You need to relax!!

I seriously can NOT tell you how many times I have been told that I need to just chill out by someone when it comes to my kids.  I admit, I am very often uptight.

I'm pretty sure the reason my oldest child is such a nervous guy is because I was always right behind him telling "be careful. you're going to fall" etc.  And with additional kids, yes I have relaxed in SOME ways.  But I'm pretty convinced I'm not wrong in my constant alertness.  Just last night my two year old fell off the chair at a restaurant when I took my eyes off him for just a second. Granted, it sounded HORRIBLE but he shook it right off so I didn't feel like the WORST parent ever, just not the best!

Before my mom passed she would always get upset with my constant nagging on my kids...but I don't know where she thought I got it from in the first place.  But I also know I do take my restrictions of my kids to a whole new level than she did.  When I was growing up I was allowed pretty much free roam of the neighborhood at about 5 years old.  That was the same neighborhood that we live in now and I still have serious concern about letting my older boys out in our yard without direct supervision.  When the older boys were little I DID use fear tactics to make sure they would not go outside with out me.  They knew that if they went out alone that "bad guys" could get them.  This seriously trouble my mom once when my oldest had a full blown fit when we tried to get him to play outside on my mom's deck without an adult outside.  He basically thought we were throwing him out to be "gotten by the bad guys."

But the truth is, I don't care what anyone thinks about how over protective I am.  The dangers in our area are VERY real.  With 5 or 6 registered sex offenders within a block of our house and multiple shooting deaths in a several block radius, I am NOT being paranoid.

I do my best to allow my boys to have some freedoms and learning experiences when I feel it is safe to do so.  But unfortunately, we simply don't live in a world today where I can tell my kids "Yeah go play with your friends, just be home before dark."  There isn't enough anxiety medication in the state for me to be able to handle that anytime soon!!


Evenflo has just released the Momentum 65 DLX Convertible Car Seat, with features that help make safety, installation and use as easy as possible for parents. Evenflo and JuiceBoxJungle sponsored me to write this post, and talk about what child safety means to me and my family.