I think as parent's we do sacrifice to a point, but it should never be the detriment of your own happiness. I don't live my life to serve my children. Instead I do the best I can to help them grow up to be well rounded free thinking capable adults.
Part of respecting your children as adults is talking to them like an adult. If you feel your child is not communicating with you talk to them about it. After all how can they know if you are feeling a certain way if you never tell them?

I know of some parents that raise kids with the expectation that the kids will support them once they get jobs. This is quite prevalent in asian and southeast asian immigrant families. Parents will guilt trip the kids about everything they have sacrificed and how they kid needs to cut them a portion of their paycheck once they become a Dr or whatever. This leads to tons of resentment on the part of the kids. 

I don't want anything from my biokids other than affection and when I'm very old I want them to care about me enough to make good decisions about my care. It's the same with my parents. They helped me through college because they wanted me to be independent, not because they wanted me to pay them back. All my parents want is a affectionate open relationship.

With my SD I know I'm not going to get anything from her, no affection, no care, no visits in my old age, no relationship. There is no reason to "invest" in her because I will reap no return.

I don't think kids owe parents anything. Parents choose to have children and to give and do for them - and if you are good parents, and lucky, you raise good kids who pay that back when they are adults (not literally, of course).  But no one should sit around "expecting" kids to start giving back to them or feeling they are owed something. You aren't entitled to your kids appreciating what you've done for them. 

The best you can do is tailor your future giving to what you think they deserve as young adults and adolescents, rather than seeing it as a downpayment for the future appreciation you will get. 

(By the way, I had great parents and have helped them out a great deal as they got older. My father is gone but I do see or speak to my mother weekly).

No way in h3ll will I be a stump.

My job as her parent was to prepare her for an independent, productive life. She was a pretty easy kid, until she hit late teens/early 20s. We went through hell, and that's when the financial support stopped. She was acting like an entitled brat and I wasn't going to enable that.

There is a happy ending to that episode in that she came back, sought counseling, got her act together. She struggled mightily. I was part of her support team, but I wasn't about to do any of the hard work for her. Today she's in a PhD program, happily married, and owns a house.

If I had turned myself into a stump for her, there'd be nothing left for me to give others. My DD is a huge part of my life, but she isn't the only part of my life.

In our nuclear and extended family dynamic is does not look like anything because that is not what our family dynamic is.  My brother and I were raised to be self sufficient viable adults. We are very close to mom and dad.  We are both successful professionals who have raised our own kids successfully and who are in 25+ year marriages.

We are caring, living, and supportive towards each other but we also expect and demand that each person step up and support themselves and their own family.   In this way the family "tree" can give, support, and nurture everyone in the family and be nurtured by everyone in the family.

When someone steps out of the bounds of mature and reasonable behavior, tough love steps in and the the tree flogs them into line as required. Figuratively of course.

Everyone in the family is clear on this.  Go to the family for help and support, do not go to the family to legitimize your behavioral bullshit or to facilitate your continued crappy choices.

It is a delicate balance.

To give a "tree" has to be cared for.  I have never understood anyone who appreciates being thrown a bone by a toxic asshole. Family or not.   It is not about parents being recognized or appreciated.   Quality parents do not do what they do for recognition.  Quality parents raise quality children who honor their parents with their choices and performance.  

Sadly, far too many people these days breed children as a source of unconditional love that they do not get from their own shitty parents or idiot choice in partners.  A very sad situation.  On the paternal bio side of her family, my DW's clan is committed to the breeding for unconditional love model. Her first cousin has done it, and other first cousin's semi adult daughters are doing.  Then they troll for worshipers, who are also young out of wedlock unconditional love breeding idiots.  Sadly, these cousins are all replicating the crappy parenting that was used to raise them.  It is truly sad.  There is no "tree" of support, shelter, love or even a vegetable level of intelligence in that group.  It drives me nuts.  It breaks my wife's heart. 

She has a level of fantasy about that part of her family as her BioDad was killed in a car accident before my MIL even knew she was pregnant with my DW.  So there is a void my DW has in her heart and when her cousin's go down the breeding for unconditional love nightmare it crushes my wife.

Tolerance of idiocy, stupid decisions, and demands from entitlement minded morons should not happen IMHO.

That seemingly intelligent people tolerate is mind boggling to me. Regardless of who those who are a toxic drain on others may be.

smh