Blog Entry: The scary side of parenting
Wow. There is NOTHING like taking your child to a big, crowded children's play house to bring back all your own childhood insecurities and fears - amplified by a thousandfold as you watch the usual bad stuff happen to your own child. Nothing major, obviously - just the kind of casual nastiness from a couple of the bigger kids, which feels SO much worse when you're watching it happen to your baby.
And of course, as the parent, you have to look cheerful and unconcerned by the whole thing, to help your child stay calm and make sure they have a good time even if they have just been casually punched or kicked by a much bigger kid who really should have known better...
And then there's The Big Playhouse Issue, the one I'd forgotten might even come up (possibly because I'd worked so hard to blank it out of my memory?) after all these years away: rope bridges.
I really, really hate ropes courses. And when I say "hate", I mean "pathetically fear". I mean, I used to be the little kid crying and shivering with panic at the head of the bridge, the one who nearly threw up afterward if she ever did manage to cross them.
You know how people always say to kids that once they go ahead and DO that scary thing, they'll enjoy it? I never, ever enjoyed it. Not once. When I was 21, I nearly quit a job I'd just taken - a good job, a job I needed badly - when I found out that as a "bonding" thing, we had to have a day out at a ropes course. Because I was an adult, I didn't cry where anyone else could see me, and I managed to force my way through the day with muscles and teeth gritted to hold back my real reactions, while everyone around me seemed to be having fun.
Then afterward, when no one else could see me, I cried and shook with decompression, because I am so physically petrified of those things.
It's irrational. It's stupid. It's deeply humiliating. I hate this weakness I have, which no one else I know has ever shared. It makes me feel small and really dumb.
Today, I had to encourage my tiny son to cross those ropes, because it was important for him and I really, really don't want to pass on my panic to him. Today, to help him, I had to cross those ropes. Twice. I kept a smile on my face. I kept my voice chirpy. After the second time across, though, I had to call Patrick to pick us up, half an hour earlier than planned. I kept my voice chirpy the whole way back to the house, and waited until Patrick and MrD left for their own trip out.
Then I walked inside the house and cried and shook. Because not only had I had to cross those rope bridges, but the stupid, irrational panic was multiplied a thousand times as I watched - and helped! - my son cross them, too. I know in my head that they're perfectly safe, but my body refuses to accept that, and the feeling of watching my son put himself in mortal danger (untrue though I know that scenario to be) is just lethal.
I hate that I'm still so scared of something so babyish, at the age of 33. I am baffled by the fact that this morning, which should have been fun, turned out to be one of the hardest mornings I've ever spent as a parent (outside of a medical situation).
I came very close to not posting this entry, because I am so humiliated by my fears. But I think - I hope - that there must be other people out there who have "childish" fears that they're embarrassed by, who might be willing to share them here or at least be glad to see that someone else has them, too.
Do you guys have any fears you haven't outgrown, even if you think you should have? Or: if you're parents, what are the hardest things you've had to do to help your kids?