Today at the park I was observing my children and the different challenges they pose to anyone who is watching them. Eleanor has always been physically adventurous---I remember going to the park when she was two and being constantly afraid that she would fall off the play structure and hurt herself badly. I was continually chasing her and spotting her as she climbed higher and higher on the challenging equipment meant for older kids. She almost never fell, as in, maybe I saved her twice from falling over the years. She had a great sense of where her body was and what she could do, for example, she knew how high she could jump from, and how high was too high.
Taking Eleanor to the park often involved telling other parents, "No, she'll be alright, she can do this..." and hoping I was right. I do occasionally call Michael to ask his opinion about what she's doing---as a confirmed risk averse person, I'm not always the best one to judge. Today I took my eye off her for a moment, and when I looked at her again she was standing on a bar that was about 4 feet off the ground, and about 4 feet long, with tall side supports on either side. She couldn't quite reach from one side to the other, so she would take a sort of step on the bar (meant for hanging upside down by your knees, I think) and sort of jump to the other side. I still don't know if I should have let her do that.
Amanda is adventurous in other ways, and watching her involves a different kind of vigilance. Today at the park she sat down in the sand and played an elaborate game with shovels, a plastic bag, and a number of buckets. I would let my eyes wander, look up, and she'd still be there. Until, of course, the time when she disappeared. I looked up, searched the entire playground, finally found her playing happily, not in danger, and completely oblivious to my concern. She is very independent. Watching her involves fewer heart stopping moments, but still requires attention.
One of the questions I have often thought about regarding Eleanor and risk is whether I should get her to stop climbing so much. When she was younger, especially, other parents gave their opinion that they wouldn't let their kids do what I let Eleanor do. At that point in her life I felt that the options were to try to teach her to climb safely, or to put her in a straight jacket. Trying to contain her would have been bad for both of us. Nowadays, though, I can tell her when she's going too far for my comfort, and she will (generally) listen. This creates problems, however, since I now have to decide how firm to be about telling her to stop doing something. As I was thinking about this today at the park, Eleanor was climbing across a really cool sort of monkey bars, with her feet up and her head down. She'd been doing this for about 20 minutes, but just as it was getting time to leave the park she fell down about 7 feet to a squishy rubber surface, landing on her stomach. She was pretty traumatized by the experience, and while I don't think she seriously hurt herself this time, I know it is just a matter of time before she does.
I guess the point is that I need to find the balance between protecting her and acknowledging the inevitable trip to the emergency room. I just haven't worked out the details of what I should let her do and what I should stop. Hopefully I figure it out before too much longer.
Taking Eleanor to the park often involved telling other parents, "No, she'll be alright, she can do this..." and hoping I was right. I do occasionally call Michael to ask his opinion about what she's doing---as a confirmed risk averse person, I'm not always the best one to judge. Today I took my eye off her for a moment, and when I looked at her again she was standing on a bar that was about 4 feet off the ground, and about 4 feet long, with tall side supports on either side. She couldn't quite reach from one side to the other, so she would take a sort of step on the bar (meant for hanging upside down by your knees, I think) and sort of jump to the other side. I still don't know if I should have let her do that.
Amanda is adventurous in other ways, and watching her involves a different kind of vigilance. Today at the park she sat down in the sand and played an elaborate game with shovels, a plastic bag, and a number of buckets. I would let my eyes wander, look up, and she'd still be there. Until, of course, the time when she disappeared. I looked up, searched the entire playground, finally found her playing happily, not in danger, and completely oblivious to my concern. She is very independent. Watching her involves fewer heart stopping moments, but still requires attention.
One of the questions I have often thought about regarding Eleanor and risk is whether I should get her to stop climbing so much. When she was younger, especially, other parents gave their opinion that they wouldn't let their kids do what I let Eleanor do. At that point in her life I felt that the options were to try to teach her to climb safely, or to put her in a straight jacket. Trying to contain her would have been bad for both of us. Nowadays, though, I can tell her when she's going too far for my comfort, and she will (generally) listen. This creates problems, however, since I now have to decide how firm to be about telling her to stop doing something. As I was thinking about this today at the park, Eleanor was climbing across a really cool sort of monkey bars, with her feet up and her head down. She'd been doing this for about 20 minutes, but just as it was getting time to leave the park she fell down about 7 feet to a squishy rubber surface, landing on her stomach. She was pretty traumatized by the experience, and while I don't think she seriously hurt herself this time, I know it is just a matter of time before she does.
I guess the point is that I need to find the balance between protecting her and acknowledging the inevitable trip to the emergency room. I just haven't worked out the details of what I should let her do and what I should stop. Hopefully I figure it out before too much longer.
Comments
The challenge in parenting is to try to let the child get into non-destructive trouble, and experience non-damaging hurt.
With Eleanor, the most important part might be helping her to remember her most recent rude surprise, currently this week's 7-foot fall. Or more precisely, that it happened when she thought it would not, therefore there was some safety factor that was neglected or was out of her power (yes, we need to learn this and how to tell the difference).
Other children, more fearful, need to learn to take risks by showing them where their fears are and are not realistic regarding risk of injury.
So after Eleanor does something that seems risky, or while she's doing it, debrief her: does she understand the consequences of a slip (for example) and does she understand how to best reduce its likelihood.
"Are you willing to fall from there if something slips?"
is a start, and "Yes, you can control yourself, but how can you make sure this [tree, swing, pole, etc.] will support you?"
And so on.
Eleanor definitely remembers the fall, and when we went back to the park she stayed away from that particular piece of equipment. It is difficult (but worthwhile) to get her to generalize from that experience to other possible experiences. We're still working on it.
I like your first question: Are you willing to fall from there? That changes the tone of the discussion from "I can do anything" to "I can do something to protect myself if I fall".
used with Michael...
And he's still alive and mostly unharmed.
Love,
Dan