Nagging Helicopters
By Kristina

What over-controls, over-does, and is over-paranoid? Helicopter parents, that’s what. Every which way I look, I see more parents that are way too caught up in their kid’s lives. I’m talking about moms, dads, grandparents, guardians, anyone that tries to live their kid’s lives. It’s okay that they care about their kids because they’re supposed too. The problem is that they are supposed to watch their kids grow up, not be there to hold them down.

Some kids should just be left alone. They don’t always want their parents coming into their room and asking them what’s up, why they were yelling on the phone, or crying at school, and stuff like so. If they really wanted their parents to be involved in their lives and problems they would ask. Although the parent has been through it all before, some kids just have private things that they would prefer not to share with their parents.

Well of course parents want to know what is going on with their kids because they want to know that their kids are safe. It’s perfectly fine to think this because caring about others is a natural human instinct. However most times kids just don’t want their parents to be a part of everything, so if parents try to make themselves a part of everything kids are just going to try to find things to keep away from them, like my friend Shanna’s older sister. She is 16, and has a boyfriend. My friends mom always try’s to get her to tell her everything about her boyfriend, stuff that she’s obviously not very comfortable sharing with her mom.

If parents do too much for their kids, and are always, always there to fix they’re problems the kids aren’t going to be able to do it themselves. Sure they can make them food and do their laundry, but they shouldn’t be cleaning their rooms and putting away their dishes. Seriously though, if they baby their kids too much, they won’t know how to live on their own. Some people won’t even let their teenagers stay home alone for more than ten minutes, or let them use cooking appliances. I think they are capable of using a stove at age 11! If they don’t know how to use an oven, they are not going to be able to cook for their families one day. My mom always tries to teach me all of her techniques because that’s what her mom did to her. She says she probably wouldn’t even know how to cook if her mom didn’t teach her when she was younger, so now she teaches me. I think it’s important for parents to trust their kids with these types of important responsibilities.

Another thing, parents are supposed to control their kids. You know, they have a say in what time they have to be home, when they have to be in bed, and such. Some parents however, abuse their rights of power, when it hurts the most. When kids want to sleepover their friend’s house, or go to a party, and the parents say no. Kids will always ask the same thing, “but, why?” Parents always do the same thing-straight to excuses. Sometimes they have something big the next day, or had a long day and they want them to have some rest. This is a reasonable answer. Other times, they really don’t have any reason at all, they just want to be able to have the control to say no whenever they want. Kids can tell this because of their constant changing excuses. I remember my mom told me I couldn’t sleep over my friend Michaela’s house because I had dance early the next morning. I reminded her it was a vacation, so she totally changed her excuse to “I had a long day.” We kept fighting until she simply said she just wanted me home.

Then there are some parents that try to take too much stuff away. When kids are little, parents will take away something small, like a cookie, that they don’t want their kid to be eating. However, the more they take away that cookie, the more the kid will want it. Some parents send their boys to all boys’ school, and vise versa with girls, so they won’t see each other. However, when they take away girls from boys, or boys from girls, all they want is to interact with each other, which would probably make the parents very angry. I know this girl Erin that goes to a private school near by. In elementary school she was cute and innocent, and stayed the same at her public middle school. Her mom decided she didn’t want Erin exposed to male interaction, and switched her to an all girl’s school. Now that Erin doesn’t see boys anymore, she takes advantage of when she does and that doesn’t turn out too good. However, I don’t think anyone could really blame her from wanting something that her mom took away.

I am definitely not a victim of any of this. My parents are not helicopter like at all! The reason I know so much about these nagging parents is because I get to hear and see a lot about them. One of my best friends Samantha has a helicopter mom. She is very nice, but she is really annoying when it comes to mothering. Samantha is not allowed to go to boys houses, at all! Not even like her closest guy friends. Now that I think about it, she is really not allowed to go anywhere if her mom doesn’t know two parents that are going to be there. That would pretty much rule out the world, besides me and my friend Sydney’s house. Of course Samantha gets very mad about this, so she will sneak out of her house, or come to one of our houses before we go anywhere. I would hate to have to lie to my mom like that all the time.

As I stated before, I am not really victimized by them, and am extremely happy that I’m not. I really do feel for the kids that are because my mom and dad give the perfect amount of parenting. They will notice when I’m upset, but don’t nag me to talk about it. They let me do a lot of things that other parents, such as Samantha’s, would never let their kids do. Helicopter parents really, really bug me to death! If I am ever a parent, I will make sure I will not be a helicopter because the last thing I would want to do is ruin my kid’s life for them.