To ‘Make Sure’

 

Ran across a great ‘zen’ quote while stumbling yesterday:

Let go… or be dragged

Then, it came up in a conversation about ‘making sure’ –with teenagers.

‘Making sure’ is probably the most alluring, and least effective, form of security a parent can seek.

No parent wants to face the reality of the terrors of freeing a child to the world. As possibly-Phyllis Diller said:

having a child is giving your heart permission to walk around by itself for the rest of your life

Parenting is terrifying, and letting go is even more terrifying. It’s hard to do when a two-year-old wants to wear all their favourite clothes at once…

… without thinking about what they’re allowed to do with a computer.

When a 15-year-old struggles for independence and liberty, it’s not easier to let go. It’s particularly not easier than it would have been when the child was three. But that’s water under the bridge and time can’t flow backwards.

But ‘making sure’ has a synonym. That is: ‘making a mess.’

Trying to control the thoughts, feelings, goals and preferences of a child (especially a teenage child) is pretty much guaranteed to get messy. Some kids can withstand a lot of it, without it affecting who they are, or what they choose, very much… but those kids are rare (and it’s inherently disrespectful to them, too… they just don’t mind so much that their parents are.)

For most kids, the lack of faith in them that this ‘making sure’ demonstrates does real damage to their stability. They react in ways that are surprising even to them: they vandalize things, they sneak out at night, they make cavalier choices with their lives and bodies, they check-out of things they once cared about, they disconnect from the people they need…

Yes, trusting that the world is a safe-enough place for our precious teens is hard. Trust anyhow.

Yes, trusting teens out in the world is hard. Trust anyhow.

Yes, trusting that we’ve been ‘good enough’ parents to this point, so our kids will be able to cope (and maybe even thrive) is hard. Trust anyhow.

Yes, letting go is hard. Let go anyhow.

Let go… or be dragged.

Hover Parent

Helicopter Parenting Vs. Free Range Parenting is a false dichotomy...


I have thought about this, quite a lot over the years --not the least because I have fielded criticisms from both ends of the spectrum: that I am overprotective and neglectful. It's really, really funny when they're both from the same person...

The phrase I've always used is benign neglect... but I think I need to work on that a bit. I have felt it wasn't quite right for a long time, but haven't really sorted it out in my own head yet.

I believe very strongly that a great many of the problems we see with kids, young adults and society is a massive lack of appropriate supervision. Not someone guiding the kids' activities or telling them what to do or how to do it (of which there is an overabundance, and all of it lacks respect), but someone actually watching them --their development, their discoveries, their forays into the social landscape. 


99% of what goes wrong in any child-on-child interaction could be prevented by anyone with half a brain watching it escalating, long before it gets out of control. What we usually have is someone studiously ignoring them until they're too annoying, or too violent, to un-ignorable and then meting out punishment which appears to be mainly about having interrupted the grownups.

What I'm suggesting is not the same as helicoptering over what's going on all the time, leading kids to this activity or that, or interfering with their play and discovery, telling them what they're learning or quizzing them endlessly... and it is certainly not stopping them from overreaching themselves, trying hard things, becoming frustrated or otherwise engaging in the wide and messy world. 


It is over-managing so their fragile little selves won't have a bump or a bruise ever that I've always been extremely sarcastic about. I don't need my kids not to have a sad. I don't need my kids to feel they're entertained 100% of their day, and whether they are or not is frankly none of my business. In fact, I think the worst of helicopter parenting is that 'your feelings are my fault' aspect that is, in my view, intrusive into a child's private life in some cases to the point of abuse.

My kids were not out 'on their own' when they were 8, 10, 12 or 14... I was with them. Not necessarily doing what they were doing --but there. And almost always the only adult there. I was writing a book, or reading, or writing stories or chatting with whoever was there including other people's children just like they're people, but I was there. 


We had a lot of parents hovering around the gym/dance studio/sports field until the kids were 8 or 10, then I was alone -- unless there were younger kids in the program. 


My kids didn't have a curfew, ever. They were expected to be home (or picked up) when they were done what they were doing. They were expected to have a reason to be out, including a destination and an activity. 'Hanging out' and 'being home later' was not on the menu. They were dropped off and picked up, very often with their friends in the car...

