To ask how the kids of very overprotective parents turned out?

[Uncleebz]

To be honest I can see the pros and cons (don’t have kids myself) of insulating your children from risk. However, my friend has a son who’s 14 and the rules he has are insane (eg not allowed to go anywhere on his own with friends unless accompanied by an adult). It got me thinking do you know any adults who were very overprotected as a kid (or are you one) how did it work out for them? What are they like now as adults?

I have a friend who’s a partner in a consulting firm. A work contact of his was exactly like this - his wife actually studied and took every exam alongside their only son so she could coach him; he had little to no unsupervised independence, they basically chose his uni and course, etc.

The dad arranged summer work experience for the son (who was 18 or 19) at my friend’s company. He literally talked him down the street on the phone to the correct address, then rang my friend on a separate line to ask if he could please leave his meeting to go down and assist, as the boy was panicking because he couldn’t get into the building. I think the problem was a revolving door, and he’d never walked through one before.

Kid was completely NT, just utterly clueless and unable to rationalise situations or make even the simplest decisions for himself, because they’d barely ever allowed him out of their sight.

God alone knows what his outcomes have been but it’s difficult to imagine he’s a happy, functioning adult making his own way in the world.

My parents were "tell the truth and you can do it" parents and we had lots of freedom. We are close now as adults and see them frequently. My husband had to lie to do anything as even at 16 had to be home at 9pm, so would like about where he was doing and what he was going.

Strict/over protective parents make for sneaky kids IMO.

Very judgemental post , you have no idea as to why someone may appear over protective, why not just focus on yourself and mind your own business?

Whereas my husband had neglectful parents and no rules growing up, he is not fine and has depression.

This is really important. Overprotectiveness has obvious drawbacks but there is less focus given to people with very relaxed and permissive parenting approaches and sometimes I think those can be even more dangerous.

I grew up in a town full of wealthy progressive liberals and there was a lot of very performative lax parenting: kids rarely had curfews, underage drinking and taking soft drugs was tolerated from the mid teenage years (or at least a blind eye was turned) and despite the fact this was an academic town with successful parents kids often weren't pushed academically and allowed to go off for years and "find themselves".

I saw an awful lot of my contemporaries go properly off the rails and in some cases develop serious problems with drugs and miss years of education which they never really got back. I can't be sure it was all attributable to this but I'm sure a much higher proportion of these kids "failed", given their demographics.

You do want your kids to learn to take some risks and to start to make their own decisions but if its communicated to children that they don't need to give any consideration to risk whatsoever they lose the sense of self-protection that they need to assess risks properly.

I have to say its made me a much stricter parent with my own daughter.

My parents were strict and controlling. I became a very good liar in my late teens and went off the rails a bit once I left home. Lots and lots of very unsuitable relationships etc. I also had no idea how to stand up for myself as I have never been allowed to question their decisions or advocate for myself, and for a long time was a doormat people pleaser.

It has taken me a long time to shake all this off but having my own children was a revelation - I have encouraged them from early childhood to be assertive, to think for themselves, to ask their opinions and explain to them why some things weren't possible rather than reverting to "because I say so", which was all I ever used to hear as a child.

Needless to say they turned out very differently to me - neither felt the need to go off the rails, we have a great relationship, they are confident and outgoing. I suppose my own parents gave me a great template of how NOT to parent in that I grew up determined to never, ever be like that with my own children.

I think that like many things a combination of factors come into play and a child's personality/ disposition is equally as important in how childhood and adulthood relate in an individual.
I do believe though in " generational trauma " and how it is almost impossible for people to be able to break a cycle and to not pass on learnt behaviour completely, to return to the state before an occurrence happened.
When a tragedy occurs in the family it's very difficult to stop it altering behaviour down the generations and sometimes this comes out in ways such as overprotective parenting.

