How to Raise Your Adult Children: Because Big Kids Have Even Bigger Problems [Hardcover]

Gail Parent (Author), Susan Ende (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 5, 2010

There are many books out there to teach you how to handle your children after they graduate from diapers, but none tells you how to proceed once they graduate from high school. As new patterns emerge in the lives of young adults, parents find that their grown children have bigger problems than they did just a few years ago.How to Raise Your Adult Children is a manual for anxious moms and dads. Whether confronting the question of setting a curfew for a college kid at home or paying for a forty-year-old daughter's wedding, two "been there, done that" moms give advice with an edge on a variety of emotionally and financially perilous situations, including:-Your kid needs money-your money-Your kid moves back home and stays home-You know your child should not marry his or her significant other-Your big children keep dumping their little children on youCombining the wit of Emmy Award-winning writer Gail Parent and the insight of psychotherapist Susan Ende, this book answers questions most parents never imagined they would have to ask.

--This text refers to the Audio CD edition.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Comedy writer Parent and psychotherapist Ende combine their wit and expertise in this collection of letters from parents facing issues with grown children. According to the U.S. Census, 55% of men and 48% of women ages 18 to 24 are living with their parents: this trend has given rise to a host of financial and lifestyle conflicts. In separate chapters, each with an introductory section, the authors answer questions relating to money, the college years, living arrangements, work, dating, family rituals, marriage, in-laws, grandchildren, divorce, and aging and illness. In their approaches, the authors differ: Parent, who wrote for The Golden Girls, is often tongue-in-cheek, while Ende takes a slightly more earnest approach. The questions--gathered from friends, relatives, and "strangers"-- are wide-ranging, from what to do when a college student trades the car his parents bought him for a motorcycle to how to deal with a dad who is dating his daughterÖs 28-year-old girlfriend. The dueling tones and format donÖt always work, but the authorsÖ overriding theme--that adult children are separate from parents, who must respect their right to make their own choices in order to foster independence--rings true.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

About the Author

Gail Parent is an Emmy Award-winning writer and producer whose credits include The Tracey Ullman Show, The Carol Burnett Show, Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman, and The Golden Girls. She is also the bestselling author of Sheila Levine Is Dead and Living in New York. Susan Ende, M.F.T, is a psychotherapist and has taught at the California Institute of Technology, Pepperdine University, and California State University at Los Angeles. Karen White is a classically trained actress who has been recording and directing audiobooks for more than ten years. An Audie Award finalist and Best Audiobook of the Year 2009 winner for The Hemingses of Monticello by Annette Gordon Reed, she has earned many AudioFile Earphones Awards, including for Too Good to Be True by Erin Arvedlund and Inside of a Dog by Alexandra Horowitz. Of Karen's narration of Nothing to Envy by Barbara Demick, Publishers Weekly says, "Karen White delivers a stunning reading, her character interpretations are confident and well-rounded, and she forges a strong bond with the audience."

--This text refers to the Audio CD edition.

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 18 and up
  
• Hardcover: 304 pages
• Publisher: Hudson Street Press (August 5, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1594630690
• ISBN-13: 978-1594630699
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.5 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #490,337 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Gail Parent, where have you been?, September 12, 2010

By 

Jill Meyer (United States) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: How to Raise Your Adult Children: Because Big Kids Have Even Bigger Problems (Hardcover)

I probably wouldn't have bought this book if Gail Parent hadn't been one of the two authors. I am the mother of two adult sons and I think I've done a fairly good job of raising them. But Gail Parent was one of my favorite authors from her fiction published in the 1970's and 1980's. "Sheila Levine" is still readable forty years after it was written and "The Best Laid Plans" is one of my favorite books.

So, where has Parent been for the past 30 years or so? Raising two sons, it seems, and hanging out with psychologist friends. (Also writing for TV but not writing more novels.) With this advise book, written with her friend, Susan Ende, she has reentered her old readers' lives just at a time when they are facing the dreaded "adult children syndrome" (my term, not hers). Both Parent and Ende dispense advise in the form of answering letters in tandem from parents asking about how to handle problems with both their children and their parents. We're the "sandwich generation", after all. Parent's answers are more practical or social, while Ende's are more psychological. Both authors tend to hit the mark with their responses to the questions posed, while some of the questions/problems presented seem to beg the response, "Are you kidding me, you must be crazy". I applaud Parent and Ende's restrain in responding to those questions/problems.

So, do we members of the "sandwich generation" need Parent and Ende's book? Maybe, sometimes, we 50 and 60 year olds really DON'T know all the answers. Parent and Ende are here to help with their breezy, yet serious advise.
It's a good book that I'm glad I bought. Now, Gail, let's get some more fiction, please. What ever happened to Sheila?

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Is your 40 year old kid still at home? Some entertaining advice, August 31, 2010

By 

William Edwards (Los Angeles) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: How to Raise Your Adult Children: Because Big Kids Have Even Bigger Problems (Hardcover)

Half the people I know spend a big portion of their life dealing with the problems of their adult children. After providing them with a first class education, start up money, a Rolodex full of contacts and recommendations, why do they rush to the rescue every time a kid stumbles a little? Including letting 30-somethings move back home! Guilt I suppose, and a lot of other things covered by this book--after all, the kid didn't ask to be born, he reminds you. The advice is serious and well reasoned. The presentation is easy to take. The book has a light touch and is genuinely funny--kind of a spoonful of sugar makes the medicine go down. Do we have an obligation to let our children grow up, with all the risk and occasional trauma that entails? This book has a lot of answers.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Not Impressed, March 23, 2011

By 

Ann - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: How to Raise Your Adult Children: Because Big Kids Have Even Bigger Problems (Hardcover)

Although there was some good information, I found a lot of the comments offensive. Although Parent was probably to be funny, calling people idiots, etc. and calling their children names is not what I would call appropriate. Also, the book seems to lack diverse perspectives; there was too much focus on wealthy parents.