There’s a point in many people’s lives that we deem our parental “cut off” date — an official end to our reliance on our parents and their support. Some say it’s when we blow out the candles on our 18th-birthday cakes, others claim it’s when we walk across the stage at college graduation and some even declare independence when our parent’s medical insurance kicks us off the policy at age 26. For my family, there wasn’t a precise date on our calendars when my bags had to be packed and out on the front porch. Rather, my parents’ progressive withdrawal of themselves as my constant safety net through adolescence left me ready for college without the baggage of parental dependency.
When I began college, I quickly realized that my desire to become independent from my parents wasn’t shared by many other privileged students. As I watched people in the dorm pull out their dad’s credit card to order yet another meal from Uber Eats, saw parents dropping off their kid’s cleaned laundry and listened night after night as people called their moms to edit their essays, it became evident that parental overdependence and wealthy college students often go hand in hand.
Yet, this behavior is not usually the fault of the students, but rather a direct result of “helicopter parents.” These parents represent a growing trend of overly involved parenting styles that extend into every aspect of a child’s life — emotional, financial and educational — and continue into adulthood. Others call this “concierge parenting,” where parents act more like handlers in their children’s lives rather than supportive figures by calling to wake them up every morning and tracking their academic deadline. While this overparenting may seem like a way to help college students cope with the challenges of transitioning into adulthood and managing a higher cost of living, those laundry services and weekly Venmos can undermine students’ ability to grow into fully functioning adults.
With that said, independence does not have to be measured on a fixed scale or tracked on a steady timeline. According to a study conducted by the Pew Research Center, less than half of young adults are entirely financially independent from their parents. Many of these individuals work two or more jobs to fully fund their education, rent and living expenses. Other students, like myself, have the privilege to financially depend on their parents for college tuition and housing, giving us the time and resources to cultivate independence in other areas, like learning to cook, maintaining a house and budgeting our finances.
However, there is also the low extremity on the independence continuum, consisting of students whose parents create barriers between their children and the practicalities of adulthood. While this may seem like a protective shield from the slap in the face that is adulting, overparenting can greatly stunt one of the most important stages in someone’s life. Defined by the National Institute of Health as a critical time to “develop the characteristic qualities necessary for becoming self-sufficient, engage in mature, committed relationships [and] assume more adult roles and responsibilities,” young adulthood sets the foundation for future years and is not a stage of life to skip over for a more convenient college experience.
While helicopter parents are largely responsible for their children’s overdependence, it can be perpetuated by distance and money. Roughly 70% of undergraduates attend college within 50 miles of their homes, and are consequently stunted by the easy access to support when a quick drive home or another visit from their parents can spare them the energy to develop essential life skills. In cases where distance is not the problem, money is often the substitution.
Although there isn’t a guidebook to raising a young adult, there are ways to shift from over-dependency to self-sufficiency. In a world where the cost of living, job market competitiveness and pressure to succeed continue to rise, parents can stand by as an accessible, but not a fully dependable, support system. Allowing young adults to fail and try again — whether it be burning another meal when learning to cook, spending an entire month’s grocery budget in one trip or finally cleaning out the lint trap when doing laundry — helps them foster self-reliance and grow as adults. In doing so, when we walk across the stage at graduation, we can rest assured that we will be ready for our own lives, not ones shaped by our parents.
