Thursday, May 24, 2012

Paranoia

I will be the first to admit I am a bit of a paranoid mother. It's obviously a character trait passed down from my dear mother, who is known to constantly disclose the risks of any given activity (my sister's college roommates had an ongoing joke about everything they did mimicking my mom's "somebody has DIED doing that you know...") I was quite a carefree and reckless adolescent/college student, but now that I'm a mother I worry A LOT about my kids: drowning, suffocating, being electrocuted/kidnapped/murdered, falling off a cliff, getting bit by a rattlesnake, etc. And considering our outdoors lifestyle, there is a certain degree of risk you must accept. I think the word that comes out of my mouth most often when I'm playing with Theo is "CAREFUL!" And I often tell Tim the same thing... be careful, be careful, be careful even when I know he IS. Tim, however, is a lot more laidback. He doesn't worry about our kids falling in the Provo River, or launching themselves off a cliff. He is smart about it, but he lets Theo explore within certain boundaries and doesn't constantly hold his hand and monitor him. I think this will be good in the long-run, if they make it out of childhood unscathed (relatively). I want my children to be free to explore and be "free-range" kids, but I also am still pretty scared about their safety (I think this is a big reason why most kids are kept inside or only get to play at parks outside, there is so much that could happen, and sometimes does). I noticed the other day one of my child-free friends posted something on Facebook about the benefits of letting your children roam and explore and how she would do that when she had kids, and I wanted to say "just you wait! it's hard to let them do that without worrying!" and then I realized I HATED it when experienced mothers told me to "just wait" when I shared how I thought I would one day parent (and you know what, I loved my natural birth, I'm still breastfeeding my toddler, AND we co-sleep very happily, thankyouverymuch).

I also had a realization the other day when I was watching "Finding Nemo" that I needed to relax, a bit. I need to loosen the reins so my kids can experience life without their mother's constant worry. I had another realization when we moved in to my house and saw that all my little brother does is play video games in his room all morning and afternoon (he does work at night, I'll give him some credit). He was allergic to fire ants as a child, so my risk-averse mom didn't let him leave the house most months out of the year. And now he's the biggest couch potato I know.... still a great kid, very helpful and smart, but a royal couch potato. Theodore is a small, kind of wimpy kid who loves computer games and the iPad more than anything, so I think we will have to make a consistent effort to keep him outside and active.




PS: my dad said yesterday when I told him to be careful with the baby: "your mother and I haven't killed a baby yet! chill out!" and then he said "oh wait, I guess that's not entirely true!" (I had a little brother who died as a newborn, though not due to any fault of my parents'...) It was so funny, probably not something to laugh about, but I'm sure Ryan has a sense of humor.

7 comments:

  1. Ethan was a couch potato before the ants. And he won't be playing video games all morning and afternoon once we get there. I am taking him with me everywhere I go.

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  2. I sound like that. I am always telling my kids (3 and 1) to be careful, as well as my husband. However, I am not a "helicopter" parent. I let them do things and watch and give them warnings to be careful. I worry but I know that I have to let them do things and explore because that's the best way they can learn about the world around them and about natural consequences.

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  3. Remember Tim has launched himself from a cliff.

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  5. Glad to know I am not the only one who worries like that. When we go places I feel like I am constantly thinking about the worst possible ways my kids could get hurt or killed. I just have to remember to take lots of deep breaths and relax. Everything is going to be ok.

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  7. haha. I think this post is funny. I think, to some degree, we all start as worry moms. Once we've carried them and bonded with them for 9 months, it's only natural to love them more than life. But, once you've been to the ER 4 times and seen that they do indeed live through stitches and broken arms, and are just fine afterwards, then I think it is easier to worry about things that could actually cause death but not sweat the things that could cause a little hurt and trauma. I wrote a blog post about kidnapping and letting your kids play outside, unsupervised herehttp://whaddyashay.blogspot.com/2010/06/how-safe-are-your-kids.html

    although I should say that last year when I let D play outside, unsupervised, it cost me $1300 in paint repairs to my neighbors car.....

    Ouch.

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