It's tempting to say, now that they're 19 and 21, that they're 'this way' because of how I handled them... but I suspect they came as themselves and are still themselves. If anything, I'll take credit for their total lack of nervous habits, but otherwise it's all them. However: here we are... they're adults and I do not worry about them. I trust them, know them very well, and believe they can handle absolutely anything that comes their way.

I believe this is because I stood back and watched things develop, instead of driving their lives (or padding the world with bubble wrap) --there to help if they needed it, there to stop things that were getting out of hand, and there to watch them handle things well, very often. 

_______________________________

Photo Used with Permission (Creative Commons, Attribution)  Seven News Helicopter over Perth's Swan  River by Michael _Spencer

Trust Is Hard to Restore

Tragically, perhaps, once a question has escaped a parent's mouth and landed on the floor in front of the child, there is no way to make it not have been asked. 

Restoring trust is harder than it looks. Apologies only make reparations on the damage done in the moment. The break in trust lives on long past the event, and the apology. 

Truly, trust can only be restored by constantly and consistently refraining from repeating the offence. I am reasonably quick on the uptake, and managed to discover this (mostly by falling on my face, but I have found over the years that personal humiliation is an astonishingly effective learning tool) quite a long time ago, but with enough repetition to be absolutely certain what I was really doing...

Someone asked me if I'd asked one of my kids something about The Future with some particular boy. It reminded me that I've learned that there are some questions my sister can ask my kids, their friends can ask them, their grandparents can ask them, even total strangers can ask them... but I can't ask.

In my kids' heads, by virtue of me being The Mom, I can't ask some questions. Because the questions are loaded. 

Because they imply a preference or an opinion that should have nothing to do with how they live their lives. 

Because even if I'm dying of curiosity, it's none of my business until they decide to share. 



The weight of my status as 'mom' imparts extra meaning in questions --even if for me (or whomever) it is merely idle curiosity.

Questions from mom's face just will not be heard neutrally by her kids' ears.

5 Questions A Mom Can't Ask

1. Do you think you have a future with him?
This implies that I want (or don't want) her to be involved with him for a long time. That implication on its own colours the child's view of what she's supposed to think or want.

2. Can you afford that?
This implies two things: a. I have any reason to be in on your finances, and; b. I don't think you should be buying whatever it is you're talking about. A: none of my business, and; B: WOW, so totally none of my business.

3. Is your apartment clean?
Wow, yeah, still none of my business.

4. Have you kissed him?
My sister can (and has) asked questions like this... I can't. I just can't. I can't imply that I think she should have, and I can't imply that I think her judgement is poor. I just can't ask.

5. Do you think that's safe?
Same thing, really --the only reason to ask this kind of question is because I clearly don't think it is. Either I don't trust you to have any rational sense of danger, or I think you're too stupid to know what a sense of danger means. 

Can't ask. 

See what I see: you are wrong

Trust... it's a big word, and a big idea. It's something I found along the way, kind of by accident...

When my kids were really little and still thriving on breastmilk alone, it struck me that there were a few things they knew that I had no way of knowing. 

They knew if they were hungry or full. They knew how much they'd had to eat and how much room they had left. 

Whatever I might be the worldwide expert about, when it came to knowing my children better than anyone else, anywhere, it was perfectly obvious that there were some things they knew more about than me.

They knew how they thought and felt. I had access to what they expressed.

They know how they feel -- I can only take their word for it. Even if I think they're confused, if they're convinced they're angry, not sad, they are experiencing it -- I'm only seeing the effects on their faces, any amount of which may be nothing more than muscular habits, or unrelated relaxation.

They know if they're hungry, uncomfortable, weirded out by someone, traumatized by an image or idea or experience, or not. I don't. Contrary to our whole culture's determination about who knows best about children, I can't know. As the mother I can't know.

I can't determine for them what they're thinking or feeling or experiencing. I can't even tell if they see the colour red the same way I do. As close to them as I have been, as well as I have known them -- arguably better than anyone else in the world ever has or ever will -- I can't experience their experience, and I certainly can't tell them what it is. 

They know themselves better than I can ever know them... always.

From this awareness, I grew trust. 

I could either take their word for it or I could determine that they were wrong. Something about that idea just would not go down. I couldn't look at their faces and tell them that what they were experiencing was not happening. Not with credibility. Because it wasn't happening to me.

