Dear Annie: Children need to learn personal responsibility

The following column was previously published in 2021.

Dear Annie: This letter is a message to “Fed Up,” the reader whose husband dotes on their daughters. She needs to know that her husband, as well-meaning as he is, is NOT doing your daughters any favors. I know this all too well by example. My mother never learned to be independent. From her earliest childhood, my grandparents took care of my mother and father: Paying for their mortgage, bailing them out when they got into monetary trouble because of my father, and so much more.

Grandma continued this practice after my Grandpa passed, until the day she passed away. I was informed by Grandma, who I loved dearly, on my 16th birthday, that she expected me to grow up and fill her shoes. I was expected to take care of my mother, as she knew very well that my mother wasn’t capable of it.

I quietly refused and moved several hundred miles away. Upon Grandma’s passing, I was shocked to learn that she had gone through six figures in money taking care of my mother. My mother did inherit a little money from Grandma, had my father’s pension and her own Social Security and other tiny incomes — enough that, if she were careful, she could have lived comfortably to the end. Instead, she spent it on cruises, trips and other expensive things.

In the end, she passed utterly penniless; her home was foreclosed upon because she ignored the property taxes that Grandma had always paid, and she neglected to have things repaired in the house that needed repairing. When she was evicted, she had no heat and no hot water.

Is this an extreme case? Likely, but it is also what could happen if “Fed Up’s” husband doesn’t make his “little girls” grow up. Show him my letter and ask him this: What will happen to them when you and I are gone? — Saw It Before

Dear Saw It Before: Thank you for your letter. You give some stark examples of what can happen when you give and give without teaching your children personal responsibility.

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“How Can I Forgive My Cheating Partner?” is out now! Annie Lane’s second anthology — featuring favorite columns on marriage, infidelity, communication and reconciliation — is available as a paperback and e-book. Visit Creators Publishing for more information. Send your questions for Annie Lane to [email protected].