Fully Grown Children Who Don't Really Care About Their Parents Do 11 Painful Things That Let Them Know
Irina Bg | 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.
Too often, fully grown children grow distant. This is developmentally normal, of course, during adolescence, but sometimes it means these adult kids don't really care about their parents. Reacting with anxiety often only makes it worse. When that happens, a conversation needs to happen quickly to avoid further damage to the relationship, so watch for these things that might happen between adult kids and their parents.
Fully grown children who don't really care about their parents do 11 painful things that let them know
1. Ignoring family traditions
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It's important for adult children to maintain a sense of autonomy and form their own routines. This is something that starts in adolescence, when they tend to do the opposite of what their parents expect and try out new identities.
As they become fully grown adults, they regulate a little more toward the middle, but they are still very much their own people. That's why this is the stage when full grown adult kids who don't really care about their parents start doing subtle-but-painful things that send their parents a clear message: I don't care about you.
When an adult child stops observing family traditions, they send 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.
However, there may be more to it. Sometimes there's a values issue at play in the old tradition, one that doesn't feel right to the child. According to research, one-third of family estrangements come from a mismatch in values. So, while it may feel like the kids don't care about their parents, there's always a possibility it's somethign that can be resolved.
2. They don't reach out or stay in touch
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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. They still crave some connection.
Joshua Coleman, a psychologist and author of the book The Rules of Estrangement, explains that our culture interest in personal development has created a more individualistic society overall.
What people forget is that we are no longer totally interdependent or tied to our biological families for life. Unlike the old days when survival generally meant staying in that family-based society, communication is totally optional.
"Today, nothing ties an adult child to a parent beyond that adult child’s desire to have that relationship," he told the BBC. And many grown kids these days don't reach out or stay in touch because they're just not that motivated.
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, which is why, when fully grown kids don't at least try, it often means they really don't care about their parents.
3. Forgetting to share milestones
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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 to people we love. For many fully grown kids, it's all too easy to forget to share updates. For those who don't really care about their parents, it's likely not an accident.
For the kids, it might not feel like much a loss, but for their parents it can cause serious distress. Dr. Coleman notes that most estrangements feel like they're for the best to the adult kids. But, he reports, "Most parents are made miserable by it."
When adult children let their parents into their lives, it eases their feelings of disconnection. But parents need to remember that their kids aren't obligated to share anything, let alone milestones.
4. Being dismissive during conversations
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Anyone who has raised a teenager knows they're uniquely skilled at being dismissive during conversations. Scrolling on their phones or attending to other tasks when they’re with their parents means they’re not really paying attention, and, to some degree that's normal. Their parents should expect them to be respectful, of course, but it's pretty common at this stage for kids to talk to their parents less (and maybe listen even less!).
If, however, these are fully grown children, then their sending their parents a strong message behaving like this, saying they clearly don't really care about their parents. After all, being only half-present sends the message that what their parents are saying isn’t valuable.
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, and if parents want to take a step that can help bridge that gap, they can start by also trying to be attentive during conversations themselves.
5. Only reaching out when they need something
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While asking for assistance is part of all relationships, especially parent-child relationships, adult children who only touch base with their parents to get their needs met often make their parents feel like their relationship isn’t prioritized on a purely emotional basis. Often, these grown children don't really care about their parents.
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. Acting like visits are a chore
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It’s important for parents to give their kids space to make their own decisions, especially 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.
Sadly, not enough grown children care enough about their parents to truly understand this, or to adapt while their parents are live. Often, this realization only occurs when the parent passes away, and the kid realizes all the ways they were so lucky to have their parents.
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. Most importantly, when times get tough or when times get tough, self-determination allows people to turn inside for solutions rather than toward others.
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. Acting ungrateful
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When adult children don’t express gratitude for their parents, it can make their parents feel unloved and unappreciated. This can be an oversight, or it can be a sign that a fully grown kid really doesn't care about their parent.
The only real way to know why this adult kid isn't expressing any gratitude (or worse, acting totally ungrateful) is to talk to them. There are many things that can seem like a lack of gratitude, like depression. This makes sense when you consider that practicing gratitude can "rewire your brain". Similarly, feeling negative and upset for a long time can rewire it toward misery.
It can also be that the adult kid is grateful but that gratitude isn't coming out in the way a parent wants it to, or can receive it.
For example, maybe the kid is upset about something from the past or something their parent is doing now and that is tainting all the other, positive interactions. The only way to resolve it is to talk it through and for the parent to set aside the need to be "right" and truly hear their kid. If that doesn't work, then it is much clearer whether the child just doesn't care.
8. Ignoring their advice
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Adult children don’t realize that ignoring their parents’ advice can make them feel unloved. While receiving unsolicited advice can feel like a form of criticism to any adult, 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 even the kindest and best-intentioned advice, it can be a sign they don't really care about them.
9. Canceling plans regularly
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Something adult children don’t realize they do that makes their parents feel unloved is repeatedly canceling plans. To the grown kids, it's no big deal, but to their parents, it's a last-minute loss of something they were greatly looking forward to.
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. These grown kids might not know how fulfilling it is for their parents to spend time with them. They also may not realize how lonely it can be to have an empty nest, especially once people retire.
Yes, it can be hard to be this honest and vulnerable, but this type of vulnerability is what actually allows people to know us, love us, and to give us what we need. As research psychologist Dave Smallen, Ph.D., writes, "Vulnerability is essential for cultivating emotional intimacy, useful for resolving interpersonal conflicts and for seeking support in challenging times."
While we don't have to be this open for everyone, and healthy vulnerability is reserved for those who've earned our trust, this should includes adult children! Once they know what their parents need and have been kindly invited into the experience of having plans cancelled, if they keep doing it, then there might be carelessness behind it.
10. Being distant and withdrawing affection
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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. This isn't just speculation, research shows that regular contact, like phone conversations, helps relationships thrive in families.
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.
If an adult child who used to say "I love you" or gave hugs stops doing so, it might mean something is wrong and is definitely worth figuring out.
11. Being endlessly argumentative
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Some families are very competitive and love a good debate. In other families, this type of verbal sparring can come across as aggressive and unkind. Regardless of the type of conversations you're used to, having a fully grown child who seems to be endlessly argumentative is exhausting.
Still, it takes two to tango, as the old saying goes, and parents need to look at how they're participating in this cycle, too. As psychologist Nick Wignall reveals, “If you treat conversations like competitions, you’re bound to lose no matter what.”
“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.
If a parent has made the effort to take accountability for their role in this argumentative cycle with their adult kid, and the kid is continuing to be combative, it can be a sign that their child doesn't want to interact with their parents that much.
That being said, it could also be a sign something isn't right with this adult child and they don't know how to express it better. Anger, especially in men, can be a mask for depression and other emotional health issues. And, when it comes to kids (grown or not!), it's always better to try and help them heal, first.
Alexandra Blogier, MFA, is a staff writer who covers psychology, social issues, relationships, self-help topics, and human interest stories.
