>> I feel like a failure here
You have a son who’s thinking independently and finding his way in life. That’s not an indication of failure on your part.
There are at least 100 million people affecting the political juggernaut. So don’t make it a priority within your family.
you’ve been fired from your job but you have to keep good relations with the boss because you have mutual relatives. That’s how you handle it.
Keep the door open on your terms. Short polite neutral subject once-a-month-on-Sunday phone conversations. Set a timer to remind you to keep it short and on a high note. If it strays to politics or religion, end it (something on the stove! gotta go!). Send birthday and Christmas cards. Meet publically in a quiet café where he can feel more adult, and keep with the short, polite conversations - order just coffee so you can leave if you need to avoid a conflict - and leave with a compliment - don’t engage. Invite him to be part of extended family affairs - weddings, recitals, sports, etc. Same as if he were your ex-boss married to your wife’s aunt’s favorite daughter.
It’s his time to fly - and to crash and burn a few times. It’s time for a new chapter in your life, too. Go make it. Your daughter’s waiting.
What a great topic. You are not alone. Really enjoying and taking to heart the well thought out responses.
My advice? Please don’t let differing viewpoints destroy your relationship with your son. Nothing in the world is more important than family.
At his age, it’s perfectly normal for him to reject the previous generation’s values, whether temporarily or permanently. It’s part of growing up.
I have very few friends whose views are the same as mine. But we can respect each others’ views, and find common ground on some of them. The keyword is respect.
Rest assured, you’re not a failure. However, you will fail if you let politics tear your family apart. Let your son know that you respect him even though you don’t agree with him, and tell him that you also expect him to respect you even though he doesn’t agree with you. In this way, he can no longer accuse you of being intolerant, because you’re laying down the ground rules for the relationship: That you all must be tolerant of each other.
Take heart in knowing that he hasn’t really rejected your values, though it may seem so on the surface. After all, he paid you rent, rather than being a freeloader. He’s still Christian. He worked at your small business. Those are important values which he has learned from you, and you can be proud of that.
Don’t talk politics . Not worth losing your kid over.
First, tell him you love him. Second, tell him in a cold, clear manner what he is going to find out there in the real world (write this down for him so that when he wises up he won’t be able to dodge the fact that you were right about how things are in this world and that you always had his best interest at heart even when he was busy being a young indoctrinated fool.) Third, tell him he is welcome back at any time as long as he can maintain a civil manner with you and your husband. And finally, tell him good bye and wish him the best. It’s up to him now.
From my personal experience, young leftists revert back to the right when confronted to the reality of the workplace. So there is hope.
Our son was a straight-A student in high school, four year letter in golf and an Eagle Scout. Conservative, even went to a school trip to DC one year and listened to Rush on the radio. Moved out when he graduated and got hooked on heroin and our life (and his) have never recovered.
We spent years trying to get him straightened out but finally realized we were wasting our time and money. He is still on drugs, been in and out of jail many times, lied and stolen from us, violent towards us, etc., etc., etc. We haven't seen him in 8 years and are happy about it. The drama and stress of dealing with him was much worse than the fact that we had lost a good son to drugs and bad judgements.
Our daughter, on the other hand, was trouble in school and was in and out of juvenile detention for drugs and running away. She eventually graduated from an alternative high school and made some bad mistakes in judgement for a few years, like getting a DUI.
But now she has a good job, has her massage therapist license, never asks for money, talks to her mother everyday on the phone and has gone back to school at night to get her degree. She is a smart, accomplished, well-adjusted young lady now and we couldn't be happier.
So it is inexplicable why some kids turn out okay and others don't. We gave them both love and attention. We were involved in their lives at school, sports and scouting. We went on a lot of family camping trips together. We attended church and Sunday school regularly with them. But one child turned out okay and the other didn't.
And it was not the way it was supposed to be, but it is the way it is. Sometimes you just have to accept the good and the bad and not fret too much about what "you" did wrong. We are at peace with both of our adult children, even though they turned out to be polar opposites in adult life.
You'll need a lot of tears, regrets and prayers to deal with your son's rebellion. Some get over it and others never do. But don't spend too much time blaming yourself as a parent. If you've done right by them as kids, the rest is up to them as adults, not you.
Good luck with your son. Been there done that.
When he was a baby you carried him. When he learned to walk he fell, a lot, but you didn’t keep carrying him every where just because he fell. Walking leads to biking and swimming and he will get hurt as he moves through life.
He has to figure it all out. In the most important way, his faith, he holds on, though life can challenge that too.
