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How we may unintentionally be hurting our kids ~ SEE BELOW FOR UPCOMING TELECLASSES ON THIS ISSUE ~ EARLY-BIRD DISCOUNTS! SIGN UP TODAY
By Isabelle Zehnder
August 19, 2008
Most parents hear the words “overindulgence” and “hyper-parenting” and think “not me”. Their typical response is, “Let me tell you about Julie down the street …”.
But the fact is most of us have done it at one time or another and to some extent – the problem is it’s happening more today, it’s hurting our kids, and most of us aren’t even aware we’re doing it.
We as parents all want the same thing – to raise happy, healthy, well-adjusted, self-sufficient kids. But could our parenting style be sabotaging our efforts? Could overindulgence – giving our kids too much of anything, doing too much for them – and hyper-parenting – managing and scheduling every aspect of our kid’s lives – be hurting them? Could we be hindering our child’s development, setting them up to feel smothered, inadequate, and even unloved? Is it possible that our parenting style is preventing our kids from achieving their full potential?
Experts have been saying “yes” since the 60’s, and they’re still saying it. Studies show that emotional development can come to a stop in overindulged kids and that overindulgence and hyper-parenting are related to dysfunctional behaviors in children, teens, and later into adulthood. Books continue to hit the shelves with warnings to parents – slow down, trust your instincts, stop overindulging, pressuring, and micromanaging your kid’s lives. Stop being a “helicopter” parent.
It’s time we listen.
Today the experts warn that the stakes are getting higher. Overindulgence and hyper-parenting could be part of the problem with today’s troubled teens. This article was written in an effort to help parents better understand how pervasive the problem is and how it can sneak into our lives without us even knowing it (click here for a checklist of symptoms).
Pick up either of these recently published books: Price of Privilege: How Parental Pressure and Material Advantage are Creating a Generation of Disconnected and Unhappy Kids by Madeline Levine, Ph.D.; or Under Pressure: Rescuing Our Children from the Culture of Hyper-Parenting by Carl Honoré, and you’ll see that the problems of overindulgence and hyper-parenting brought to light back in the 60’s are still very much with us today and have become more prevalent, more pervasive, and more destructive to children, teens, and later when they become adults.
We as parents love our kids and have every good intention. But has our love for our kids, our drive to shelter and protect them, our longing for the “perfect” child, our desire to create the next “Baby Einstein”, our determination to not repeat what our parents did to us, somehow tainted our ability to see what our kids really need and want from us?
How is overindulgence and hyper-parenting showing up in today’s kids? Younger kids are often unable to get along with their peers and don’t know how to share. Tweens often can’t think for themselves and can feel empty, alone, and unsatisfied. The video game they got last week is in the middle of the back lawn, their new iPod isn’t good enough because Meagan just got a better one. They just have to have the new iPhone or they’ll just die! And, they’re only 9 or 10 years old!
It doesn’t stop there, it only gets worse. The suicide rate among teens has skyrocketed, teens cutting their own flesh has become commonplace, single and blended families are the norm, the number of kids being sent to boot camps and residential programs is stifling. Depression, feelings of sadness and loneliness are common among today’s teens.
According to Madeline Levine, Price of Privilege, her teen clients complain bitterly of being too pressured, misunderstood, anxious, angry, sad, and empty. These kids come from very affluent families and are given an abundance of material things. Yet one unhappy 15-year old used a razor to incise the word EMPTY on her left forearm. She said, “I tried to imagine how intensely unhappy my young patient must have felt to cut her distress into her flesh.”
Stories like these are not uncommon. Two states away, and in another affluent area, my 18-year old client described his feelings of sadness, loneliness, anger, and depression. He had held up in his room for five years since he was 13, not going to school. The spiral began the day his father abruptly walked out of their home and continued as his parents fought the hard fight in an ugly and very bitter divorce. His step-father was cold and unfeeling, showering his own two kids with possessions and his time. He felt no one cared but nothing could be further from the truth. His mother cared very deeply and tried in her own way to make things better for him. She bought him anything he wanted and needed feeling that it somehow made up for the time she spent trying to keep her new husband happy, trying to turn his focus away from her son. Trying to keep the peace and avoid another divorce. I asked if he felt a wall had built up around him, the wall getting thicker and thicker, and he said, “You just described my life!” I then asked if there was a door for his escape he said, “Not any more.” When asked how he would feel if I were able to help him find the door and the key to escape those walls he’d been locked behind for the past five years he got up and hugged me saying, “this is the first time I’ve felt there was any hope for me.”
One of Levine’s 14-year old clients was cut from his high school varsity team. He was afraid to go home, anticipating his father’s disappointment and criticism. He believed he had nothing left to live for. It’s tempting, she said, to brush this off as part of adolescence, but that would be a mistake. Adolescent suicide has quadrupled since 1950.
And a 15-year old girl, in her desperate cry for help, called her high school counselor after she had taken a bottle of pills. Because of her counselor’s care and gentle words she revealed where she was – hidden away behind a store in an old VW bug. The paramedics arrived just in time. She nearly lost her life and will suffer permanent physical and psychological damage as a result of her suicide attempt.
These scenarios are not isolated instances. They are happening every day across this country. We must ask the question: What is it that is making kids feel so empty in this land of plenty? Madeline Levine said she was forced to consider that some aspect of affluence and parental involvement might be contributing to the unhappiness and fragility of her privileged patients.
I believe we as parents all need to take a look at how we are parenting our kids and if hyper-parenting or overindulging our kids is sabotaging our parenting efforts. We should all be concerned because as we’ve read - today’s teens are among the most depressed, sad, and troubled than any other time in history. My goal is not to make parents feel guilty. This is not about blame.
It is about identifying a problem and seeing if it might be negatively affecting our own kids and families, and if so, what we can do to stop it. It’s not about taking things away from our kids and overreacting out of fear. That’s why so many kids have found themselves locked away in residential programs. It’s about learning what works for our own individual families. It’s about preventing the problem in the first place or learning how to stop it – which is where parent and teen coaching can help.
Many parents have somehow lost confidence in their own parenting abilities. Many are so absorbed in their own kid’s lives that they forget about their own. Parents can become bitter because, after all, they’ve put their own lives on hold. We don’t need to put our lives on hold because we have children. We don’t need perfect kids.
We need to strike a balance.
So what do kids need? I think Carl Honoré said it best: “Children need to feel safe and loved; they need our time and attention, with no conditions attached; they need boundaries and limits; they need space to take risks and make mistakes; they need to spend time outdoors; they need to be ranked and measured less; they need healthy food; they need to aspire to something bigger than owning the next brand-name gizmo; they need room to be themselves. Because every child and every parent is different, every family must find the formula that works best for them.”
I’m the mother of two grown boys now in their 20’s and I have to reflect and ask myself if I was guilty of overindulging my kids or hyper-parenting them in any way and if so how I can now help them to be the best they can be. Because after all, I’m like you, I want only the best for them!
Isabelle Zehnder
Certified Family Coach
Specializing in Family and Teen Issues
www.positivefamilysolutions.com
This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
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