"My adult son is lazy. Should I kick him out?"

Without reading the letter or what the advice columnist had to say, I'm guessing the answer is yes. Just another case of lazy, failure to launch:

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Moo
My son is nearly 20. He is bright but lazy. All he does is mess around on his computer and chat to online friends. He did well in his GCSEs, despite doing zero work, and started a diploma but dropped out because of depression. He had some time off, restarted the course and dropped out again. He’s done nothing since. I am at my wits’ end. My dad thinks he’s a waste of space and I should kick him out, but that seems harsh. He is polite and will help if I ask, but he has no motivation to do anything.

The moo goes on to say "I worry that if anything happened to me, my son wouldn’t have the skills to cope." Oh...so maybe it's not so much failure to launch as failing to raise a child to be an adult?

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Response
Adult offspring can have trouble “launching” from the family home. This can be down to several things...You mentioned in your longer letter that you stopped working so you could make your son lunch. Why do you feel the need to do this?

What the fuck? She not only makes an able-bodied, intelligent ADULT lunch, she quit her job to enable it? I'm pretty sure I can diagnose the problem: golden penis syndrome.

This "adult" knows he has it really good and doesn't have any motivation to leave. The lives of his friends who are independent pretty much suck, they are likely poor and working crappy jobs or are poor college students. It can be incredibly depressing to work hard and make no money and be poor but he won't have time to dwell on it. TV /internet aren't a help, both tend to normalize very young adults having tons of net disposable income from undetermined sources or something like a blog. Very much not reality for 99% of young adults. With his level of motivation he will definitely be in the 99%.

She should just level with him. “Mommy had you for selfish reasons and has been telling you lies about how bright you are to flatter herself. Truth is, you are average at best and your life is probably going to be terrible, but you need to go live it elsewhere. Here are some books with tips on managing your home and finances because I was thinking that by now you’d be curing cancer and wouldn’t need to know how to read a bank statement or prepare food. Mommy’s sorry.”

She sounds like a real failure as a parent, if only for the fact that she thinks her son may have depression and instead of helping him get medical treatment, she's diagnosing him as lazy. Sure, he might be lazy. She certainly sounds like she raised him to be useless. But if he has an actual illness, blaming him for it is not helping anyone. Stellar moo.

I know a handful of people who match this description, but I fully blame the parents when their adult child winds up a deadbeat or a bum. Junior knows he's got it made in the shade and also knows that Mommy won't boot his ass out because she wuvs him, so what incentive does he have to try? I'm sure he pays nothing toward living costs and he even has Moo to make his lunch for him like when he was five.

He could very easily be depressed too, but the question is whether it's genuine depression or pouty emo teenage "depression." I'm not trying to make light of what is a very serious and crippling disease, but there is a difference between depression and "depression." To be frank, this kid sounds like how I've been my whole life. Hopeless, no confidence in myself, no motivation, don't want to do anything. All I can say is someone doesn't get to be that way all on their own - someone in his life has made him feel hopeless, have no confidence, and feel useless and I'm lookin' at Moo. For all we know, she's a narcissist that's just beaten him down all his life and he's got nothing left to give, especially with the detail about how when she tries to push him, he intentionally does less. I admit I have done that when my own narc maternal unit has pushed me into shit because I hate when she tells me what to do and I want to do stuff on my own terms rather than making her think I'm choosing to listen to her, even if it's something I want to do. Or he could just be a spoiled little prince goldenpenis heir who has a cushy cozy home life and has no real reason to leave.

I wish there were other perspectives involved here, like the kid, the kid's father, the Moo's ex, or the siblings. Going by what Moo has said, the kid could be a lazy useless deadbeat, or he could be genuinely depressed. I can't tell just by what she's written.

It's becoming much more common for adult kids to continue living at home too, so perhaps he doesn't see his lack of a desire to move out as abnormal.

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Cambion
I'm not trying to make light of what is a very serious and crippling disease, but there is a difference between depression and "depression."