Your job was to nurture him and send him into the world, not to clone a version of yourselves. As others have said, give him a chance to fail or find his way and always ask our Lord, Jesus for His strength.
First, he’s not a “Christian”, big or otherwise, if involved in Eastern Orthodoxy. Looking at his actions from that perspective might help you make more sense of the situation. Liberals are anti-Christian and they aren’t controlled by Christ.
I guess I’d start praying for him to have a true come-to-Jesus moment as a good place to start.
Then try tough love and change your mindset to be thankful for the 800-mile distance as a protection from him poisoning the mind of YOUR young teenager. It’s your job to direct her; not his.
He may change his thinking some day. He knows what’s true and right down deep inside. Until then, he’s toxic to the family unit.
My opinion and I may be completely wrong.
If he is going to a Orthodox Church that’s a very good sign. Orthodox Christians are rather conservative.
He’ll come around in a few years
Proverbs 22:6 is absolutely true.
I was fortunate to have had a Great Uncle who was a major influence in my life. Mostly as my father was a career man in the Army, when he was off on duty, I would spend every Saturday at his saddlery shop in Okeana, Ohio.
Whenever he would see me straying or tipping my toe off the path, he would use a tact where he would cite proverbs but in a way that would get me to focus on what was coming up rather than just blurting it out. He started each one with “A wise man once said;”
I distinctly remember this one, as well as others, and they have become driving edits of how I strive to live my life. I have three sons from two failed marriages. Ironically, those failures were my fault in that I did it all wrong by believing the prevailing wisdom of the times. But, I did not lose those defining principles and I raised my sons as best I could with them. Although they were raised by liberal mothers, my values won out in the end. They are all very conservative young men now.
Just stay the coarse and always be there to talk, not preach. The may very well come the day that he needs help and by all means, use your principles to start the help with teachable moments and not “told ya so’s”. Just as others have said here, he needs to hit that wall a few times and when he does, he will begin a process of introspection and the answers he seeks are already there. It will take a little time for him to fully realize it.
He’s grown now. Your job of raising him is over. But you will always be mom and dad.
Put the politics and differences aside. Let someone else be the voice of reason in these areas. If he wants your opinion, let him ask for it respectfully. Be open, but don’t compromise your beliefs.
If there are any things you have done wrong, be honest and candid in admitting this.
Learn from your mistakes when dealing with your daughter or any other family members.
Let your son know you love him and are always there for him. Your love and acceptance must be unconditional. He should know this. And BOTH of you need to verbalize this.
Study the Bible. Learn to articulate your beliefs based on its authority to those who accept it. You may have an opportunity to do so with your son. Let him know you are glad he is seeking God, even if you disagree about many things. Find some common ground there if possible.
Pray. Ask God to bring positive influences into your son’s life. Ask God to keep evil people away from him.
Seek to please God in your own lives. Perhaps God will bring your son back to you in His time.
Satan loves to divide families. Keep him in your heart and in your prayers and at the same time let him find his way. Stay out of the religion choice for now—sometime he may be more receptive but not now.
It’s a narrow path, not letting him learn to take advantage of you but always being there if he needs you. Narrow paths are hard. It seems that you have to watch your step. If you are firm but not too emotional, that helps.
One of our pastors has said “It may not happen in your lifetime, but keep up the prayers and keep singing your little song and God will hear you.”
I ask for the best of results for you and will keep your family in my prayers.
Tell him that it's good for 3 cups of ramen noodles at Walmart.
(subtle evidence that capitalism actually works.)
The old adage, if you love someone let them go is such a truism. Let him experience life without any of your help. Only then can he start to realize the realities. Tell him that you love him, but that he must go experience life for himself to understand who & what you are. Because nobody gave you something other than your parents, and you never disrespected them.
He’s a man. Time for him to start living his own life. And time for you to let him do so.
Trust God. He has a plan for all of us, even your boy.
you did your job now let the bird fly from the nest
Apparently, he doesn’t recognize how much he has caved into the peer pressure, however unwittingly it may have been. He is close to having the mentality of somebody under the influence of a group of cult leaders. I felt it in the late ‘70s and all the way into the mid-’90s, peaking in the early-to-mid ‘80s but never to that extent. Some is a good thing but when it compromises your belief system, you’ll be saying and doing things that will make people who have known you your entire life think that they either don’t know you anymore or never knew you at all. The peer pressure that today’s youngsters may feel (or not) is more insidious than ever.
You did fine. It’s the nature for kids, as all of us, to rebel. Don’t worry about the Eastern Orthodox Church. They’ll make him wear a suit. I know they do down the street.