Doing Life with Your Adult Children: Keep Your Mouth Shut and the Welcome Mat Out
Original price was: $19.99.$11.09Current price is: $11.09.
Are you struggling to connect with your child now that they’ve left the nest? Are you feeling the tension and heartache as your relationship dynamic begins to change? In Doing Life with Your Adult Children, bestselling author and parenting expert Jim Burns provides practical advice and hopeful encouragement for navigating this tough yet rewarding transition.
If you’ve raised a child, you know that parenting doesn’t stop when they turn eighteen. In many ways, your relationship gets even more complicated–your heart and your head are as involved as ever, but you can feel things shifting, whether your child lives under your roof or rarely stays in contact.
Doing Life with Your Adult Children helps you navigate this rich and challenging season of parenting. Speaking from his own personal and professional experience, Burns offers practical answers to the most common questions he’s received over the years, including:
My child’s choices are breaking my heart–where did I go wrong?Is it OK to give advice to my grown child?What’s the difference between enabling and helping?What boundaries should I have if my child moves back home?What do I do when my child doesn’t seem to be maturing into adulthood?How do I relate to my grown child’s significant other?What does it mean to have healthy financial boundaries?How can I support my grown children when I don’t support their values?
Including positive principles on bringing kids back to faith, ideas on how to leave a legacy as a grandparent, and encouragement for every changing season, Doing Life with Your Adult Children is a unique book on your changing role in a calling that never ends.
From the Publisher
If you are anything like me, being the parent of an adult child is probably much more complicated than you ever imagined.
We at HomeWord held seven focus groups with parents of adult children. Our goal was to listen to parents and hear their felt need. I heard many painful stories of adult children who were violating family values and faith, cohabitating, struggling with addictions, divorcing, experiencing gender confusion, suffering financial complications, or failing to launch. These parents were filled with confusion, shock, and other painful emotions.
I have spent the last several years researching this complex topic, listening to parents, and discussing these issues with parents and adult children alike. Cathy and I have lived out the principles in this book with our own family.
My goal has been to write a book that is both hopeful and enlightening, practical and life changing. You’ll have to let me know what you think.
~Jim Burns
IN THIS BOOK YOU’LL FIND PRACTICAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS SUCH AS THESE
Is it OK to give advice to my grown child?
What’s the difference between enabling and helping?
What boundaries should I have if my child moves back home?
How do I relate to my grown child’s significant other?
WHAT OTHERS ARE SAYING
“Relating to adult children can be one of life’s greatest challenges. For all who are looking for practical help, this book is a must read.”
DR. GARY CHAPMAN, author, The Five Love Languages
“Jim Burns provides great solutions at several levels. You will change the way you relate to your adult kids for the better.”
DR. JOHN TOWNSEND, New York Times bestselling co-author of Boundaries; founder, The Townsend Institute of Leadership and Counseling
“If you have adult children (or you are about to), don’t miss out on this timely message. We can’t recommend it enough.”
DRS. LES & LESLIE PARROTT, authors, New York Times bestselling Saving Your Marriage before It Starts
“Jim Burns offers practical wisdom for the parent who wants to journey through this time in a healthy, biblically based way.”
JIM DALY, President, Focus on the Family
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Other Excellent Books by Jim Burns
The perfect companion to Doing Life with Your Adult Children! Jim combines research, interviews with other empty nesters, and his work as a family educator to help you navigate life as an empty nester and find joy in the opportunities before you. The audiobook format. After hearing the words “you have cancer,” Jim Burns set out to articulate the most important principles for a life well lived and now shares them with you as a collection of essential truths for a healthy, balanced, and successful life. Audiobook format. Accompanying graphics, appendix, and discussion questions are available in the audiobook companion PDF download, which will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.
Publisher : Zondervan (March 26, 2019)
Language : English
Paperback : 192 pages
ISBN-10 : 0310353777
ISBN-13 : 978-0310353775
Item Weight : 2.31 pounds
Dimensions : 5.47 x 0.5 x 8.36 inches
13 reviews for Doing Life with Your Adult Children: Keep Your Mouth Shut and the Welcome Mat Out
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Original price was: $19.99.$11.09Current price is: $11.09.
