10 Things Adult Children Don't Realize They Do To Make Their Parents Feel Unloved
You probably don't mean to make your parents feel this way, but there's a good chance they do.
fizkes / Shutterstock During childhood, parents are there to offer emotional guidance and practical support to their kids. Their roles as parent and child are clearly defined, but as children enter adulthood, those roles can sometimes become blurred. Parents might wonder what they have left to offer, as well as when their child will have something to offer them in return. This is especially true when their adult children do things they probably don’t realize make their parents feel unloved.
There's a good deal of debate over the question of whether or not children have a duty to care for their parents as they age. In our culture, children are expected to become independent and go live their own lives, but in doing so, there are often times when adult children don’t take their parents’ needs and feelings into consideration, which can leave even the most understanding parents feeling discarded and disconnected.
Here are 10 things adult children don’t realize they do to make their parents feel unloved
1. Overlooking family traditions
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Adult children don’t realize that overlooking family traditions makes their parents feel unloved. While it’s important for adult children to maintain a sense of autonomy and form their own routines, disregarding traditions sends the message that their parents aren’t important to them. Taking part in family traditions shows parents that they instilled solid values in their children. It makes parents feel recognized and appreciated.
As adult children settle into their independence and start families of their own, they sometimes get so caught up in the new version of their lives that they forget how important it is to remember where they came from. Adult children don’t always realize that not paying attention to family traditions makes their parents feel unloved, which is why checking in with each other, especially around holidays and special events, is so valuable.
2. Not staying in touch
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Not staying in touch on a consistent basis is something adult children don’t realize they do that makes their parents feel unloved. While parents should be able to emotionally separate from their adult children and encourage them to have lives of their own, they still want to hear from their kids.
It’s common for parents to feel isolated after their kids leave home. Loneliness can twist people’s perception, making them think that no one cares about them. As psychologist Guy Winch points out, “When you're lonely, you feel so alone, so raw, so rejected, so unseen, that the idea of reaching out and risking more rejection or a rebuff seems more than you can stand, so you don’t.”
“When you're lonely, you feel so alone, so raw, so rejected, so unseen, that the idea of reaching out and risking more rejection or a rebuff seems more than you can stand, so you don’t,” he explains.
Communication is what keeps people connected. Adult children don’t have to call everyday, or be in constant contact to show they care. They can send a link to an article that reminded them of their parents. They can send a photo of the meal they’re making or a quick text that just says, “Thinking of you,” along with cute emojis.
Small acts of staying in touch can go a long way to make parents feel loved and appreciated.
3. Forgetting to share milestones
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Another thing adult children don’t realize they do to make their parents feel unloved is forgetting to share life milestones with them. Our day-to-day lives can be chaotic, which makes it hard to remember that it’s the little things that are the most important.
Parents want to feel like they’re still a part of their adult children’s lives. They want to know that their son landed a second interview for his dream job. They want to know that their daughter’s PhD dissertation won an award. They want to feel included, which means telling them that their grandkid ate their first bite of solid food or played a solo at the school concert.
When adult children let their parents into their lives, it eases their feelings of disconnection. Parents don’t just want to know the special stuff. They want to hear about the boring stuff as well. They want their adult children to call when they’re running errands and share the great new recipe they found. Being a part of their adult kids’ lives holds deep meaning for parents and makes them feel cared for.
4. Being dismissive during conversations
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Being dismissive during conversations is something adult children do that they don’t realize makes their parents feel unloved. Scrolling on their phones or attending to other tasks when they’re with their parents means they’re not really paying attention. Being only half-present sends the message that what their parents are saying isn’t valuable.
As career and life management consultant Ruth Schimel points out, “listening helps boost trust and understanding.”
“A foundation for intimacy and closeness, listening can also strengthen most relationships,” she continues. “As passive and simple as it may seem, listening is a powerful skill that benefits from your self-awareness and practice.”
When adult children dismiss their parents during conversations, they make them feel unloved. Paying actual attention and listening is a simple act that holds great emotional weight.
“Your listening is a great, intangible gift to give to others and to yourself. But it takes time, attention, and consistency to excel,” Schimel shares. “You’ll open windows and doors to new possibilities and richer relationships in most areas of your life.”
5. Only reaching out when they need something
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Another thing adult children don’t realize makes their parents feel unloved is only reaching out when they need something. While asking for assistance is part of all relationships, adult children who only touch base with their parents to get their needs met make them feel like their relationship isn’t prioritized on a purely emotional basis.
