Sunday, September 13, 2015

The Benefits of Helicopter Parenting

        I have been dismayed recently to see the backlash against helicopter parenting, including the negative commentaries, dire warnings of raising twisted children, and the detrimental effects to the parents themselves. Why the dismay? Well, I proudly proclaim myself a helicopter parent. Since day one with my children, I have hovered and clung, while at the same time being a happy and fulfilled parent raising normal and healthy, well-adjusted, independent kids.
In fact as a pediatrician, I stand by this parenting style and recommended it to my patients enthusiastically and often. I feel it is a natural extension of attachment parenting, that addresses the infant and toddler stages but mysteriously drops off at school age. In fact before I had heard the term helicopter parenting, I had invented my own word for it, sticky tape parenting. But whatever it is called, I felt that my children deserved the close attention that I paid to them as infants at any stage of development including the teenage years.
But nowadays, helicopter parenting is reviled and scorned. It is criticized and deemed harmful and repressive. I have read several articles discussing helicopter parenting and gradually the light dawned. I found the term helicopter parenting has become perverted to cover a whole host of parental problems from excessive anxiety to living vicariously through their children. It no longer refers to simply watching and waiting, but to swooping in and rescuing. Because of this, I submit that this type of parenting be renamed as Coast Guard parenting, complete with rescue maneuvers, search and seizure, and unannounced intervention.
Coast Guard parents will not allow their kids to fail, they interfere and intervene stopping children from developing coping mechanisms of their own while they also heap anxiety and stress upon their children. Helicopter parents on the other hand, simply hover and watch. When children fail, they land and teach, offering suggestions and learning techniques for future missions. They do not intervene unless its for the safety of the child and certainly do not direct the behavior of the child. However, by always being present, everything the child does can be used as a teaching moment. Nothing is lost and the parent is involved and clued into a child’s needs and wants.
For example, I read an article where a mother was sitting at a playground watching her pre-schooler attempt a ladder that was clearly too hard for his developmental level. She labeled another mom as a “helicopter parent” for coming over to her and expressing concern for her child’s safety and then watched the other parent go try to redirect her child and remove him from the ladder. I again submit to you this was not a helicopter parent. It was a coast guard parent. She was sending the message to the child that he wasn't capable of trying the harder ladder. Her anxieties of a failure, whether that was a fall or other injury, were being portrayed to the child, and then she was squelching independence by choosing another activity of the adult’s choice.
Also, the parent sitting on the bench on the other side of the playground, was also not parenting responsibly, as she needed another parent to point out to her what was going on. So where does that leave us? With the middle of the road, helicopter parent approach. A true helicopter parent would have been hovering in the background, not too close, but within range and would have known exactly what their child was attempting. There would have been no attempts at redirection of the parent’s choice, no communication of anxiety or expectations of failure, but there would have been a closeness in which when the failure occurred, the parent could come in and pick up the child immediately and sooth them. Then maybe a learning moment could have ensued where the parent could point out what made that particular ladder so difficult. Comparisons could have been made with other equipment to start the child discerning on his own. Maybe coping strategies could be laid out and alternatives suggested for the next time, and finally empathy could be taught for when another child falls, the child could draw parallels with what they felt.
A helicopter parent would release the child back on the playground and watch them either tackle the same thing again with perseverance, or choose another activity independently. At no time was the child redirected at the parents wishes or exposed to anxiety about their activities. This is helicopter parenting, always being aware of everything your child does so that you can use these moments. 
And of course, I can use this to make another plug for homeschooling. Unless you are the aide in the classroom every day, all day, if you don’t homeschool your children, you are losing teaching time everyday that you are abdicating to others, and I am talking about more than the ‘book’ time usually thought of as teaching time. You lose these times where education can make the difference between raising anxious, loss-aversive children, to raising confident children that have developed coping strategies. If this playground scene had been at pre-school, there would have been no opportunities for teaching coping mechanisms, strategy communication, or education in empathy as the interaction would have been forgotten in the myriad of other things that happened during the school day.

While I don't advocate interference and “over-parenting” simply hovering and watching isn’t wrong. It’s how you use the information gathered. So yay for helicopter parenting. Join with me in proclaiming the benefits and successes of being child-focused and child-oriented.