to believe that you can never make your children "too happy" ?

[gwendolinefairfax]

In a nutshell, not having had the most idyllic childhood I have tried to give my kids a stable home with love,encouragement and lots of laughs.

According to my brother (who has no children of his own and never had a long lasting relationship) I am not preparing them for the hard times ahead in adulthood as my home is "too happy" and not a good reflection of what life is (which is miserable in his case) I have thought about this a long time. Could he be right ?

I think you can kill them with kindness as it were. My ds has been too spoiled I think. Not with material things more the amount of time and attention and as soon as I started to expect more he freaked out and couldn't 'get' it at all. They do need to see some realities

happiness and being nice/kind are special qualities these days.

tell you brother to stick his miserable head up his arse and sniff his own intestines!

they will be confident and secure in adulthood and good at nurturing when their time comes if and when they have kids

IslaValargeone: This is OT but I don't understand your posts. Why did your HE come to an end (because someone said that you were cossetting the DC too much or because someone said they should be helped to grow in their own time)?

Do you mean waiting on them hand and foot and spending lots of money on them? Some people equate this with happiness. I don't.

If you mean laughter, fun, family time, a solid peaceful foundation, politeness, a strong grip on fairness, warmth, support and encouragment - then you are preparing them to deal with lifes hard knocks. They will be very centred in themselves and when things go wrong they will have positive mental coping stratagies. Throught childhood they will have to cope with various smaller challenges anyway - playground polatics and loosing a pet etc. You always tell them about lives bigger difficulties without giving them a shit life.

Someone said we were cossetting dc too much.
We had only been doing it for a year, and had planned to reschool eventually, but dh set the wheels in motion after the cossetting comment.
It had unfortunately been the 3rd bit of 'advice' in as many weeks and I think it gave him the wobbles.

Spoiling with kindness? I think waiting hand and foot on kids isn't kindness. Mine do chores, cook etc and have lots of fun whilst doing them (mostly). Essential life skills.

I had a turbulent-ish upbringing.

My kids are shown tons more affection and giving tons more quality time than I was.

But I have begun to think are they being challenged/tested enough? Do I shower them with too much love and affection and praise?

I am very happy now in my life and have a family I love and a successful career I hugely enjoy...but that's partly through wanting to prove myself and by kicking against my upbringing.

Things kids can never have too much of:
*your time
*hugs and kisses
*knowing and feeling safe and loved, with a lot of reassurance on this
*encouragement to be who they want to be, to do what they can acheive

All of the above are free. All surely will result in happy children. This is not to say that they are mutually exclusive with chores, responsibility and manners. Lack of these three things could lead to children not realising what 'real life' is like, and may result in their being a little spoilt.

You cannot underestimate the power of saying No and meaning it from time to time

I think children can have too much of your time if it comes at the cost of other important relationships in your life . When my son was born he was a pfb and my life revolved around him and dh barely figured. We drifted apart as a result and had to work quite hard to get our relationship back on track. Sometimes children come second, that is how life is.

We should all strive to provide our DC with a happy and stable home life.

However, it is a huge mistake to think that this means avoiding all unpleasantness and disappointment for our DC. With the backdrop of loving parnets, DC must learn to fail, to come last, to be bored, to work hard.

DC should also be made aware that their parents' relationship is important and requires time and attention.

Likeanadvent, time is not free (the whole do paid work or not debate).

I worry about all thissometimes, given all the v scary stuff happening in the world sometimes think that rather than traditional education we might be serving the DCs better by teaching them survival skills! And that if we bring them up in a bubble they might struggle if that bubble bursts.

But sunshine's argument has made me feel a little better!

I agree wordfactory. I think it's important to support children, make them feel secure and loved, but at the same time I think it's fine for them to experience disappointment, disapproval, boredom, rejection (by friends, not family) and to understand that yes, bad things happen, but life goes on.

