What fairly normal things do you not let your DC do?

[Mayflyoff]

I won't let my DC have candles, my 14 yo is not impressed. I also don't let them go on fairground rides, though I'm OK with permanent rides at theme parks. Are there things you don't let your DC do, that their friends seem to do?

Wearing a bikini. It's basically underwear isn't it?

"So you could have a 14 year old below the cm rule - is it safe because just they’re over 12, despite being below the height restriction?"

As safe as it would be for a short adult like a little old lady, presumably?

Not even Mario kart? Being able to chuck a red shell at donkey Kong when you've had a bad day is the best.

I was someone who allowed them but then banned them, using parental software. I did so because I saw a personality change from happy and cheerful to angry and frustrated. I banned after initially experimenting with shorter game segments with no luck. The ban however worked and to my great surprise, there was minimal push back. I did that when DS was about 13 and left it was it was until he was an adult.

Yes the Nintendo games are all fine - we love playing switch together

its the blue shell hitting 1st that is controversial in our house

That traffic light one is just a pathway to give your kid OCD. I absolutely despair at this thread, some of it's absolutely unecessary.

I feel pretty laidback compared to a lot of responses on here. I'm not sure outright banning things works - I would rather teach how to navigate things safely, food in moderation etc. I think it's healthy for children to take appropriate risks. Although I will admit hide and seek in an open public place is a no at the moment, it's just one game I hate 😂 fine within a garden/house/ within the railings of a play park for example. Also although we are a way off yet can understand the no motorbike rule, and not sure how I feel about driving with friends when newly passed as of yet! Although I try not to scare them, we talk about things quite openly, for example if there is an accident and flowers on the road, we talk about what might have caused it and how to keep safe etc, I'm hoping that seeing things in real life helps.
My eldest is 10 and we have a trampoline, ears pierced, a very monitored (definitely no social media) smart phone, juice, fizzy in moderation, McDonald's etc.
She got the phone recently in preparation for secondary school in September, I thought it was better to set boundaries, talk about safety, teach how to use from a young age rather than outright ban.

I was never allowed a TV in my room, funnily enough it's been something I have allowed mine. I always felt abit left out when my secondary school friends were chatting about mtv etc but I never got to watch anything as always sat with mum and dad!! Also when I started getting boyfriends 16+ I always went to there house as of course we could chill upstairs watching a film, it wasn't even about sex either, would of happily had the door open etc . More just having that little private space, I think my parents did it so that we wouldn't all be in separate rooms on screens (I totally understand) but in my later teens I felt like it pushed me away more as would go to other houses instead of having people to mine. Again instead of outright ban maybe some rules around it instead, as applies to most things really.

Do you think an adult child would come to their mum for help with crippling social anxiety if the reason for their anxiety is that their mum never let them socialise growing up (no play dates/sleep overs etc.)?

Well, this thread was interesting reading and definitely makes me glad to have left CAMHS world. I've been out of it 5 years now, and friends who still work there say the post covid generation of kids are more anxious and fearful than ever, because of both lockdown and the covid messaging (basically that the world isn't safe and other people are unsafe) on top of highly anxious helicopter and/or snowplough parents.

I can honestly say that hyper-controlling, anxious parenting is neglectful in its own way, because it deprives children of their ability to learn to navigate the world safely for themselves, make decisions, socialise, sort out disagreements, etc. Obviously expectations have to be developmentally appropriate, I'm talking here about how kids learn through play to take turns, negotiate the rules of a game, resolve disagreements in the playground, etc. If all their interactions are restricted and controlled by hovering adults, they never learn to do these things, or to self regulate. No wonder so many of them used to come to university when I taught undergrads having no clue about how to exist as part of a community. They had never really been part of one, and their parents have taught them that their "safety" and comfort matters above all other things - including the safety and comfort of others.

Some of y'all need to read Jonathan Haidt's The Anxious Generation and iGen by Jean Twenge, and start backing off and letting your kids learn to free play (yes, with other kids that aren't their siblings), be bored, experience the odd bit of discomfort, negative emotion or disappointment here and there and let that be normal.

And for goodness sake, teenagers are capable of eating cherry tomatoes and grapes, and pressing buttons on a pedestrian crossing or a lift poses far, far less risk to children than unrestricted use of screens.

And for goodness sake, teenagers are capable of eating cherry tomatoes and grapes, and pressing buttons on a pedestrian crossing or a lift poses far, far less risk to children than unrestricted use of screens.

Quite. It’s mad. There are people who give their kids their own tablets in primary school but won’t let them go on playdates. It all makes me quite angry really. I work in mental health and the level of anxiety in young adults is very sad.

