Think you're the only ones with an ungrateful control-freak for a kid? Take heart: I have a story for you that perfectly illustrates the "millenial" child and our compulsive need to define and dictate the terms of engagement with our loving parents.
This story is printed with permission of the subject, a young man who is a very dear friend with unimpeachable moral character.
So, friend's mom calls him to say that a friend of theirs is visiting NY,and will be on the Upper West Side, and wanted to know, should she bring anything for the son?
Friend's mom clarifies further: "I know you, and I know you're going to say "no, don't bring anything, I'm fine, I don't need anything" I'm just calling anyway to ask."
Her son: 'Thanks, mom, for knowing me so well, no I do not want you to send anything."
Later that night, mom calls again: "So, L (family friend) will be on the UWS at this time, she has some things to drop off for you, just let her into your building."
Friend is frustrated. Pop quiz: why is friend frustrated at this point?
A) He is a whiny, ungrateful little pisher who doesn't appreciate that his mother is trying to do something nice for him.
B) He had a secret affair with this family friend and doesn't want to have any awkward contact with her
C) He has expressly communicated his wishes to his mother, who initially approached him as a peer with his own valid desires to be respected, only to have those wishes blatantly disregarded according to the attitude that no matter what he says, he's just being stubborn, his mom knows best and he'll appreciate her efforts in the end.
If you answered A, you may be thinking like a parent, understandably. However, the correct answer for discerning the child's reaction is actually C. B is a red herring.
Part II: Friend obligingly lets the friend into the building at the appointed time to receive whatever his mother has sent. What he gets is three huge grocery bags full of delicious, home cooked meals that will provide lunch and dinner for the next three weeks.
Now, objectively, is this a nice thing that the mother has done, going out of her way to buy and prepare all this food? Sure, maybe. Unfortunately, this message backfires and friend is furious.
Quiz: Why is friend furious?
A) He is allergic to everything his mother prepared
B) He is an ungrateful whiny pisher who seems to have no problem eating all the food in the house when he visits but all of a sudden he moves to New York and is too good for his mother's cooking
C) Receiving huge amounts of lovingly prepared yet unsolicited food strikes him as a rebuke of sorts, the assumption being that he cannot feed himself and needs the intervention of his mother, even if he won't admit it.
Hopefully by now you've at least figured out that the longest sentence is the correct one. C is the answer.
Addendum: Friend's mom has unintentionally communicated her belief that this friend isn't eating as well as he could, perhaps only subsisting on carrot sticks and peanut butter. First of all, ha, if only she knew that those foods should be the least of her concerns. Second, and more critically, if that were the case, to the millenial child it is important that that diet be at least result of HIS choice, HIS control, and determined by his own capacity, and appreciated therein by his parents. If he did need some food, he would come home or even request it when an opportunity like this one arose.
Epilogue: Friend is so angry that he does not say thank you when his mother calls to check that he got her meals. He calls mom several days later, mom responds "oh, so NOW you call me." She continues, "I understood on Sunday night that you were upset about the meals, I got that, but the least you could have done was thank me for the MONEY."
Friend: 'What money?"
(There is a card with cash in the bottom of one of the bags that friend nearly threw out. Friend recovered the money and made up with his mom).
The End.