Adult children might ask for financial support if they need help making ends meet, or they might ask their parents to provide childcare for them. Yet if these things are the sole reason they’re getting in touch, it’s highly likely their parents will feel like their kids view them as a checkbook or back-up babysitter, which makes them feel unloved.
All relationships require give and take, meaning that meeting each other’s emotional expectations is essential to keeping a sense of balance and care.
6. Treating visits like a chore
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Adult children don’t realize that treating visits home like a chore is something they do that makes their parents feel unloved. It’s important for parents to give their kids space to make their own decisions, even in adulthood. Yet being part of a family sometimes means meeting parents’ need for connection, even when taking the time to visit them isn’t your first choice.
According to Self-Determination Theory, parents can positively impact their children’s development by providing them with a sense of autonomy, competence, and relatedness. Autonomy is the perception of self-control over one’s actions. Competence involves attaining a sense of mastering one’s actions. Relatedness is characterized by a sense of belonging and mutual caring.
Parents who provide their children with autonomy foster their competence and their relatedness, which is valuable even for adult children. When parents put pressure on their adult children to visit, it often leads to resentment, yet adult children who treat visiting like a chore can make their parents feel isolated and unloved. Ideally, parents and adult children are able to work out a balanced system for visits, so that neither side feels put out.
7. Not expressing gratitude
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When adult children don’t express gratitude for their parents, it makes their parents feel unloved and unappreciated. As therapist Dr. Terri Orbuch reveals, “There is one particular emotion that brings unparalleled benefits to every type of relationship — gratitude.”
“Many of us often take a moment to give thanks in our thoughts — for our health and the health of our loved ones, for good friends and family, and for the comforts of home,” she explains. Yet all too often, we don’t actually share those expressions of gratitude with people in our lives.
While Dr. Orbuch’s research focuses mainly on gratitude in romantic relationships, her findings translate over to all forms of relationships. She’s found that people in healthy relationships have three basic requirements that need to be met: The need for reassurance or self-worth, the need for intimacy and closeness, and the need for assistance.
When adult children tell their parents how much they appreciate them, they meet those basic needs. Dr. Orbuch notes that “Happy and healthy relationships require communication, realistic expectations, and trust,” which includes the relationships between parents and their adult children.
8. Ignoring their advice
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Adult children don’t realize that ignoring their parents’ advice makes them feel unloved. While receiving unsolicited advice can feel like a form of criticism to adult children, most of the time, when parents offer guidance, it’s rooted in love and care. They’re not saying that their adult children aren’t good enough, they just want to feel useful and helpful, and share the wisdom they’ve learned over a lifetime.
While it’s more than okay for adult children to set boundaries about which topics of conversation they’re willing to engage in with their parents, they should also be able to see from their parents’ perspective. When adult children disregard what their parents have to say, it makes them feel like they don’t matter, which makes them feel unloved.
9. Canceling plans
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Something adult children don’t realize they do that makes their parents feel unloved is repeatedly canceling plans. As children grow up and put their energy toward their own independent lives, they tend to think more about their own immediate needs than what their parents might need. While this is a normal part of their development, adult children who have a consistent pattern of canceling plans with their parents make them feel unloved.
No person is a mindreader, which means that parents have to tell their adult children how they feel, in order for that behavior to change. When engaging in difficult conversations with their parents, it’s important for adult children to stay open-minded and not put their defenses up immediately. As psychologist Nick Wignall reveals, “If you treat conversations like competitions, you’re bound to lose no matter what.”
“Before going into any conversation where you’d like to be a good listener, ask yourself this simple question: Is this conversation about being helpful and supportive or making myself feel good?”
“Instead of viewing conversations as competitions to be won, you’ll start to view them as acts of service that aren’t about you at all,” he explains.
“Focus your attention on the person sitting next to you — how they feel and what the world must look like through their eyes right now,” Wignall advises. “When you do, you subtly communicate that, whatever they’re going through, they’re okay.”
While adult children might not be able to drop everything at all times to meet their parents’ needs, listening to how they feel is crucial to staying connected.
10. Being distant with affection
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Adult children don’t realize that being distant with their affection makes their parents feel unloved. In any relationship, it’s easy to settle into a state of stasis, where we grow so comfortable that we forget to make the other person feel special. Even when their kids are grown, with lives and families of their own, parents still want them to share their affection.
They want to be shown that their kids still care, which means saying “I love you” at the end of a phone call. It means sharing past memories and making new ones. Relationships take effort, even the ones between parents and their adult children. We all want to know that our loved ones love us back, which is why expressing affection, during special moments and just because, is so important.
Alexandra Blogier, MFA, is a staff writer who covers psychology, social issues, relationships, self-help topics, and human interest stories.