayed over Wednesday night and I drove him down to the courthouse on Thursday. He didn’t go in and lied and said there was no court that day. He stayed over Thursday night, promising he’d go to court on Friday. I nmade sure he had the courtroom location. I again drove him downtown. He didn’t go in. I was angry and upset and turned him away when he showed up that night. I saw the Robert De Niro movie the next day.

     Now it’s Monday and supposedly today is the day. I’m taking him downtown but parking the car and going with him to the court bailiff. It would have been much better if he’d gone to court last week. I don’t know what will happen. He could be ordered to serve out the rest of his probation, over a year, in jail. Or they could give him another chance. I just don’t know if the judge is as forgiving as a parent.

Tags: Adult children, problem children