To this day, the pervasiveness of 'someone else knows better' astonishes me. This week, one of my bright, young adult daughters told me something like 'that's not what you see.'

From somewhere other than my intentional influence, they have both absorbed the culturally 'normal' reaction: you see what I see or you are wrong.

Sharing

Sharing

I recently wrote a column about sharing, explaining why I’m a social pariah and have never made my kids (or anyone else’s) share anything. After writing it, my mom told me that she was amazed by this position at the time (when they were young and this came up a lot)... and she remembered that they always had ‘special’ things. Sometimes, the entire playroom was ‘special’ and the visitors had to play with my stuff, or outside games, or complete make-believe, because no toys were available.

I have received such a fun collection of responses for this position! It is amazing to me, how thoroughly socialized in this ‘children must share’ idea many people are, as if it strikes at the core of what is right and true in the world.

One woman has the mother-in-law beast from Hades. Mother-in-law has a key to her daughter-in-law’s home, and welcomes herself and her negative diatribes against both her daughter-in-law and the grandchildren, just as often as her little heart desires. The daughter-in-law is ‘powerless’ to do anything about this, because it would be rude to, say, change the locks or bar mother-in-law from entering or ranting.

After I pick my jaw up off the ground, I realize just how different life can be in different families. Not only would my mother-in-law never risk such behaviour, knowing perfectly well she’d be lucky to escape with her life the first time, and would never get away with it twice, even my own parents do not have keys to my home. Although they are welcome anytime, being polite and respectful people, it just never crossed my mind that they had any ‘ownership’ in my house... even though they loaned us money for buying it, and it took many years to pay them back. The bank also has a huge ‘stake’ in my home, and they aren’t welcome to walk in anytime they feel like it and mouth off to their hearts’ content.

I am not required to share my home under any circumstances – because it’s mine. No one around me expects me to – because they acknowledge that it’s mine. I don’t expect to encounter any indication that I am required to share my home. But for that woman, her experience is very, very different. It is clear to me that the ‘ownership’ of her home is not absolute, and it’s up to other people when, how and for how long she’s required to ‘share’ her time and possessions.

it’s up to other people when, how and for how long she’s required to ‘share’ her time and possessions

It is exactly this muddling of ownership that I sought to avoid, in allowing my children to share (or not) as they chose. When they know for certain that the object in question belongs to one or the other of them, neither needs to struggle to stake their claim... and lending the object doesn’t confer ownership in their own minds, so they have no difficulty ‘taking it back’ when they are finished lending it, or in letting the loan stand for years.

Because I’m inclined to go take any issue to the furthest possible extent, in my home this meant that the owner can:

• refuse to lend it ever
• refuse to lend it now, no matter how many times it’s been
  loaned before
• repossess the loaned item at any time with any or no explanation
• give or refuse to give any explanation for lending or not lending, including
  ‘because it’s mine’ (This has made some people extremely uncomfortable,
  particularly other mothers who have really bought the ‘children must learn to
  share’ edict. The fun side of this for me is that I agree – children must learn
  to share. But, that is also the caveat: they must learn to share. That is, they
  need not be forced to share, but must come at it organically and through genuine
  generosity.)

A lot of people don’t trust that this can ‘just happen,’ so they force the issue. In my opinion this actually eradicates the natural generosity children have. It is hard trusting that this will, eventually, be learned: when the child is capable of understanding ownership, sharing and generosity will naturally follow. 

It is especially difficult to believe for people who only share because they think they are obliged to, grudgingly at that, because they know how distasteful sharing is. Other people hold the power, they can keep it as long as they like, treat it any way they want to, and decide whether to ever give it back.

This absence of trust that children will ‘just’ grow up, mature, become generous, share, learn... etc., etc. is the heart of a lot of unnecessary struggles for parents

Parents often know, intellectually, that children will grow up because of the internal need and desire to do so, but they don’t trust it --they don’t trust the knowledge or the child-- so they do things ‘just in case’. Unfortunately, ‘just in case’ is made out of fear, not love, and fear destroys things. Fear doesn’t create or facilitate things, it impedes them. It creates force, which creates resistance and resistance damages the innate need and desire to grow.

Forced sharing destroys innate generosity, and removes the conditions that make it possible to learn to share.