OK, here’s a kleenex. Go blow your nose and dry your eyes. I can relate because we all have those moments watching our little babies trot off and do something crazy/magnificent without consulting us. We feel like chopped liver.
But here’s the deal: If your child exhibits independent behavior, it is an indication that you have met their physical and emotional needs.
Let me repeat that for those in the back:
YOUR KIDS FEEL FREE AND COMFORTABLE TO EXPLORE THEIR WORLD AND PUSH THE BOUNDARIES BECAUSE THEY KNOW WHERE “HOME BASE” IS.
“Home base” is in your loving arms and when they feel unsure or afraid, they know where their safety net is. They have the very real choice to forge ahead or return and recharge.
Let’s compare this to “unhealthy” independence
In the case of neglect or abuse, (where physical and emotional needs haven’t been met) a child cannot attach because they were never shown how. And they cannot trust. They do EVERYTHING in an independent manner because it has helped them survive.
Let me also be clear: there are outlier cases where a child has come from a completely safe and loving home and still may exhibit an unhealthy independence. This could be for so many MANY reasons. The child may have special needs or any number of psychological and medical challenges that may cause attachment issues.
Parents, you know your kids and you know your family dynamic. Everyone is moving at their own pace and kudos to you for pushing when you need to and pulling back when it’s called for.
You are doing a great job meeting their individual needs right where they are, no matter how big of a “pivot” you need to do… a million times a day. Because that is what we do for our kids.
The Prep Work for Independence (Downloading Information)
So… I’m thinking about that bird mama I talked about earlier who whisked that poop away 24/7. God bless her. I would definitely teach those birds to wipe those bums themselves.
What’s the biggest event in a teenage bird’s life? Why, jumping out of the nest of course! It’s why we refer to parents who graduate all their kids as “empty nesters.”
If I were the mama bird, I would teach them
- Bernoulli’s equation and Newton’s laws and conservation of momentum
- I’d make them do push ups ad nauseam to get positively swole
- I’d probably sneak parachutes on their backs
- Oh, and here, take some worms for the trip down
- Here’s how to hit the ground rolling if things go sideways
My baby birds would hate me. But really- parenting is seeing ten steps ahead because we’ve been there and done that. We can and SHOULD provide them with education/admonishments etc.
But at a certain point, we must let them experience the leap for themselves. Do we ever really know where that line is?
No. We don’t.
There is also no handbook for this parenting thing. Sometimes we screw it up and apologize. We hope our kids jump out of the nest and soar. But sometimes they don’t. We end up in the ER with a kid with two broken legs. No one likes to think about it, but this is life. And for some kids… they will listen to broken legs a lot louder than your voice.
It’s a hard subject to tackle because we are looking dead in the face of our kids getting hurt if we allow them to do “XYZ.” It feels like our heart is walking around outside our body and we want to do everything IN THE WORLD to make sure that precious heart does not get hurt in any way. But if we do that… the heart cannot grow bigger or become more wise or knowledgeable. And these are the things we are working toward building. Because this is ultimately what matters in life.
Be their personal cheering section- and be louder than their fears
“You’ve got this!” “I know this is a big step, but I’m right here if you need me.” “Can I hold your hand and we do it together?” All of these are phrases we’ve said with our tiny people.
We might think once or twice is plenty to get these little guys going, but when fear is great, the encouragement must be 10x greater. There is no one they want validation from more than we, their parents.
Be relentless. Make eye contact. Fist pump them– be silly. Whatever it takes for them to know deep in their soul that we have their back WHATEVER THE OUTCOME. They fail? “We got you.” They succeed? “We got you.”
My boys and I tackled a hard subject this morning and I told them “Listen, when, in the future, you make a poor choice… you come talk to us. You’re tempted to make a poor choice by friends? You come talk to us. There is never a situation where your parents will not be a safe haven for you to come to. We talk first and figure out the rest of it later.”
Will there likely be consequences for poor choices? Definitely. Will we have to craft disciplinary measures to bring them back to center? Also yep. AND we are their biggest allies and cheerleaders. And medics. And administrators of justice. We are all these things and we have the special insight and privilege of knowing our kids better than they know themselves.
What a tremendous joy, blessing and responsibility all rolled into one.
Practice makes… more practice
Learning independence as a child is a dance that both parent and child do together, believe it or not! Each parent-child relationship has a rhythm to it and the parent sets the tone for that speed by calculating the readiness of each child.
You know that lump in your throat you feel when you know it’s time to let go but it’s “scary” for you?
I get that lump all the time. And the irony is… my child is experiencing the same lump. One is getting ready to “do” the action and one is releasing the other to “do” the action.
It’s here where the magic happens.
The relationship. It’s always in the relationship.
There is absolutely nothing wrong for us, as moms to admit to our kids that we’re struggling with the process.
“Honey, I know it’s time for me to help you do this thing or learn this thing and but mommy is struggling because it’s hard for me. I’m afraid you won’t need me. And I know that’s not true because you’ll need me in other ways. So… let’s do this together. Let’s push through our fears together and do this thing!”
Now you have positioned doing “the thing” in light of the beauty of the relationship. It becomes not about doing the thing, it becomes the art of practicing relationship and setting the tone for the way in which mom will humbly lead her child each time they approach “the new thing” together.
The groundwork for character has been laid… the building blocks that make us who we are.
When our kids approach each new situation (hundreds of times a day) of trying something new, we aren’t trying to steer them toward:
- Learning something lightning fast
- Being the best the first time around
- Operating in a bubble without help
Instead, we are planting the reassuring self-talk that sits in the bottom of their souls.
- “God and my parents love me and cheer for me even when I fail.”
- “When I do fail, they are there to comfort me.”
- “My parents’ curiosity makes me curious to try new things.”
- “I know who my safe people are in my village to ask for help.”
This. This, my friends.
Raising “independent children” is not about “Look! My child can do the thing by himself and now I don’t have to do anything!”
The heart of the matter… is always the heart of the matter. We are helping build a process in them that is one they can use for the rest of their lives to approach newness with confidence.
With grace.
With humility.
And with a propensity for running toward adversity.
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An American humorist, writer and author. When boiling down the chicken soup of life, she finds those golden, fried nuggets of truth & writes them long after the kids go to bed.
