One of my favourite photos of one of my daughters is of her, at 18 months, 5 foot up a ladder with a big grin on her face. She now works in mental health, and is a firm advocate of extreme play. Whereby the parents let the child decide what's too dangerous, because otherwise the child won't know what's safe/what's not when they're finally let loose...and an 18-year old who can't tell for themselves that taking drugs is too dangerous is an overdose waiting to happen.
OK, here goes ... I adopted my kids and they do have problems. One is dyspraxic, one has attachment/anger/social acceptance issues. Dealing with my girl first - she's 16, 17 this year. I speak to her normally, but on a level that she appreciates and understands. But my hubs thinks I let her get away with too much. She always comes in at the time I tell her to but when she does come in, she will expect to be able to make herself some tea - this is sometimes at 10pm or later. As far as hubs is concerned, if she wants tea, she should be in at tea time. As far as I'm concerned, making herself a sandwich/wrap and a cuppa is OK by me so long as she cleans up after herself. That, is one example. I'm not frightened of my daughter, but I'm frightened of what she might do. She went through a period of self harming and there have been two half-hearted suicide attempts. When I say half-hearted, what I mean is, on the first occasion, following an appearance in court where she was asked to be a witness for a friend who confessed to her that she's been groomed and .......... by an adult male, my daughter got money from another friend and bought/drank 2/3 of a bottle of vodka. Night in hospital. The second time, she purposefully walked into the road in front of a police car and told them she "wanted to die". Arguments about her have put me and hubs at the point of filing for divorce until I involved social services. Things are much improved and continue to do so. (although they will never be, perfect) So a lot of what I do is based on my forward thinking. I deal with situations thinking, how will this affect her mood? How will it affect everyone else? Is whatever she's doing/asking, worth the big fight?? whereas hubs is more of a rule person, this is they way you do things and you shall not deviate from the path kinda thing. Laddo, 13 cannot understand why I let daughter do things but not him - he doesn't understand the difference in the four year age gap. He doesn't fully understand common sense and loves to joke around. I know how to deal with him to the extent of ignoring him until his behavior changes, hubs can't do that because he needs laddo to - again - conform to what children 'should' do. Laddo is the happiest person in the word if he asks you for something and you say yes, whether it be a yoghurt or an Xbox. But by the same token, he can be your worst enemy if you say no, regardless of whether it's a yoghurt or an xbox. In a recent text exchange, he asked if his friend could sleep at out house. I said no (because it was a week day) and his reply by text was "Grrr, I h8 you. you ruin my life. i have to spend another week with u" I ignored the text. An hour later, he messaged to say he was on his way home early, and the fight was forgotten. So sometimes, it depends on the children as well as the adults.
Oh jeez, sorry. Moms have it bad. You guys get blamed for everything. Well remember, there's temperament. Genetics do play a big part in who somebody is. But with anxiety you just want to be as aware of it as possible. It sounds ridiculous but simply noticing what you're noticing has a kind of magical power to it. Dan Siegal also talks about "mind sight." Mindfulness is the real deal. If you spend 5 minutes a day sitting with yourself and checking in on your breath, bodily sensations, detaching from and observing your thought stream, it will definitely have payoff for you and your kids. OKAY I'M DONE SORRY
Sounds like my son. At about 7/8 (I think - long time ago!) my wife told him he wasn't allowed to...I forget. My wife went into our bedroom to find a note upon her pillow "I hate you big fat porky mum." My wife was so amused she told a friend, who said "I hope you punished him." No, we didn't punish him. He was upset, he expressed himself, all over now. I'm spending a weekend cycling around Wales with him next month.
Honestly because this question pertains to writing i would say it doesn't much matter. You can research a broad idea of traits related to what would be considered "overprotective" but you can make anything work with your character because well, you made them! from my own outlook though i'm a father of both a boy and girl and id kill someone for my daughter but i would expect my son to put up some sort of defense before i killed his attacker. guess it all depends on how you were raised and what your opinion on parenting is. I would think for the most part mothers protect sons and fathers protect daughters in everyday situations that arent life threatening. once it reaches that point gender goes out the window. just an opinion
Great, all the replies really helped. I am going now deeper into father's background, because I want him to be overprotective. I was thinking something about birth difficulties which would leave the father scarred.
My mom wasn't overprotective of me at all. lol She let me do what I wanted and make my own mistakes. Because she knew that if she tried to restrain me, I would just act out more. So as long as she knew what I was doing, even if it was wrong, she would let me do it. Eventually, I grew out of my rebellious stage and turned out just fine! But my dad... Woooo, my dad. He did not agree with my mom's way of parenting. lol They were divorced, you see. When I was acting out, he would ground me. Granted, he lived a half hour away from anyone I knew, so it's not like I did anything anyway.. But still. lol One time, he got so mad at me for how I was behaving, he sent me to my grandma's house (an hour away from civilization) to help teach bible school for a week. I had no phone, no friends, no life, for a week. I just had to sing Veggie Tales songs and teach preschool children how to glue sticks together. It was really terrible... And didn't help me at all. lol
I wanted to add that it also doesn't have to be recent event s that make a parent over protective- Like something happened to another kid that was on the news that was hurt and the events hit a little to close to home, or the kid being hurt in some way and the parent in compensating. One thing about my parents protectiveness is that my mum forbade me from doing anything remotely dangerous- like walking in sunset because it might be too dark compared to my dad's safety net: 'You can go out at night but if you travel at night CALL ME I don't care I'll come get you.' Also I find a lot of overprotective behavior is from not believing their charge can care for themselves or ignorance.
As an only child, I can't comment form a child point of view but from a mother's point of view, the amount of children makes a difference. My eldest (step daughter) had left home just before my younger two (adopted) moved in, so they are all now 35 (girl), 16 (girl) and 13 (boy). My boy, will always be my baby and no matter his age, I will always be more protective over him than the girls.
