Yo u r C h i l d re n N e e d to Fa l l O u t w i t h
Yo u to L e a ve H o m e
Yo u r k i d s h a v e n e v e r t i d i e d t h e i r r o o m. T h e y ’ v e p l a y e d t h e i r
music long and loud and driven you mad. You and your kids
are about at a breaking point, and you wonder where you
went wrong as a parent of sullen, moody, dressed-in-black
teenagers. Your kids are monosyllabic, depressed (but miracu-
lously cheer up when their friends come round), always
hungry, rude, mercenary, troublesome, and unrelentlessly
embarrassed by you. And you blame yourself. It is all your
fault. You have somehow failed them. Rubbish. This is all
good stuff.
Look, your kids have got to fall out with you to be able to
leave home. If they loved you too much, they couldn’t leave.
Yo u ’ v e n u r t u r e d t h e m , w i p e d t h e i r b o t t o m , d r e s s e d t h e m , f e d
them, doled out money for all of their life. And they don’t
want to feel grateful. They want to leave, drink too much,
have sex, and use grown-up swear words. They don’t want to
be your darling little angel anymore. They want to be irritating
and daring and rude and adult. They want to discover and
explore and get into trouble all by themselves. They need to
break the chains, rip the parental ropes off, and run over the
hill shouting that they are free at last. How on earth can they
do that if they are still in awe of you, still feeling so attached
to you, still loving you so much? They have to break free by
not getting on with you before they can come home again as
something more than just your child.
This process is all natural, and you should welcome it and be
glad to see the back of them. Throw ’em out early, I say, and
then they’ll be back all the sooner. You can’t ruffle their hair
ever again or tuck them in or read them a story, but you will