: Benjamin D. Garber
: Holding Tight/Letting Go Raising Healthy Kids in Anxious Times
: BookBaby
: 9781936268917
: 1
: CHF 10.50
:
: Familie
: English
: 198
: DRM
: PC/MAC/eReader/Tablet
: ePUB
We can only hold our children close so long. We must let them go slowly, one step at a time, allowing them to build identity and self-esteem, confidence and competence. We must take off the training wheels at some point and let them go, even though we know that they'll fall and skin a knee. But how can we let them go safely in a world filled with fear and danger? Holding Tight/Letting Go is the necessary and natural push-pull dynamic that must play out between every parent and child from birth through death. It's the ambivalence that we experience, torn between keeping our children safe and encouraging their independence. It's the dilemma that we all face knowing that we let our children go into a world filled with internet predators and school shootings, toxins and addictions and crime Holding Tight/Letting Go is your resource for healthy parenting in the twenty-first century. This is the story of how identity emerges in the context of relationships, from birth through death, from Facebook to Twitter, and beyond. When should I say no? When should I push him to try something new? Should I let him have a phone? Should I monitor his social media? What does 'privacy' mean when there is none? Holding Tight-Letting Go tackles these and the hundreds of similar questions that fill every parent's thoughts and fuel every parent's nightmares. Holding Tight/Letting Go is more. It speaks to each of us about who we are and how we make relationships as parents , as adults, and as children ourselves. How we hold our partners and our own parents tight and how we must eventually, inevitably, let them go, as well. Holding Tight/Letting Go speaks to each of us as human beings trying to understand self in these times of terror and technology.

Chapter One


Taking Off
the Training Wheels


Growing up is a poorly choreographed dance:

When you hold her tight, she demands to be let go.

When you let her go, she cries to be held tight.

This book is about your child’s first steps.

It’s about putting her on the school bus on her first day of kindergarten, and dropping her off at summer camp. It’s about telling her “no,” she can’t drive to her friend’s house, and it’s about walking her down the aisle.

It’s about which video games she can play and which movies she can watch and which friends she can hang out with. It’s about urging her to try out for the play and the soccer team, moving her into her dorm room, and being there to comfort her when she’s scared and sick and lonely.

It’s about knowing when to hold her hand and when not to, when to stand by her side and when to watch from a distance, and when to not watch at all.

This book is not about everything human; it’s about that single, powerful dynamic upon which everything human is built. It’s about the push-pull, back-and-forth ambivalence that characterizes every relationship and is most obvious as it occurs between parent and child. It’s about holding tight and letting go.

Listen: It’s a warm Saturday morning in late spring. There’s a lawn mower buzzing away in the distance. Fluffy white clouds dot a perfect blue sky.

The training wheels have finally come off. Your little girl is wearing her pink princess helmet and a look that conveys both determination and terror. You jog alongside the bicycle, one hand clenched over the handlebars, the other holding the pink plastic seat, offering advice and encouragement. Smiling, even though we all know how this story goes.

“You can do it! Pedal harder!”

You’ve always been there to protect her, to bandage the boo-boos. You’d throw yourself in front on an oncoming car to save her. So why, now, are you launching her toward certain harm? She’s going to fall. Probably skin a knee. Maybe bruise an elbow.

Every scratch and scrape she’s ever had flashes through your mind. Twice you rushed her to the ER. You’ll never forget her look of shock and betrayal when she broke her ankle. The screams and tears were bad enough, but that look said, “How could you let this happen to me? I thought you were here to keep me safe!” That was the hardest to swallow.

You’re starting to breathe hard now. Is it the exertion or anxiety? Part of you wants to stop, to find the wrench and put the training wheels back on. She’s safe that way. Well, safer at least. But another part of you understands how much she wants this new freedom. She wants to ride a big girl bike just like all the other kids in the neighborhood.

“I’m doing it, Mommy!” You recognize her squeaky, high tone. She’s scared but she wants this so much.

“You’re doing great, sweetie!”

Catastrophes run through your brain: Are the