Communication in any relationship is important, but sometimes it can get a little overboard. Set boundaries with your children on how you want them to contact you.

Make it clear whether you want to be contacted by text, email, or phone call. The last thing you need is them interrupting a phone call at your work or an important phone call you are on at home. You don’t want your phone blowing up all day at work. You may also want to set up a separate email account for emails from your kids so they don’t get lost in the shuffle.

You will need to set limits on how often your children can contact you. Let them know how often you would like to hear from them and that blowing up their phone and sending a thousand emails isn’t acceptable. Of course, unless it is a dire emergency. Remind them you have a life too and won’t be there to respond in twenty-four hours like you are customer support at a company.

Require your children to be considerate in their communication. Also, if you have something coming up out of the ordinary, like a business trip or a meeting at work that may take several hours, let your children know. This way, if you take longer to respond, they won’t think something happened to you.

Like with the privacy issue, the communication issue is a two-way street. You need to respect their communication boundaries as well, so have a detailed conversation about this so everyone is on the same page.

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