30 People Share "Seemingly Harmless" Things Parents Do To Their Kids That Can Actually Have Serious Consequences

According to Lenore, the founder of Let Grow, a nonprofit that promotes childhood independence and resilience, it is “not only hard for parents to figure out the exact right balance between too strict and too lenient, too prying and too hands-off—it's impossible.” So figuring out the right balance becomes a key issue. 

“One thing many parents are choosing today is to keep their kids under constant surveillance, with the help of tech. Whether it’s being able to track their kids’ movements, read their browsing history, or even scan their texts, parents have all sorts of new tools to make them seemingly omniscient,” Lenore told Bored Panda that child surveillance has become a touchy issue in recent years with the advances in technology. However, this is a problem because kids need to have some privacy as well.

“For the same reason you didn’t want your parents to read your diary, or to build a treehouse on the branch right next to YOUR treehouse, children need some space to grow into their own person,” the child independence expert said. “Kids need to know they are loved, but they also need to know they are trusted. They can’t prove that if parents never actually let them do some things literally on their own, without constant surveillance.”

What we shouldn’t be doing is treating our children as work-release felons by constantly tracking and monitoring them. “In the past, the only people we electronically tracked were felons on parole. They had to wear an ankle monitor that the warden could check to make sure they were where they were supposed to be. The felon knew that this was better than prison—but it wasn’t freedom,” Lenore explained.

Instead of surveilling their own kids all the time, parents could attempt Lenore’s approach of “talk, don’t stalk.” This approach leads to greater trust.

“Try to keep the lines of communication open with your kids, and gradually give them more freedom as they get older and earn it by being responsible. Taking all independence away for their ‘safety’ is a way to teach them that you don’t think they can handle anything on their own— how deflating!—and that you don’t trust them. Would you appreciate a spouse who tracked your every move? Would you feel trusted? Love requires some trust.”

Meanwhile, blogger Samantha, who runs Walking Outside in Slippers, told Bored Panda how she approaches parenting and the importance of seeing each child as an individual. What works for someone else’s child might not be what your own kid needs.

“I am trying to do more to meet my kids where they’re at, figuring in their personality and what their needs are for them personally. In the past, I would sometimes assume that I knew what was best for my kids, based on what the ‘average’ kid ‘should’ need or want. But kids can be so different, even within the same family,” Samantha explained to Bored Panda.

Samantha opened up just how different her children are despite growing up in the same household. “My 6-year-old daughter, for example, is very organized and a bit of a perfectionist. She also needs lots of attention and affection. While my 10-year-old son is a sometimes wild but also very sensitive and artistic soul. He needs his space. They are night and day,” she said.

“I have learned I need to adapt my expectations of them and goals for them based on their individual personalities and quirks. I can create space for them to be who they are, and I believe this acceptance and customized attention will benefit them in the long run as they develop into teens and then adults.”

Lenore, the president of Let Grow, previously explained to Bored Panda that our “catastrophizing culture” has made a lot of parents anxious and scared.

As a result, plenty of adults don’t want their kids doing much of, well, anything. They become overprotective and even overbearing because they’re scared for their children’s safety.

“The result is not safety, it’s anxiety—kids who absorbed the message that everything is too much for them to handle. When you’re anxious, a simple slip-up doesn’t seem so simple. It seems huge—even life-threatening. How can you avoid those awful threats? That part is simple. You avoid doing anything,” Lenore explained how some parents think.

According to Lenore, this leads to children being far more passive and timid than they should be. “Everyday life is seen as filled with risk” for them, even if they’re objectively completely safe.

Lenore was very straightforward about the fact that this passivity is not making children happier. When they’re kept snug deep inside their comfort zones, they start to think that this is all that life has to offer. What’s more, they have a limited understanding of their own capabilities, thinking that they can’t do much of anything.

However, authority figures like teachers can help kids become more independent and to help both them and their parents leave their comfort zones. Sometimes, it takes someone from the outside to give a helping hand at the right moment to make you realize something needs to change.