Tiffany –
Love the author’s perspective
After hearing a YouTube excerpt from this author on this topic taken from a presentation he did at a conference, I decided to order the book. My husband and I have two teen boys, one of which is turning 18 in a month. We have been struggling with him and his very independent and somewhat rebellious (to authority) personality, and haven’t been sure how to enter this early adulthood stage with a kid who still has a lot of maturing to do, but will be an adult, still under our roof for awhile, and trying to navigate the messiness that our society is right now. This book has really helped shine some light on what works and what doesn’t. Written from a Biblical standpoint, and by a man who has been there with his own children, I have gained quite a few tips that I have already been employing as I try to parent my almost adult boy into manhood with the easiest and less traumatic transition possible for all. Some of the advice is hard to hear and the exact opposite of what my instinct is to do, but all perspectives and consequences of certain approaches are explained so well that I find myself mentally referencing what I read as my day goes by.
Harold Kooistra –
Outstanding book for a Church Small Group or class
I used this book to lead a small group at my church for 18 parents with adult children and we all thoroughly enjoyed the book. It’s a great treatment of the issues related to parenting our adult children. The questions included at the end are extremely helpful and led to lively discussions.
Camille Block –
I wish I read sooner!
I didn’t know I needed this book until I made all the mistakes as a mother of adult kids. I just read it this year and wish I had started it 10 years ago. It is so practical, non-judgmental and full of wisdom. I would say it would be best to start reading this BEFORE your kids turn 18, not after. And then re-read it again when they are in their early twenties. Well written, easy read but profound advice.
GK –
Excellent IF your adult kids are younger….
This book is written more for the adult children who are entering into “adulthood” – like 19-27 perhaps – NOT those that have already established a family and their own “thing”. Good information – but too late for our kids and us…
Shirley Holland –
Good.
Every parent should read this. If you don’t need it now, you will.
JT –
Perfect for todays understanding of emerging adults
This book is so appropriate for learning about todays emerging adults. Understanding their culture and their beliefs is so eye opening. The Boomer Culture and the Gen Z and Gen X Culture is very different. Until there is an understanding of the difference, it is difficult to relate to your younger adult. Making that transistion from Adult to Adult takes practice, patience, and as Jim says many time “biting your tongue”. Easy to read with all the necessary “hot buttons” to learn.
JW –
Very helpful
This book has a lot of insights and wisdom in dealing with your adult children. It help me put things in perspective, encouraged me that we were doing some things the right way, and gave good solutions and ideas for areas we were struggling. I really appreciate the insights from this author. No one really prepares you for having adult children and this book helped a lot.
Leigh Roberson –
just what I needed
Wow, this book is filled with both skillful and Godly wisdom. It is easy to understand and put into practice the concepts for doing life with adult children. Our family is already doing many of the things mentioned, and it was so good to receive confirmation that we are doing things well. I learned many things I can tweak in my relationships with my daughters and granddaughters. This is a highly valuable resource and I certainly recommend every parent to read this book. Thank you to the author for sharing these tools and wisdom.
S Veinot –
Is a book
Caroline B. –
I never write reviews but this book has touched me so deeply I had to. As a lost conscientious parent as my son is now 18, unable to work out how best to navigate this next stage of parenting life, I found Jim Burns and this book. What a truly magnificent book. I have such a deep sense of relief knowing I have it to hand and I will read it again and again to help me get it right. Our adult children need us to get this Rite of Passage right to allow them to grow and succeed in life and this book gives me everything I need to know and more. I am so grateful for it.
Rick –
This is a great read. I really needed to hear Jim’s message as I was struggling to control my inclination to give unsolicited advice to our three adult children. Already I am seeing the benefits of keeping quiet! I am not a religious person, however I believe in Christian values and I think most people do who are looking for material to improve their relationships. This book serves as a realistic and poignant reminder of how to maintain healthy relationships in your kids as they fledge. Thank you Jim!
Laurie Anne Burnouf –
Some great tips on building a stronger relationship with my adult children!!
sarah07 –
This book is so helpful in navigating the challenges encountered with adult children. It is full of wisdom, practical ideas, and written with compassion, kindness and a great sense of humour. Even if you are not a Christian, this book contains numerous pearls of wisdom and practical suggestions which will help you in your relationships with your adult children. There are so few books available on this important topic, and Jim Burns has written something here that is honest, non-judgemental and hugely positive. It is a real blessing to me and the many friends that I have recommended it to, and it is so helpful to re-read every so often, to remind myself, amongst other things, to “keep my mouth shut and the welcome mat out!”