My son is 22, and has been going through many issues for the past 14 months (which seems like an eternity to me). He was in the Army, married, financially independent, had a car, but was into drugs. Now he's unemployed, divorced, totally broke, car repossessed, but he is clean. I have been doing everything possible to help him through this, and in the process driving myself nuts. His mother and I are divorced so I'm doing this solo. It has totally consumed me and I have been seeing a counselor for the past 4 months. I never imagined I would be dealing with this as a parent. My son is currently "couch surfing" as I could not have him live with me, since he was content with living off of Dad and I had trust issues.
My son knows I love him and would do anything for him; in fact I probably did too much the last year. On your show, I heard you tell somebody when you were in therapy school, you were told something that has stayed with you forever..."YOU CAN'T CARE MORE THAN THEY DO". When I heard this, lights went off in my head enough for a light show at Disneyland and I realized this was my problem. I am caring about things more than he does. I'm caring about him getting a job, getting a roof over his head, caring he has money. The problem is I care more than he does. This doesn't mean I will quit caring about him, but I need to back off pushing him to take care of the issues I deem are important. Nothing is going to happen until he cares, and right now I'm trying to force him to care as much as I do, which isn't working. Those words just made so much sense to me and really opened my eyes.
Thank you for those 7 words. They should be on every parent’s wall. I am going to tell my son about this so he knows why Dad is suddenly getting off his back. When he cares, then I will be there to support his journey back, but until then, I will remember your words..."You can't care more than they do". Thank you again.
Mike
