How to let your kids do it themselves (and stop helicopter parenting)

According to many studies, parents are becoming involved in their children’s work lives. No, not helping with a paper route or arranging babysitting. Parents are calling the bosses of their kids who are college graduates to discuss work issues. The ‘helicopter parent , hovering near her children, is morphing into a bulldozer, mowing down any obstacle her offspring confronts.

So many parents micro-manage their kids’ lives, “helping” with , friendships, activities, that children cannot face hurdles alone . I know one mother who picks up the phone and calls the children who tease her daughter. If playground squabbles require parental interference, how will this child deal with more adult challenges?

 I grew up with very hands-off parents. I remember in junior high signing up for softball tryouts, and riding my bicycle, alone, to the field.  In high school, I arranged summer programs at colleges. I also filled out college applications on my own, basically just asking my mother for the checks I needed.
My oldest daughter was similarly self-sufficient, researching Yes, we had to drive her to schools, but she lives in the city and doesn’t have a license. But I know parents who actually wrote the essays for their kids.

If we don’t let kids make some decisions on their own, how will they ever take care of themselves A recent trend is college graduates who live with their parents while working entry-level jobs; my husband and I joke with our kids that at 18, they are out the door. But I hope the reality is that they can function without coming home and relying on me to do the laundry and to write a note when they are sick.

I understand the compulsion to keep doing for your child — who wants to watch her kid fail? But doing everything for them isn’t helpful in the long run. A college student I know had to drop out of school. His parents had always reviewed every assignment with him, helped him study for tests, organized his activities. When he got to college, he was unable to work independently. In the long run, it might be better to fail early on and learn from those mistakes, than to go out in the “real world” and fail in ways from which it is more difficult to recover.

 

Once, when I was the editor of Big Apple Parent, I got a call from a woman looking for a job. For her daughter. The daughter was apparently very busy, so she had her mom call. Two suggestions to future job applicants. If you are old enough to get a job, you are old enough to place your own phone calls. 2. If you are too busy to make said phone call, how will a job fit into your action-packed life?

Not only are kids not allowed to fail, they are also absolved of responsibility when something goes awry. At my daughter’s middle school, a parent has to be informed that a child is not doing well in a class before the teacher is “allowed” to give a bad grade. One of my daughter’s friends never did her homework and never studied. The teacher neglected to tell her parents, so the kid was given a passing grade.

 When I’m old and gray(er), I’d like my kids to be able to take care of me, fetching me a nice cold lemonade and bringing me a large print copy of The New York Times If they don’t learn how to take care of themselves, what will happen to me in my dotage?



This is an original post to NYC Moms Blog. Judy hopes that her self-sufficient kids will not insist that she change her own Depends when she is elderly.