Fucking hell. This thread isn’t funny anymore. Some posts here are just horrifying.

Just watched an interesting TED talk about young high achievers having absolutely NO coping mechanisms because their parents cleared every obstacle and fixed every problem on their path. Kids need to fail. They need to learn to navigate it and from challenge comes growth.

If you’re happy for her to work on an internet-enabled device in a study, I wonder why not in her room? What might happen if she studied in her bedroom that wouldn’t happen in a study?

Sooner or later you have to start trusting a teenager’s own judgement. They need to learn to trust their own judgement too, and how to make good, considered decisions, before they disappear off to university and have to navigate all kinds of scary stuff with very little support.

Btw mine did a lot of past papers using their devices. You would be printing hundreds of pages otherwise.

(I also think that if you are concerned that a 15 year old would be into posting explicit photos of herself, there are more effective ways of addressing that behaviour than banning devices in a particular room.)

On the plus side, we haven't seen 500 posters on this thread saying they dont allow their 15 year old to be at home alone or walk to school. Which has always baffled me on threads about independence.

I can never understand people who swear like troopers then expect their children not to do it - it’s hypocritical. Just don’t swear yourself and they will be led by example. It’s not that hard

I don’t think it was ever funny, the first few I read made me feel sad and then it’s slipped into neurotic.
I lived a super restrictive childhood and have vowed not to do this to my children. We have an open house, friends are allowed back, snacks are allowed, trampoline in the garden, access to tech etc.
The only thing we don’t do is American sweets as they are full of absolute crap.

Agree, shows what little trust they have in the child

No grapes / boiled sweets
Maybe grapes but they have to be cut up - I still cut up DC grapes until they were teens (!)
My brother choked when I was a child and it really affected me (he was ok in the end) as parents were at work (early 80s) and I had to do Heimlich manoeuvre on him

This is such a sad sad thread. The pride of parents making their children's lives lonely and isolated and neglecting to prepare them for adulthood and leaving home.

No playdates/ playing out is the very saddest. I just cannot understand this. It's what childhood is made of. We had and still have an open house. My dc's friends have been welcomed whenever my dc want and they and their friends have some brilliant memories of water fights, baking, putting on shows, performances, dressing up, doing each others 'make up', planting stuff in the garden, riding their bikes, bake sales, playing on skateboards and just mucking about being carefree kids.

I’m going to guess your children are very young @dontcomeatme

It was the diluted juice as a 'treat' that got me not the swearing 😂

I'm kind of hoping they're 16 😂

Actually think every parent should be given Jonathan Haights book and required to read it / listen to it before attempting to parent a child in 2025.

A friend would scoff at me and another family insisting on free imaginative play for our children. Hers were scheduled within an inch of their lives and had no time for such nonsense too many lessons. It would be cruel to compare the outcome of their parenting and ours.

As I have said High School is going to hit some like a ton of bricks

I just don’t get the not letting and holding them back - not teaching them to be able to make their own decisions because isn’t that our job.
to explain to teach - take the cycling on the road. Cycling as I said is illegal on the pavement our job is to give them the correct tools to be able to do it (helmets/proficiency courses etc) and hope they are sensible enough not to be daft

DS desperately wanted to try prime (non caffeine version caffeine for me is just as important to be aware of the risks as alcohol and vaping especially energy drinks) and once it came down to a sensible under £3 price I bought some. Well he hated it tasted all fake and artificial much preferred milk and water

You are quite right. It is hypocritical and I should do better!

She sleeps in her bedroom (see my previous post about sleep hygiene and others' comments about the same) and she gets undressed in her bedroom.

I guess you've never come across posts about 15 year old girls sending nudes to boys. Do you think they've all been away from school the day they were told "the internet is forever, don't send nudes"? I mean charitably speaking, perhaps their parents never talked to them about it but it's drummed in to them at school.

Currently she's 11, no, I don't trust her, she knows she's not allowed to have her devices in her bedroom and yet she has just emerged from a month long ban on her phone after one day and one week which were the consequence of having it in her room. She thinks that hiding it under her bedclothes will prevent us from knowing she's got it in there, and also that shoving all her dirty clothes down the back of her bed will stop us from noticing she hasn't put them in the wash basket. She's a child. Of course we don't trust her.

And I also think that allowing social media for a child is like sending them to play on a motorway. They may have limited traffic skills but it's just not possible to do it without getting hurt. Children are not good judges of what's safe and what isn't. It's our job to keep her safe. And that applies to 15 year olds too.