Thank you Travelinglady and disparaissant and others who have commented on this thread.

I appreciate most of the feedback. My son only recently started looking for a job and he is being quite selective in what he is willing to take. He's been diagnosed with ADD and, on top of that, if he doesn't find a job that really interests him he will not do well anyway and get discouraged so I think his approach is the right one for him. He has had some online interviews already.

He also had been in therapy. Once when he was living with me for a summer whilst at university and the other time before he graduated.

My son is adamant that he wants absolutely no advise from me. He says advise from me is triggering for him. So almost every conversation ends up with him telling me to stop giving him advise. He tells me he is unhappy living with my sister because of social isolation... not meeting friends his own age. I have made some suggestions on how to meet people where he is and then he gets angry at me for doing that.

I also get the distinct impression that I only hear from him when he wants something from me, and it seems likely that he doesn't respect me, and that bothers me a lot. I feel that whatever i might do for him will never be good enough for him.

My sister and her husband are providing a stable environment for him with many comforts of life and without all the pathologies that exist in my relationship with my son. I really believe sometimes he simply despises me and agree he would benefit from more therapy. I am in therapy myself and have been seeing the same pdoc for 9 years. I have 45 minute appointments with him each week.

I did help him find both therapists he has seen previously so once he is settled in a job I can look online if he wants and help him find someone suitable.


He is also adamant about blaming me for his problems. I failed in some aspects (not all) of raising him. His dad died when he was 8 and we almost fell apart into complete dysfunction. I was also abused as a child and never learned what it meant to be a good parent. Somehow we held it together and I was able to work and provide for him. I also developed a relationship with a man who lived with us for a number of years while he was growing up. My son didn't accept him for a long time but eventually did and even went to visit him in Germany when he was travelling.

But I have had severe bipolar disorder with a number of hospitalizations starting 10 years ago. Before that I was undiagnosed and untreated but never had a psychotic break. Living with a parent who goes psychotic and who has unstable moods is hard, but he has said to me before that he recognizes that despite all my failures I always wanted the best for him.