It really is a chicken and egg question. Is our DD anxious because we have been so protective towards her. Or are we that way because she is so anxious and in need of protection. Is she immature because we haven’t allowed her to grow up. Or do we treat her like a younger child because she acts like one. She is autistic so it is very hard to pick apart.

Protecting people does not decrease anxiety, it increases it.

Like most things the middle way is the best. No one is arguing about allowing your kids to do whatever they want with no rules. That is neglect and sends the clear message you really do not care.
But children grow into adults. You need to slowly let them learn how to navigate the world alone.
I used to work in support staff at a university. Some of the 18-year-olds did not know how to take a train alone. Basic living skills were not always there.

Yes - a few school friends had very strict or overbearing parents. One went down the "off the rails" route and kept lots of secrets from her parents (she could have ended up in serious trouble including prison or dead some of the things she did to "rebel"), one had crippling anxiety and wasn't very streetwise at all. She could barely cross a road on her own, and I remember once a proper weird guy coming over to her in town and asking her what her plans were for that night and she told him the exact itinerary!!! So we had to change what we were doing as we didn't want this weirdo following us.

I see it with my own kids now. The friends of there's which have overly protective parents who are extremely anxious etc have all sorts of problems with eating and making friends for example

Ugh, just lost a long post.

anyway, quick version: I turned out okay but have had to learn a lot of things late. Like how to take a bus/train, shop in a supermarket, etc. It’s mostly just embarrassing.

I wasn’t allowed to do anything but be at school and home. I tried once to get a job aged 15-16 but my parents found my applications and tore them up and I was never allowed out alone after that. I really resent my lack of life skills.

My SIL is a VERY helicopter parent, her DS is only 2, but is already very clingy to mum because he's never been allowed to be without her.

Not great for me but could be a bad combination of mental health, ND and overprotective parenting. I was determined my kids would be brought up differently. That's not going so well since I gave birth to a lemming. Finding it really hard to find a good balance.

My mother was ridiculously overprotective. I wasn't allowed to walk to school alone until I was in sixth form. I couldn't go into town with my friends on a Saturday afternoon until I was 17 and then only for two hours. When my friends started turning 18, if they invited me to their parties I was allowed to go for the start time and I had to leave an hour later. That way my mother could say I'd shown my face and that she'd allowed me to go when I complained that I wasn't allowed to do anything. She would wait outside the venue for me for the full hour after walking me there, and then she'd walk me home (this was only for places like our local community centre hall or someone's house if parents were present, I wasn't allowed to go to parties in clubs or anything). There was one venue in particular that lots of my friends had their 18th parties at and she would stand outside the main window and look in for the whole hour. In the end I was so embarrassed I stopped going, and the invitations dried up anyway. I was bullied for years at school for being a weirdo.

I wasn't allowed to go to the cinema with friends until I was 17 and she did the waiting outside thing for the whole film - at one point I went to the toilet and I could hear her talking to my brother outside (old fashioned local cinema with windows that opened onto the street). She often used to bring my younger brother with her to wait with her 'for company'. I wasn't allowed on school trips, to stay in for lunch at school for clubs, no school discos as I got older, no sleepovers.

Then she got a boyfriend and literally overnight my brother (three years younger than me) and I were left to our own devices. To say we made up for lost time is an understatement. We went from having our every move monitored to my mother not giving the tiniest shit about what we got up to. I went off the rails massively. I ended up with a drink problem, and got myself into some awful and very dangerous situations. I had had no guidance whatsoever as to how to 'adult'. Some of the things that happened to me still have repercussions decades later. It took me years to get my life on a slightly even keel.

I had to be so, so careful when DD was younger. So many times I had to stop myself from being overprotective myself, or going too far the other way to prove to myself I wasn't like my mother. Thankfully I had DH to guide me (his upbringing had its issues but his parents were never overprotective and were quite healthy in that respect). DD has turned out fine and there haven't been any issues but my god it was hard.

