Over Sold: In Trying to Protect My Daughter, Have I Made Her Afraid of Everything?

I try to be honest with my daughter about everything and that includes things that come on the news. I try to tell the truth in terms that a kindergarten student can understand, but I am starting to think I am over selling things.

When I see another poor young woman’s destiny lie in the hands of a psychopath who takes advantage of the fact that she is lost, has drunk too much, etc. I warn Park about the dangers of alcohol and drugs and how, although it is certainly not a young woman’s fault, crazy people will target your weakness and take advantage of a situation. Her take a way “Mommy, I don’t want to go to college because someone is going to force me to drink and I don’t want to!”

Every time she sees someone on a TV show who is sick or hurt she goes “Mommy are they dead,” because I’m always telling her about foolish acts that lead to despair. I feel like the father in The Croods, where every story he told ended with “.., and then they died!”

When I counsel her to choose a mate carefully and not tolerate anyone who hits, hurts or abuses her, her take-a-way: “I’m not getting married;” “I hate boys” or the latest “I’m going to marry Daddy.”

I’m proud of the fact that I’ve tailored a life that allows me to work from home and set my own schedule, giving me the freedom to volunteer at her school, take time as I want, schedule my day as I see fit and most importantly, be there when she gets home from school. Her take-a-way: “Daddy works, Mommy I don’t know what you do!"

When I try to convince her to be a big girl by ditching a bath and taking a shower, I show her by bringing her in with me to demonstrate how easy it is. Her take-a-way: She loves to shower, but ONLY WITH ME! So now she showers AND sleeps with me! Larry has her like Gulliver still in her converted crib-to-bed. Although, to his point, she still fits, I’ve tried to bribe her with a big girl bed of her own of which she informed me she will never sleep in unless it is in our bedroom. Who needs a house when we could have apparently gotten a one-bedroom apartment and been fine!

What I am actually attempting to do is to get her to make good decisions, to be wise about her choices and to choose her friends and situations with great care but sometimes I think I am having the opposite affect and will have a kid who never wants to leave the house.

And yet, when we are on vacation or playing with her friends she is fearless. She wants nothing to do with me – only stopping to ask permission to go with her friends, order food, or get back in the pool. I can go an entire day and barely see her! She’ll jump in ten feet of water, go down the gigantic water slide and is apparently so fast and fearless that she was asked to be on the swim team.

This is not the same little girl that comes home to me, that doesn’t want to marry, go to college or take a shower. This is an independent little spirit that runs the world when she is not up under Mommy. I guess there is a reason you kick them out of the nest, so they can make their own, hopefully wise decisions without a parent’s panic. That being said, I will try to think a little more before I speak. I will try to encourage her to fly not only when she is away from me but when she is with me; after all, with her in my shower and my bed, it is starting to feel a little cramped!