As many of you (yes, all 2 people who actually read my blog) know I recently read a book called Free-Range kids by Lenore Skenazy. It is a fabulous book. And I believe it should be required reading for every parent -- even those who have no intention of following it. First, because it is well written. She uses humor and real life to make her point. She makes fun of herself without being mean to herself. And at the end of each chapter she gives some real life suggestions we can try. Actually 3 suggestions -- baby step, brave step, or one giant leap. You can pick which fits you (and your child) best.
It is important to note that the point of free-range kids is not to throw kids in the deep end without know how to swim and hope they don't sink. The point -- over simplified -- is that we must teach them confidence and decision making so that when they are out on their own they are able to do things for themselves. If we hold out kids close, protect them at every move, and prevent them from experiencing life, then when will they learn?
She gives 14 commandments of learning to give your children a little more freedom, experiences, and life.
Commandment 1: Know When to Worry. In other words -- know when a possible danger is a scrape of the knee and when the possible danger is a broken neck. Let them experience the scraped knee and protect them from the broken neck. There is a benefit to children to scrape their knees at times. They learn what works and what doesn't. And they learn to get better.
Commandment 2: Turn Off the News. Really. This is one is hard. It is every where. I gave up NPR a few years ago. I enjoyed NPR but it made me angry at people's stupidity so I gave it up so that I would not be angry every morning. Giving up the actual news was easy. Giving up internet news is near impossible...especially when my friends keep sending me links to stories of horrible things. She also suggests to limit TV viewing of shows that death, abuse, and mayhem. That is hard for me. Her reasoning is simple -- if you see tons of these things your brain is saturated with evil things so you always think of the worse happening to your children. Besides, violent crime has steadily declined since 1993 (at least think that was the year she used). It is safer for our children then it was for us. We just have the dangers put them in our face more now than we did in 1993.
Commandment 3: Avoid Experts. Why? Basically they make us paranoid. You don't need to be an expert to tell you how to raise your child (although sometimes it would be really nice to have the user manual). You need to trust yourself. Do your best. You don't need "What to Expect When You are Expecting."
Commandment 4: Boycott Baby Knee Pads. Oh my! This is my pet peeve. When I was getting ready to bring home Ladybug I got advise from everyone about all the do-dads and gadgets that were "necessary" to raise a child. Monitors, gates, leashes, etc. And I wondered how did we ever make it to adulthood. We didn't have those things...and we lived. I actually once fell out of a moving car and I lived (honestly). However, she did make one exception for the "safety" equipment. Get a good, properly installed car seat. Use it. All the time. But there is no need to buy knee pads for your baby to make it easier for them to learn to crawl.
Commandment 5: Don't Think Like a Lawyer. This one is a little hard for me since all day at work I am suppose to try to think like a lawyer (without being one) and then I have to come home and avoid thinking like a lawyer. Again, this is you can not protect against everything. You don't want your child to be hurt but do you want to take away an experience. You want your child to wear a helmet when he or she goes bike riding but do you want your child to only ride a stationary bike?
Commandment 6: Ignore the Blamers. These people are everywhere in your life. These are the people who are basically saying "it is your fault." In reality these people are really saying that because they won't do whatever it is you just did, there is no way their child will ever be hurt. It is a false sense of security. The reality is you could do everything right and something could still go wrong. This is what we call "life."
Commandment 7: Eat Chocolate. Okay I am taking this one literally. Nobody ever gives me advise to eat chocolate. But this one is really about Halloween -- I think. This is the "don't eat any candy until we get home because you never know if it has been poisoned or a razor inserted in it." The reality is...this is a perceived danger -- not a real one. Do not freak out over fake issues.
Commandment 8: Study History. Look back 50 years. Look back 100 years. What were kids doing at 10. What were kids doing at 15. What were kids doing at 20. Here is a reality -- when our parents were 18, they were starting jobs, buying houses, and having kids. When I was 12 years old I was babysitting. But I know some 12 year olds now that are still being babysat. We do not do our children a service by treating them like babies long after they cease to be babies. How can we expect them to be adults at 18 (which they will legally be whether we like it or not) if we do not give them tools long before they are 18?
Commandment 9: Be Worldy. Look how other countries raise their children. We live in a developed country. We are the land of the free and the home of the brave. Right?? Yet we completely restrict our children and try to protect them against any possible life experience that might possibly maybe hurt our children. Again, let them experience things. And not just let them have run of the neighborhood. Let them help cook dinner. Let them clean their bathroom. Let them go outside and play.
Commandment 10: Get Braver. Yes...you! Let go of some control (let's be real -- you never really had it anyway). Live with the risk of ... life. I have a client who seriously wonders why her son is anxious all the time. He is 11 years old. She kicked her husband out of bed when her son was born because a baby can't sleep alone. And he still doesn't. She will not drive on highways because there are too many cars and anything can happen. The child can not be without a cell phone -- just in case. Her child has anxiety because he absorbs it from her. Be brave. Experience life. And maybe your children will experience it too.
Commandment 11: Relax. Okay this seems a little contradictory to the last one. Stop assuming that every little action has an impact on your child. There was a huge discussion on one of my internet groups about the movie Tangled when it first came out. The moms were in an uproar. A Disney movie had turned a kidnapper into a mother. They had let a kidnapper raise a child. What was that teaching our children? Should we let our children see such a movie with such things in it? You know what my daughter saw? A mean woman locked a girl in a tower. That's it. She did not ask if I kidnapped her. She did not wonder if someone could kidnap her. She did not worry. It was a Disney movie.
Commandment 12: Fail! We so want our children to succeed that we forget to let them fail. We do their homework. We pick their clothes. We give them step by step instructions. They must succeed. We insure it. They will not fail. You know what we do by doing that? We guarantee that they don't know how to learn. And they don't know how to try. They give up if they are not perfect the first time they do something. They don't enjoy the process. Let them try things. And if they are not good --- that is okay.
Commandment 13: Lock them out. Okay not really. But send them out. Children have forgotten how to play. They watch TV. They play Wii or playstation. They have hand held games. What they don't do is play. They don't run around the neighborhood playing cops and robbers. They don't run around their rooms playing ... I don't who they would pretend to be now but when I was growing up we played Charlie's Angels. We saved the world. We climbed trees. We swung from the rafters in the barn. We dug up a bull skull in the back field. We dug forts in the snow banks. Has your child?
Commandment 14: Listen to Your Kids. When you child tells you something listen to it. When your child asks to do the dishes -- let them. Even if it means you will redo them after they go to bed. When your child tells you they want to make their own breakfast -- let them. Even if it means they spill half the milk on the floor. Children don't want to be treated like babies. They want to feel helpful. They want to feel a sense of accomplishment. They want to feel like you trust them. And how will you know if you can trust them if you never give them a chance to prove themselves -- to you or to themselves.
No you do not need to give your 9 year old a map and a subway token and tell him to find his own way home. No you do not need to let her walk walk 1.1 miles to school as a kindergartner. No you do not need to let them go into a public restroom by themselves. Her point is simply this (or at least what I have taken from her book -- which I, again, encourage everyone to read) challenge yourself and your child to experience life. Let go. Live.
I am working on it slowly -- but I am also struggling with the possible attachment issues too.
Mean Mama
