People use a wide variety of phrases to support and encourage one another. Some of them can lift our spirits and make us feel like we can take on the world. Others, however, can fall short despite the best of intentions because they undermine us and destroy our confidence so thoroughly.
Parents in particular can unintentionally miss the mark when they’re trying to be supportive, because they don’t always realize how their words can be interpreted by their grown children. The phrases listed here are some of the main offenders, so to speak:
1. “Why don’t you just…?”
Some parents offer unsolicited advice to their grown children that they genuinely think is helpful or supportive, but is really quite the opposite. This is especially true when they’re unfamiliar with the complications that their children may be struggling with. Without the right knowledge or experience, you can be “helpful” in ways that end up being hurtful.
For example, my friend’s mother sent her adverts for Ozempic so she could lose some of the weight she’d gained, which was actually water retention caused by the medication she has to take for her Crohn’s disease. She had told her mother this countless times, but that explanation never seemed to get through.
Grown children don’t need to be micromanaged: for the most part, they’re adults who are fully aware of their own needs and can make their own decisions accordingly. In my friend’s case, her mother was assuming she knew more about what her child needed than her child did, rather than acknowledging her health struggles and asking how she could support her.
2. “Maybe you should aim for something more realistic.”
Understandably, parents generally try to spare their children as much pain as possible. As a result, they sometimes try to anticipate situations that could cause their grown children stress or grief, and then encourage them to take an alternative route that will be easier and less potentially painful for them. The route they usually take here is to suggest that their children pursue something more “realistic,” i.e., much easier for them to attain.
In their minds, they want their kids to be happy and successful, with as little stress involved as possible. It’s possible that, in their personal experience, this means pursuing something that can be achieved quickly and easily.
But in reality, using a phrase like this often tells their adult children that they don’t have faith in their abilities. Instead of supporting the goals they’re striving for, their parents are unintentionally telling them that they don’t think they’re capable of very much at all.
3. “That’s more like it!”
A parent whose adult child just succeeded at something may think they’re being encouraging and supportive by using a phrase like this, but in reality, it has the opposite effect. By saying it, the parent is essentially telling their child that they were doing terribly before and only now are they proud of how their child is doing.
Instead of being supportive, it undermines their adult child’s achievement and expresses negative judgment towards their journey thus far.
For a person who has been struggling, particularly due to circumstances beyond their control (e.g., a limited job market, health issues, and so on), the message is clear: their parent was disappointed in them before, and they’re only now meeting their parent’s expectations of them.
4. “I guess you know what you’re doing.”
When a person says this to another, it’s usually said sarcastically. I know I intended it that way when I said it to a former partner of mine who was attempting to hang a 30lb mirror with half-inch finishing nails. In drywall. Even though I had asked him several times whether it wouldn’t, in fact, be better to find one of the studs or use some heavy drywall anchors instead.
Anyway…
Parents who say this to their grown children may intend to show support for their process, even if they’d choose to do things differently than they are, but it certainly doesn’t come across that way. The key is in the words “I guess”, here. Whether it’s conscious or not, it comes across as a passive-aggressive way of saying that they absolutely do not believe that their grown kid knows what they’re doing at all.
5. “What I would do…”
When a person finds a way of doing things that works well for them, they often want to share their techniques or approaches with those they care about. After all, they want those people to be healthy and happy — especially their own children.
Unfortunately, many people forget that their children are not extensions of themselves, even though they share DNA. As such, the things that worked well for them may be anathema to their grown children.
The parents may even feel that their children don’t appreciate the hard-earned life experience they’re trying to share, without realizing that by not paying attention to their children’s unique needs, health concerns, and even their personal preferences, they’re undermining the choices they’re making about their own lives.
6. You have nothing to be worried about!
Many people turn to their parents for guidance and comfort when they face various challenges in their lives. For example, if they receive a challenging health diagnosis that requires more tests.
It can be almost instinctual here to downplay the concern. After all, if they minimize it, the child will feel reassured, right?
Well, yes and no.
Obviously, it’s not great to go into full panic mode, fueling all manner of worst-case scenarios. But equally, if a parent responds to very real concerns by informing their adult child that they have nothing to worry about, that can undermine and invalidate their adult child’s feelings about what they’re going through.
Emotionally invalidating phrases like these dismiss worries as being ridiculous or unfounded instead of acknowledging the gravitas behind them. They are often used when the parent is trying to reassure themselves that there’s nothing serious to be concerned about. After all, that’s their child — the thought of something bad happening to them may be terrifying. But if they’re so fixated upon reassuring themselves that everything is okay, then they aren’t giving their child the support they need to navigate this difficulty.
7. “When I was your age…”
Parents generally want the best for their children. As a result, if they’ve had a happy, successful life, some of them might use themselves and their own lives as examples when encouraging their children to pursue certain life goals.
For instance, a parent who’s worried that their child isn’t meeting certain life milestones may think that they’re being supportive when they say something like “When I was your age, I was married, I owned a house, and I already had two children.”
But saying this fails to take into account numerous differences between what the world was like several decades before and how it is now.
For example, in 1975, the average cost of a 2- or 3-bedroom house in the USA or Canada was around $40,000. Today, it’s over $400,000. The adult child in question — and their partner — might be working two jobs in order to make ends meet, with the rising cost of food and the housing crisis to contend with. As such, the parent’s well-meaning comment risks undermining their struggle while simultaneously implying that they aren’t doing enough.
8. “You’ll always be my baby.”
This is one that many parents think is endearing or loving, but it can be both frustrating and immensely undermining to their grown children, particularly in certain circumstances. Sure, parents will always see their offspring as the youngsters they once were, but it’s vitally important to recognize that they are no longer children.
When a parent says this to their adult child, they’re usually telling them that they’ll love and support them no matter what, because they’ll always be their beloved child. They don’t realize how undermining it can be to some adult children to feel that they’re being viewed as a baby or helpless young child. While it’s not the intention, it risks telling their grown children that they aren’t seen as competent, autonomous adults, and that they’ll always be infantilized in their parents’ eyes.
Final thoughts…
When it comes to the phrases we use with one another, intention is everything. If you’re talking to your adult child and they bristle over something you’ve said, try to open up the dialogue to see where the miscommunication was, rather than summarily dismissing their distress.
It’s highly unlikely that you’re intending to undermine them, but the way they interpret your words may come across as patronizing or unsupportive. Hopefully, you can come to a mutual understanding about which phrases are actually encouraging and which can end up doing more unintentional harm than good.