I had quite a tough childhood in some ways, my parents gave me zero emotional support, and while it definitely wasn't a good thing, it did have some positives. I am very independent (perhaps too independent) to the point where, when people asked me who I cope with DS when I have no family support apart from DH I honestly couldn't understand what they meant. I just don't expect anyone to help me, which means in tough times I just cope. I don't look to others to pick up after me and any help I do receive I'm extremely grateful for. Sometimes I think my approach is all wrong though - perhaps I try to do too much by myself? Hard to say.

I think my approach with DS will be to let him know that life can be difficult and unfair at times but that almost every hardship in life passes and you can move on to better things. I don't protect him from disappointment, even at 13 months - if he wants to open the cupboard and take out all the stuff, I just won't let him. He cries, and I'm sympathetic, but he'll get over it. What I want for him is not to crumble when life is not all it's cracked up to be. I want him to be able to take disappointment on the chin and still walk on smiling when things are going wrong. At the same time, I want him to be able to truly enjoy the good times and to be a kind and generous person. Not much to wish for, eh?

I am very much against protecting children from things like death and failure. These are facts of life and if you come up against them as normal things then they lose their power to frighten you. In Irish culture it's normal for small children to see and touch the dead bodies of their relatives, something that I think makes death seem like a normal part of life rather than a scary unknown. Equally I always think it's a bit mad when parents won't tell their curious children the facts of life - what exactly are you protecting them from?

You cannot make children (anyone) be happy. Happiness comes from within. All you can do is provide your children with the tools and skills to do/be the best they can. Once they are satisfied that they are doing/being the best they possibly can, then they will know happiness.

OP, your brother is talking nonsense, and I think you know it. Life can be very tough, and you can't protect your children from it, but the thing you can do for them is give them a stable environment, love and support when they're forming their sense of self, so that they'll feel strong enough to deal with hardships when they happen when you can no longer kiss things better.

My parents did what I honestly believe was their best for me, but their own upbringings were so emotionally and financially deprived it's not surprising they didn't do much of a good job on us - they both felt their children were lucky to get the absolute minimum in terms of attention, education, praise etc. I'm expecting our first baby in little more than a month, and the one thing I am absolutely determined is that he will know his parents love him, while we also love one another.

Your brother seems to think that it is 'this' or 'that'.

You can do both. You can give love and security AND prepare them for real life. You can talk with them about some tough realities while you hold them and you answer their questions. We don't hide things here, they watch the news, they hear family war stories, they have been to funerals. But -i think- they get plenty of love and security and things are explained to them.

Also, what LeQueen and others said about chores.

I can understand what your brother is trying to say.
My childhood was not perfect (single mother etc). I always had to work at everything as things were not handed to me on a plate.I am now relatively
successful and my children have a good life; nice home , clothes extacurricular
activities, lots of love. However, i do worry that they will be ill equipped for real life and wiil be unable to cope with failure . I kind of feel that i have to toughen them up in order for them to be able to cope with life.

I think it is very nice to have happy kids - but prepare them for life too.... they need to know that failure happens - in fact being supported through the act of failing at something is the BEST thing a parent can offer their child... I was made so frightened of failure that I almost had a nervous breakdown preparing for my driving test.

Make them aware that they have responsibilities too... life is not just about sitting there and lapping it up, but about giving/doing/striving. Stretch them - mentally and physically - if they are never asked for more, they may be tempted to always follow the easy path - which, though satisfying in the short term, can lead to a life less lived

Getting too philosophical now, so going to go indulge in some wine!

"He was infering that they'd all turn out to be inadequate in life because we are always so nice to each other and nice is weak, basically."
I would mostly disagree with this. My DH was raised in just such a family, all of them (DH and his siblings) are nice, none of them are weak, inadequate is just not a term I would apply to any of them. All are happy, stable adults.

But, I also know someone who was also raised this way who fell for a womanising wife-beater, she was not equipped to deal with this and stayed in the relationship far too long and had her self-esteem destroyed. But then, regardless of upbringing, few of us are equipped to deal with that situation, and her happy childhood is relevant only because she had no idea a husband could behave like that because her father was such a good role model. Actually thinking about her a bit more, she recovered, and maybe her happy childhood DID equip her for recovery.

So I've changed my mind, I now totally disagree with him.