Funnily enough, when I was much older my mother completely denied she had been overprotective at all and claimed that I was a juvenile delinquent who she couldn't control, and all my issues were my own fault. She was so convincing that sometimes I doubted my own version of events. But other people I knew from back then, and relatives too, reminded me of what she was really like.

I don’t think you can blame every personality trait on parents. Mine were somewhere in the middle but I’m an anxious mess because I’m autistic. I’d they’d been more involved (in a good way) that wouldn’t have been a bad thing. It’s about meeting a child’s needs.

I’m over-protective but my son is autistic so he’s quite happy for me to take him to college and collect him. I tell him that I’m an idiot and know he’s capable of doing things for himself. He doesn’t want to go out and doesn’t want to drink. I don’t really have rules because we don’t need them. He’s very good at self-regulation. I know I’m starting to irritate him a bit but I hope he appreciates that I’m a very honest, open person and there’s nothing he can’t talk to me about. I’d never try to control his life so I don’t think he has any reason to rebel.

Not hugely unusual for a parent of a 2 yr old

Wow. That sounds borderline terrifying. Glad to hear you go through it ok.

Growing up I had a friend like this. Her mother was completely OTT and had lots of 'rules' as well. Rules such as my friend was only allowed around to another friends house for homework, she had to ring her mum when she arrived, the mother would ring every hour to check on her. My friend was taken everywhere by her mum (including to school as a 6th former), wasn't allowed to ride a bike and even as a teenager wasn't allowed to use anything in the kitchen or make a cup of tea because it was dangerous. It was almost like her mother was scared of life.

I was the only 'approved' friend that my friend was allowed to be with unsupervised because my mum was deemed as respectable. It was at my house where my friend learned to do things like ride a bike, make a cup of tea, use knives and cook food, wear makeup, drink alcohol, use buses.....
I am forever grateful to my mum who's supplies of lies to my friends mum was never ending- 'yes friend's mum, they're upstairs doing their maths' when in reality we were actually in town.

As soon as she could, my friend moved out, went to uni, got a degree and a husband. She now lives thousands of miles away and is non contact with her mother or indeed the rest of her family.

I hear you. People quite possibly look at my DD and decide I have been over protective, whereas I have parented the child I got given, and actually spent quite a lot of time trying to get her to do more and be more adventurous.

Personality has a huge bearing. My parents were very strict. I went off the rails in my teens and didn't pull myself together until my early 20s. It was an unhappy time. I didn't really enjoy my rebellion but was trying to find out who I was as there was no autonomy at home. It was just "you will do as you are told".

My younger sister was good as gold. She's a naturally anxious person and was happy to be sheltered and spend all her time with our mum.

I did OK in the end. Good career, married, kids etc. My sister is terrified of life. Prefers to stay home, despite being very academic at school has not really had a career. Won't drive outside her town.

We might have ended up like that anyway but I do think with more balanced parenting I would have skipped much of my unhappy rebellion and my sister might have been encouraged to venture outside her comfort zone a bit more.

I knew a few kids like this - it was rare in 1980s Dublin, and we looked on those families as oddballs, but actually they have done well in life. They definitely missed out on fun and adventures, but they also missed out on some mistakes the rest of us made. They generally married young (happily) to similarly cautious/safe types, and remain close to their families.

I should say in the families I knew, the parents weren't exactly strict, and certainly unkind. It was just that they lived a certain way and their kids followed their lead in living very cautiously.

Certainly NOT unkind.

Friend's (friend is v controlling) DD went to farthest away uni (to get away from parents) and discovered booze in a big way and regularly gets v drunk. She also spends money like water. My DD went to nearby uni. She has tried alcohol but doesn't particularly like it and sticks to soft drinks and budgets carefully.

I hear you. People quite possibly look at my DD and decide I have been over protective, whereas I have parented the child I got given, and actually spent quite a lot of time trying to get her to do more and be more adventurous.

Yep this is my experience too. It's actually exhausting how much I have tried to get DS to be more independent. Yet I still get accused of being overprotective (always by busybodys who know nothing of our situation).