The other day I was shopping at Kid-Kid, by myself without any children to keep watch over. I was looking at the books when a little boy walked over to where I was standing. I heard the mom on the other side of the aisle, "Come here Sam...Sam come over here...I need you to stand by me...Sam..." At that moment I saw myself. That is exactly what I say when I shop with my kids. I am constantly telling them to stand next to me. If Emma wanders from my site for two seconds I panic.
Later that day I read an article about a mom who willingly allowed her 9 year-old son to ride the New York subway alone. She then wrote an article about it in the New York Sun. She states that we as parents live in a constant state of fear, "The things we did as kids without thinking twice...have somehow morphed into acts of daring on par with shark hunting in a hamburger suit." The article also states that crimes against kids are down to levels we haven't seen since the early 70's. She says that it's the media that's scared the living daylights out of us. Children are 40 times more likely to die in a car accident. I think of the world I grew up in, wandering the neighborhood, playing with friends, riding bikes, building forts. I worry if Emma goes outside by herself for two minutes. I want to know where she is every second of the day. Sadly, the world has changed in the 20 years since I was a child. I always tell my parents, "I wish I could have grown up in your era." My dad tells awesome stories of when he was younger. I believe I have a few pretty good stories too. However, each parental generation is forced to be more protective than the last. This story made me think that maybe I should ease up a little. I would love to be more trusting and less anxiety ridden. As one parent in the article states, "I'm comfortable being nervous." I guess I am too.
What do you think about this mom allowing her son to ride home alone? Purely crazy or we should all be more trusting?
6 comments:
A little of both. I definitely agree that we make parenting out to be more difficult than it needs to be these days. We're inundated with professional opinions and magazine articles, all telling us what is best for our kids and making us worry that much more about EVERY LITTLE THING. My mom gets frustrated with these things because she fed us all sorts of stuff and did all sorts of things with us that the studies now say NO to (i.e. she put bumper pads in our cribs, let us sleep on our tummies, fed us rice cereal BEFORE 4 months, fed us straight cows milk at like 6 months instead of formula) and we're all fine. Yet there is this expectation these days that we can't feed our kids any junk food or artificial sweeteners and that they have to have so many ounces of this and that every day, yada, yada, yada. Back in the day the kid would eat what he would eat and that was that. I definitely feel like we worry a lot more nowdays because we're thrown all sorts of statistics, studies, and articles and told we need to abide by them. Ok, I got a little off subject there.
That being said, my fear is that if I don't take the proper precautions, something will happen to my child and I will have to live with the anguish/guilt the rest of my life. I think there has to be a happy medium though. Otherwise, our kids might not be physically taken from us, but they may have some mental problems as a result of us placing unrealistic expectations and restraints on them, causing them to lose out on what should be a care-free part of their childhood. I guess we all need to just be practical, optimistic, and cautious at the same time. Easier said than done...
I feel the same way about Dad's era Ash, the things he did that we could never do nowadays...anyway, I definitely think kids should have a little freedom, but I see where you're coming from being overprotective. I've often told myself that when I'm a father I need to learn to lighten up because I've known that I would be too overprotective. I think maybe if we give kids a little space they learn to be a little more independent, which is good. But hey what do I know, I'm just a 19 year old kid who's years from marriage ;)
I think we do need to be more careful now then when we were kids, but maybe not to the extreme that some of us go to. I personally think that (depending on your neighborhood) it should be fine to let your kids play in the backyard alone for awhile, or ride their bikes together around the neighborhood. I don't think we should worry so much about those things. However, letting your child ride on the NY subway alone? I don't think that is safe. I think we just need to be aware of the places that are and aren't safe.
Maybe I am being hypocritical though. I live in a nice, safe neighborhood and still wouldn't let my kids play outside alone. Of course, my kids are still very young. I don't know, I guess there are different circumstances for everything. Something to think about.
I saw this on the today show. I'm just like you. I'm way overprotective. I have to know where my kids are at all times. I'm just really freaked out by the kids that do get kidnapped. I don't think I'll let down. It's who I am. The backyard is differnt, someday I hope to let go more, but not now. It's nice to hear your prospective.
I think as a parent we must do what we feel it takes to keep them safe. I am glad to hear that kidnapping is way down, but personally I would rather my child die in a car accident than be kidnapped and murdered because I wasn't as cautious as possible. On the other side I feel that I am very cautious in the car too for instance car seats and driving carefully. I think each parent has to do what they feel is best for their kid. Each kids is very different as far as what they can handle at a certain age. I can't really say what I would do with my nine year old because I don't know how responsible nine year olds are. I know that I wouldn't dare let my five year old ride her bike around the neighborhood. Granted we live a town house complex.
I don't think that I would ever trust society enough to let my 9 year old go on the subway by themselves. I think that my stress level has gone up since we have moved to a more populated area. We used to be in Grand Forks ND and now we are just outside of D.C. There are more people to worry about around here. I think that people in general are good but it only takes one crazy to ruin things. In Grand Forks I used to work with Hanicapped kids for the school district and I was so surprised at how independent they were. They weren't scared to ride the city bus by themselves, walk to the mall, ride their bike to work, go grocery shopping or anything.Their parents had allowed them to be independent and they proved to be very capable of doing these things. I think that I would be the crazy parent that would always be worrying about them. Especially with their disablilities. I really think that it depends on where you are living or the places you are visiting. We need to let our kids be independent but we also need to be aware of things that are going on around us to protect them when there is something or someone who is suspicious. I think that moms know best and we need to trust our instincts. We need to do what feels right.
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