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How I Wish I Could Fix My Grown-Up Kids’ Problems

Parents can’t always help in life’s balloon-popping moments

4 min readJun 17, 2024

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A shelf with a display of children’s toys
Photo credit: Catherine Oceano, author

I bought a lottery ticket. My oldest daughter lost her job some weeks ago. These two facts are not unrelated.

I don’t think I will win a big prize. But you never know. My neighbour won a million a couple of years ago. That amount would help.

My daughter is a single parent to two girls. She lives in one of the more expensive places to live across Canada and she can’t move away because her ex-husband lives there and they share custody. So her options are more limited than they might be.

It’s a frightening world when you get unexpectedly and abruptly tossed aside by your employer and your job is what pays the rent and fuels your life and your kid’s future. It wasn’t “personal”; her entire team was let go. Somewhere down the line I suppose they didn’t think they could afford to pay these folks to do the things they were doing.

Watching your grown-up kids struggle with big problems like this is very hard. It’s what my husband calls a balloon-popping episode. Just like when a toddler has one and it suddenly breaks and they burst into tears. And what if you have no more balloons in the house?

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The Parenting Portal
The Parenting Portal

Published in The Parenting Portal

The home of parenting articles written by parents and about parents.

Catherine Oceano
Catherine Oceano

Written by Catherine Oceano

old but not dead, mother, partner, grandmother, writer, Canadian Become a Medium member and support great writers like me.

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