You're 100% correct, no question. My comment was meant to highlight the mother's claim-- if she's defending his lazy ass by saying he's depressed, she's a lousy mother because she's letting him be a leech on society. If he's truly depressed, she's a lousy mother because she should be helping him get medical treatment and instead she's complaining he's lazy. She's trying to have it both ways and failing twice, imo.

"My adult son is lazy. Should I kick him out?"

If you have to ask, you already know the answer.

I'll be a bit more moderate voice and say that in this day and age it's a lot harder to strike out on your own at the age of majority simply because of things like wage stagnation and qualification inflation, where you need a 4-year degree for an entry-level position at most places. So Junior not leaving the house by 20 isn't strictly an issue, IMO - the sitting around on his ass gaming all day is. Work and contribute to the household or continue your education Shorty, take your pick.

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"Yes, fellow readers, nothing says 'devoted father of a special needs kid' quite like drinking, snorting cocaine, and then taking the boat out for a spin."
- Tiquer

"So Junior not leaving the house by 20 isn't strictly an issue, IMO - the sitting around on his ass gaming all day is. Work and contribute to the household or continue your education Shorty, take your pick."

This. And this is why I'm suspicious that she's an enabling Moo. If she had raised him with the knowledge that there are no free lunches, she wouldn't have this problem now.

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bell_flower
"So Junior not leaving the house by 20 isn't strictly an issue, IMO - the sitting around on his ass gaming all day is. Work and contribute to the household or continue your education Shorty, take your pick."

This. And this is why I'm suspicious that she's an enabling Moo. If she had raised him with the knowledge that there are no free lunches, she wouldn't have this problem now.

There are free lunches...and mommy quit her job so that she could cook one for him every day. That's why I place the blame squarely on her child-rearing, rather than the economy.

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yurble
mommy quit her job so that she could cook one for him every day.

Yeah, does that seem supremely weird to anyone else? I mean, monumentally stupid, yes, but also...weird.

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kittehpeoples

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yurble
mommy quit her job so that she could cook one for him every day.

Yeah, does that seem supremely weird to anyone else? I mean, monumentally stupid, yes, but also...weird.

In terms of what is normal, yes, it is weird. In terms of some of the things we've read about moos doing...well, things do get a lot weirder.

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yurble

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kittehpeoples

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yurble
mommy quit her job so that she could cook one for him every day.

Yeah, does that seem supremely weird to anyone else? I mean, monumentally stupid, yes, but also...weird.

In terms of what is normal, yes, it is weird. In terms of some of the things we've read about moos doing...well, things do get a lot weirder.

True. It's not as weird as, say, breastfeeding a ten year old boy, but it kinda makes me think along those lines.

It all fits in fine with my amateur psych theory that there is so often an abnormal attachment between single moos and only sons! I have seen it in a couple moos I know--one widowed young and one divorced. All sorts of enabling and unreasonable "living through the kid".

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kittehpeoples

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yurble

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kittehpeoples

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yurble
mommy quit her job so that she could cook one for him every day.

Yeah, does that seem supremely weird to anyone else? I mean, monumentally stupid, yes, but also...weird.

In terms of what is normal, yes, it is weird. In terms of some of the things we've read about moos doing...well, things do get a lot weirder.

True. It's not as weird as, say, breastfeeding a ten year old boy, but it kinda makes me think along those lines.

Yes. Guessing there is a new man in her life and that is why she suddenly cares about Jr. moving out. Maybe she thought at one point Jr. would be the only man in her life so she quit her job to make him lunch. Note both her daughters turned out independent and obviously weren't coddled. While it is highly speculative on my part moos can be textbook predictable.

20 is the new 10, welcome to your self-made nightmare moo.

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happyhiker
She should just level with him. “Mommy had you for selfish reasons and has been telling you lies about how bright you are to flatter herself. Truth is, you are average at best and your life is probably going to be terrible, but you need to go live it elsewhere. Here are some books with tips on managing your home and finances because I was thinking that by now you’d be curing cancer and wouldn’t need to know how to read a bank statement or prepare food. Mommy’s sorry.”

I think it is too late for this looser.

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Passive Aggressive
Master Of Anti-brat
Excuses!