When are you an adult?
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I have two sons. One of them is 18 and the other is 20. Both of them are "almost" adults. In my province the adult age is 19 so it could be said that I have one son who is an adult while the other is still a child. Then again, if I was to go to my mothers house in Saskatchewan the age of an adult is 18 so both of my sons would be adults. Or, if you look at when we were on a vacation in March we were on a cruise which left from the USA. In Florida they were both adults BUT neither was old enough to drink. Except when they arrived in the Bahamas they were both old enough to drink and both were considered adults.
It's funny how someone can be an adult when they leave home, a child midway through their journey, and an adult again upon arrival at their destination. Of course they were the same age and the same people for the entire trip. The only difference was the laws of the places they were going through. Their adulthood was purely based on someone's view of what the law should state.
What is the right age to be an adult? Should it be 18 like in my mothers province? 19 like our current province? 21 for drinking like in the USA? Personally I'd advocate for 14 as a learner adult and 25 for a full adult--if you can show you have earned the title. But more on that later.
Why is 19 an adult in my province while not in others?
My youngest son really hates the fact that he isn't an adult yet. He wants his own credit card. He wants his own independence. He wants to be free from his parents control. At the same time he wants his lunch ready when he gets home from school. He wants me to wake him up for school every morning. Perhaps there is a reason he isn't considered an adult while he is still 18 and in high school.
Here children start school in the year they will become six years old. School is twelve years. My son's birthday is in January so he was 6 when he started and he is still in school at 18. His brother was born in September. He started school when he was 5 and graduated at 17. Depending on which month you were born determines if you are 17 or 18 when you finish high school.
Why does that matter?
Well, parents are only obligated to look after their children while they are still children. Once their children become adults a parent can quite happily kick their child out of the house and let them fend for themself. Some adults would be horrified at the thought of kicking their child out while they are still in school -- but not all parents are good parents. Not all children are people you would want to have in the house. Some parents just believe that forcing a child to "grow up" by forcing them to leave the home is good for them.
The government took a look at this and decided that no child should be kicked out of their house while they were still in high school. To make sure that parents were legally required to house and feed their children while they were in school they made sure that every school age student would be considered a child. As a result 19 years old for an adult. Honestly, not a terrible idea. Force parents to make sure children can finish their education without the burden of a job, bills, and a rent payment.
But age doesn't mean maturity
But will the children be ready to be adults at the age of 19 years old (or 18, or 21, or whenever?)
When my children were younger there was a question I got asked a lot. That usually started with "When will I be able to....". When can I stay out late. When can I set my own bedtime. When can I stop asking for the car keys. When can I sleep over at a friends house. When can I get a job? My answer was always the same. "When you are ready" or possibly "When you are mature enough". Of course they hated that answer but it was the best one I could give. When they showed me they were capable and responsible then I would feel fine giving them the responsibility they asked for. When they were irresponsible or incapable then I wouldn't allow them to. They may not have listened to me, but I still tried my best to guide them from harm and keep them from dangerous activities until they were ready.
And I can tell you from experience that age doesn't mean ready. Intelligence doesn't mean ready. Only ready means ready.
Age isn't the determining factor
When my oldest son was 18 years old he had a decent paying job and had graduated from high school. He had researched how to live independently. He had many discussions with me about how to act like an adult. How to file taxes. How to pay bills. How to cook his own food. How to budget, get insurance, navigate how act responsibly and so much more. He was still very much learning everything BUT I knew that he would be able to cope even if I didn't help him. In the end he decided to live close to home (in our downstairs suite) for a year as he perfected his adulting skills but by the time he was 19 he was very ready to live on his own and function as an adult.
At 18 years old my younger son is arguably smarter than my older son but he would be far far less capable to functioning as an adult. My younger son is just far more focused on other things: how to get into university, how to get good grades, how to make himself look good for medical school interviews, how to navigate to the career he wants when he is older. Adulting skills like paperwork, government forms, utilities, bills, budgeting, cooking and all the other myriad of daily adult activities are things he cares nothing about and has taken no step to learn. Now, if I was to die or otherwise be unable to navigate him through adulting I'm certain he would learn quickly enough....but it would be a very tough time for him to get "up to speed" and I'm certain he would make some missteps along the way.
There are many "adults" who don't deserve the title
Working in a Pharmacy I see people of all types. I see people who are mentally challenged. I see some with mental illness. I see some who are brilliant and some who are hardworking. I see all ages from babies to the very aged.
I can say that age means nothing when it comes to being an adult. I see parents or even grandparents who are clueless on how to function as an adult. Terrible decisions. Irresponsible behavior. Foolishness in many degrees. Then again, I also see some very young children who are forced to act far older than their age to care for younger children or disabled parents.
How do we choose an adult age or standard?
In the end the government has to set a bar between child and adult. The only "easy" way to do it is by choosing an arbitrary age. I wish that we lived in a society simple enough that village elders could decide when a child was old enough to "be a man" but those days are long gone.
That is why I set a 14 and 25 year old age group though. At 14 children start to demand independence. They are big enough and strong enough to get into some very adult problems. They are smart enough and developed enough to learn adult skills. They are also inexperienced enough to make some very childish mistakes. That's why I would deem them as "learner" adults. They still need protection from predators, they still need guidance from their parents, but at certainly old enough to start behaving themselves...even if they don't want to 😉 By 25 people have developed into the people they will be for life--their personality traits and set and their brain is fully developed. At this age they are as "adult" as they will become.
I still think there would be a test to make sure people can function as adults though
People need a license to drive a car. They need to prove they are capable. Sometimes I wish there was a license to become an adult. Prove they are capable of navigating life in the "real world".
In the end the best I can hope for is that parents take up the mantle of training their children to become responsible adults. And I hope that the majority of parents are responsible enough to take that job seriously. Then again....maybe that's just wishful thinking.
Thanks for reading,
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