Support for fathers with "difficult" adult children

FOR DADS WITH ADULT CHILDREN

with serious mental illness, substance use disorder and/or chronic unemployment.

 

10 week SUPPORT GROUP STARTS

Thursday October 8th, 7 pm

"Difficult adult child" is not meant to be pejorative, but describes the predicament that parents of adult children with serious mental illness, substance use disorder or chronic unemployment experience. They don't know how much help to give, when to step back, and how to handle their own feelings of frustration and shame.

The groups are facilitated by Judith R. Smith, Phd, LCSW, a psychotherapist, researcher and the author of Difficult: Mothering challenging adult children through conflict and change (2022) and Jeffrey Hoffeld, LP, a psychotherapist in New York City and is on staff at the Spectrum Neuroscience and Treatment Institute.

Jeffrey Hoffeld, the co-facilitator of the group, shared his reflections on a recent group.

"I came to the group with some apprehension about how men with different backgrounds and life experiences would interact with each other.  I wondered if they would  be capable of sharing their stories and worries in a spirit of openness, devoid of competition. I was relieved to find that in remarkably short order they were patiently and caringly listening to each other with no hint of criticism or judgment. I believe that each of them felt seen and heard. Several discovered pathways forward.

It was also remarkable that the fathers in our group closely identified with many of the the experiences and emotional struggles of the mothers in similarly painful circumstances described in the assigned readings from Judy’s groundbreaking book Difficult."

The book and the support groups are based on the data that Smith collected during a multi-year research project with over 50 older women whose adult children were struggling with being self-supporting and self-sufficient. She learned that there were many commonalities in parents' emotional reactions to this difficult situation, regardless of the differences among the adult children's problems.

This is what fathers' reported after the past group.  

 Feeling more hopeful

“I think my health is improving, honestly … in terms of my mental health.  My mood has improved overall … I think I have been able to look at myself in a different way and lightened up on myself.”

“I felt hopeful for both myself and my kids … a little more positive feeling about my situation.”

The pivotal shift: letting go of expecting change

“There is one transformation that I underwent from listening to another dad.  Phil was also spending a lot of money every month to support his son but he wasn't expecting that condition to change. Hearing his attitude of acceptance - influenced me very concretely — pretty much by later that evening.  I let it go… I have ceased worrying. It's freed up a lot of time how in which I was each month worrying 'how will I get him to grow up?'  Now, I'm thinking I don't know that he will.”

Moving beyond my “echo chamber”

“My own situation is a bit of an echo chamber. I talk about it with my wife, I don't talk it through clinically with anybody else… through the group allowed me to get out of the echo chamber — there's, in our case, five other voices… hearing other people's perspectives widens how I see myself and my son— it's helping.”

Camaraderie and validation.

Hal the surprise of feeling that the other fathers "just really wanted to be helpful... a happy surprise that there are five guys that really want to make an effort to really help another human being's life."

Interested in joining?  Questions? Register here for a one-on-one meeting with Judith Smith. https://www.difficultmothering.com/support-groups

 New group for fathers,

begins October 8th, Thursdays at 7 pm.

Schedule a consultation with Dr. Smith and together you will decide if the group is a good fit for you.

 

New group for mothers

begins September 8th, Tuesday.

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