Dr. Lindsay Gibson

It's not between a parent and child.

If you try to hang on to that kind of role play with your adult child, you're gonna be moving further away from them than getting close.

Yeah.

So the idea that you have to absorb whatever it is that the elderly parent is putting out.

and that somehow you're a good person if you don't have any personal reaction to that, and you just sort of chalk it up to them being older.

Somehow, you know, that can be seen as the desirable way to do it, but it's not sustainable.

And really what happens when a parent is older is that lots of times if they're, for instance, if they're living with the adult child, for instance,

lots of times they really are not running the show anymore.

And it's important for the adult child to recognize that the roles have shifted.

And now that this is their home, or they're the ones who are shouldering the care of the parent, they have a right to be treated in a respectful way.

And they can start setting limits with the parent or setting boundaries on what they will listen to or what is okay to say or not say.

They can bring interactions to a close.

They can walk away.

They can say, mom, when you say that to me, it hurts my feelings.

Please stop.

And of course, they're not going to get a, oh, I'm so sorry, honey, I didn't know that I was making you feel bad.

They're not gonna get that.

They may get more blowback, but you still, once you feel like you don't have to take that,

It really does something inside to your feeling of efficacy, your feeling of freedom.

You can even work through a lot of old stuff when you're forced into a situation like that with a parent because after a while, it just becomes psychological survival where you begin to