Worried About children(VENT)

The kids are gonna be all right, Mom.
Mine are.
You WILL start to relax in a few years, when things go wrong and then the kids are all right ANYWAY, despite all your worry.

Know your Mamma Instincts are working beautifully, and you will guide them and love them and sometimes make crazy decisions, and in the end, they're OK!

:)

(btw, turn the damn NEWS off!)

In the world we live it is so easy to worry. All the news is chaos and repetitive loops reporting this tragedy or that disaster.
I would like to recommend two books for you. Both are amazing and even if you choose not to implement the principles in them I have no doubt that both will give you a little less worrisome perspective!

"Raising an emotionally healthy child" John Gottman. He is the foremost expert in marriage and his marriage books are always high on my list as well.

"Free-Range Kids: Giving Our Children the Freedom We Had Without Going Nuts with Worry" Lenore Skenazy. This woman is hysterical, this book is fun to read, but it is also full of factual information that will help parents today rest a little easier!

I feel the same way. When I got pregnant with my first daughter, one of my first thoughts was the school district we were in wasnt that great. I made sure we had a house built in a wonderful school district by the time she was 2. ;) Everything I do and every decision I make is with my children in mind. I personally think its normal, but Im sure some worry free people will disagree.

I am thankfully not much of a worrier (unlike my husband)... sometimes I wonder if I should worry more, but it just hasn't ever been a big part of my personality. For one, I would stop watching the news (I never watch the news, that probably helps)... I do, however, listen to NPR a lot to get my news (much less depressing, and a lot more interesting)... and if I need weather updates, I go to the internet. Of course I want my kids to have the best of everything, but there is also a big part of me that really values adversity and resilience, so if the situation is not "ideal", I look at it as good teaching moments, because lets face it, life is not always ideal, or even logical! At least you realize that you do this, which is the first step in being able to re-record that tape that plays over and over again in your head.

*I just noticed the reference lovemym&ms to John Gottman's book... That is, in my opinion a great book and suggestion...... I do have a lot of respect for everything Gottman writes.

Be careful not to show your boys how much you worry or they may become worriers. My friend is the queen of worry and her 8 year old worries about everything, it's very sad to me. I am a worrier too but I don't let my boys see it.

Everyone worries about their kids if you didnt you would not be a mom, my husband and older son seem to think I have a strange obsession with kidnapping ( okay maybe I do) I have an irrational fear of it I panic literally if my boys are not home on time or if the little one ended up walking home by himself I am literally terrified. It takes serious self restraint to allow my son to play in the front yard yes okay I am a little crazy. We all have our issues the trick is not to put our issues on our kids they will gain their own baggage

by finding a place of Peace, Faith, & Trust within yourself.....that's how you can survive & thrive as a Mom, Wife, Friend, & all those other things you need to be.

The answers are within you...it's not something anyone else can do for you.

When those worries begin, when you start to really think on things....just take a deep breath & SMILE.....breathe deeply......& let it go. You will be amazed at how much difference a little bit of therapeutic breathing can do!

& about that move, have you considered a small town or small unincorporated area of a larger city? When we moved from St Louis to our small town, we checked out all of the school districts in this area & their track record before choosing one. It made all the difference in our search!

Yes, I worry about my daughter as well! We even just recently moved, and one of the reasons was to get our daughter into a better school district. There are only 2 school systems I would want my daughter in around here - where we are now, or a couple cities away where I grew up!

If you are still looking for a state to move to, I invite you to Alabama! :) We are in Madison right now, which is a fairly large city. I grew up in Scottsboro, which is fairly small (one high school class in Madison = the whole high school at Scottsboro...haha). I personally do not want to live in Huntsville again..

Good luck on relocating, I hope you find something close to what you want!

And relax, try not to worry too much, and as others have said, don't let your kids see you so worried!

Don't worry...you are not alone on this. I constantly worry about my boys. To let you know how bad -when my first was born I started worrying about him driving!!

It is really tough when you do watch the news and you realize just how quickly and randomly the gift of life can be taken away from us. There is no sense to it and it scares me so much to think about whether my family will be on fate's roullette wheel. Just look at this 9 you who recently died while at an event to meet her congresswoman. So tragically sad. I know stats are so low that it will happen to us but does anyone EVER expect it to happen to them...yet it does.

My struggle is to not let my boys know how much that I worry. It don't want to turn them into stressed out and tense people. And I don't want them NOT to try new things b/c I am worried for them.

Good luck on your relocation...how fun to get to pick where you live. If I were you I would go south...sounds like you get so much more bang for your buck down there than up here...and its warm!(well, not so much now I suppose :-)

I certainly worry about my kids but maybe not quite to the extent that you do. There are so many things out there to worry about that I would end up driving myself crazy and my family. Kids have to experience life and learn from it. You need to be the one to teach them how to react in every situation and hopefully they learn from your good teachings. You can't control everything that happens out there but you can control what happens in your own home.
L.

I, too, am a worrier. Can't help it, it's just who I am.

I do tell my kids (now 19 and 16) some of the worries because they need to pay attention to certain things around them. Talk about taking risks -- calculated risks that will encourage them to be their best, and the negative risks that will only hurt them. However, I try not to tell them ALL of my worries.

I also try to turn my worries to sharp attention or into actions whenever possible. School not fulfilling all of the things I'd like? Then I supplement with outside activities to help (baking to help with fractions, walk in park for environmental conversations, Please Touch Museum for fun and some culture, different classical and ethnic music to discuss how it makes you feel, etc.). Friends doing or saying things I don't approve of? Work the message into a conversation -- while watching TV, or mentioning a related article that I recently read -- or how friends' actions make your children feel. Take control of your worry by not being passive to the fears. Some you can't do anything about, but some you can.

Good luck!

Hi, 2boys:

I can understand how you may feel that way.
You know that addiction has 2 components: control and feeling or sensation.
what are you getting out of your addiction?

The wheel of life is a model of change. It was carved in the stone
walls of cathedrals. People seeing the image received instruction about the change process.
The lesson : At the top of the wheel is a smilling, well-dressed, kingly or queenly person. Symbolizing Happiness. Things are normal and going well.
The wheel turns clockwise, change has occurrd. The same person is now upside down and falling through space with a look of distress. This position is one of Loss.
The wheel continues its movement and at the bottom of the wheel the individual is now nude and is being pulled along through the muck and mire of life. This is the position of Suffering.
The wheel turns and the person is again clothed. rises up to the position of Hope. There is hopeful anticipation of once again reaching the position of happiness.
The wheel's lesson is that thaere are only four positions in life: happy, loss, suffering, and hope. We alre always in one of these positions.

Addiction causing us to deny reality of the wheel of life.
Hope this helps.
D.