Stopped parenting my 5 kids when they went to college. It changed our relationship.

A mother of five describes changing her approach once her children entered college by stepping back from closely monitoring grades and daily academic performance. She says the shift felt partly selfish, after years spent tracking homework, tests, and book reports, adding up to 260 report cards over 28 years. While she stopped supervising education closely, she continued paying tuition, buying books and supplies, and sending monthly care packages. She attended the move-in period, then relied on frequent communication during the first months. She recalls her second son calling from a supermarket for Kraft Mac & Cheese and later adjusting plans to ask for help settling in. After her second and third sons graduated, they rented a house with five other young men, and she avoided returning. As they entered work life, she reports they reduced partying, calling themselves young professionals, and later discussed a “quarter-life crisis.”