Hellobee Boards

I can't say for sure, because I'm.not a parent, and who knows what will happen. But, I would like to encourage my kids to exercise more than I did, and I would like to.fight less.

I don't know how I feel about privacy, honestly. We had very little of it growing up, but I was ok with that. We had to give my mom copies of all of our passwords to anything we did online, like AIM, and we never had cell phones. Computer was in the living room, and that was that. I liked it, and I can see why my parents did, too. They trusted us, and we had very little to hide. I guess we will have to see-I suppose it will depend on the child.

@LovelyPlum: I think internet privacy and your bedroom privacy are two different things. My parents had no idea about the programs I used on the internet when I was 13. They just weren't educated enough. However, I know the trouble I got in and I will not allow that to happen with my kids so they will, 100%, be handing over all internet activity information and passwords to me or DH. Now, that's not to say I'll go snooping around, but if there is any cause for concern at least I know how to get into it all.

@LovelyPlum: haha, I only have that opinion now because I was such a brat on the internet when I was young! 13 years old and chatting with LOTS of men on ICQ. I could have gotten myself in a WHOLE world of trouble and my parents wouldn't have had any idea.

I have a long list, but one is really high on it. Instead of using discipline, setting limits, etc, my mother just used shame and guilt to try to control my behavior. She still does it, to a point, when she isn't getting her way, and it's only very recently (I'll be 30 this year) that I've really started to understand how extremely terribly and damaging it has been for me.

She had a very hard time being a parent, and not being a friend or a peer. I recognize that she had a really hard childhood, and that I shouldn't blame her for her failings. But it's very hard. She and my father both were never able to approach parenting from a standpoint of 'this is the parent I want to be, and I'm working hard to hit that mark'. For them it was always 'this is the best I can do, and I hope it is enough'. And it just wasn't, to be honest. In a lot of really important ways.

I am working hard to be different for my daughter. At almost two, she already knows that when I say no, I mean no. There is no guilt and no shame in my house. The rules are the rules, there are consequences for breaking them, and it's all ok.

I have so far been able to approach parenting very differently than they did, due to my life circumstances (stable income, a partner who isn't chronically ill, having sorted out my shit before reproducing). I hope to be able to continue. I know that my parents did their very best, but it isn't always enough.

@LovelyPlum: I didn't have a problem with transparency, what I had a problem with was deception . . . My mom told me she trusted me, but would then go behind my back and read my diary, go through my drawers, etc., and then act like nothing happened. I would have had no problem giving her passwords, etc., because they were asked for upfront. It's not like your parents put a key logger on the computer to get your passwords so that they could check up on you. If that makes sense?

hmm...

I actually think my parents did a pretty great job, as far as parenting goes. Honestly, most days I just hope I do half as well as they did. I seriously don't know how they did it all.

If anything, I'll be more open about religious beliefs than my parents were (but that's a given, as my DH and I are different religions). I hope I push my kids just a little harder academically. My mom was a teacher, so she didn't let us get away with anything behaviorally....but I think because she saw such a range of kids and their abilities, if we were doing mostly okay with grades, that was good enough for my parents--and I feel like I wasn't pushed hard enough at school. I pretty much always coasted through, putting in minimal effort, and still making A's and B's. That's been a hard habit to break in adulthood.

Everything else though---again, I'll be happy if I'm half as good as a parent.

Oh gosh I agree with so many that have already been said and have a million more I could add.

One that's been really important to me in the past few years is to accept your kids for who they are and be supportive of their decisions...love your kids regardless of if you disagree with them. My sister is a lesbian and I married a man much older than me, so you can imagine that my parents were not very pleased with either situation. But in addition to not being pleased (as a very big understatement) I was called a whore (and worse) and treated horribly for a year until they were able to accept my choices. I will never do that to my kids. If I disagree with their decisions, I'll explain why, but also say that I love them and support them no matter what.

@MsLipGloss @Banana: Those are major boundary issues and I totally agree with you it wasn't right of your mom to do that. I would never root through my child's private things. Trust is a really good thing to have between parent and child, and the child that cares about that trust will do her best not to disappoint the parent anyway, for the most part.