The pain of motherhood

Being a mother is a learning curve - always. You start off in marriage with so many ideas, then you have a baby and throw all the ideas out of the window. Then you have a toddler and all the ideas you formed about toddlerhood you throw out of the window...and so on.

My two girls are 8 (nearly 9) and 6. Compared to many children today my two are were allowed to play out. They have boundaries, but they were allowed to walk to their friends' houses on the street as long as they told me where they were, etc. They know the rules about not going into even their friends' houses without permission and to never get into anyone's car, or talk to strangers. They are allowed to climb on play equipment, to run and bounce and jump and explore.

I want them to have the freedom that I had as a child. Life now, despite the news, isn't any-more dangerous for children than it was in our day - except for on the roads there are more cars; roads are more dangerous. The media reports more on it, but according to research I read there is no more 'stranger danger' than there was in my day (1970s-80s). But I think that life has changed in different ways. The children who are allowed to play out freely round us tend to come from 'difficult' backgrounds, and then children who come from secure homes generally aren't allowed to play out freely. I realise that this isn't always the case, I'm just speaking from personal experience. Let me explain...

I wanted my children to not be snobs and to play with other children from different backgrounds.

But our ideals don't always work out do they?

We live on a street of both privately owned and social housing. We've had trouble with kids on the street drinking. So if the teenagers were about my girls had to come in- and they were very good about it, if the teenagers appeared they came in. One of the lads is from a family who have 5 children, his parents did absolutely nothing but watched from the garden as the police cautioned him. My two used to play with these children.

Then my eldest comes to me and asks me about a little girl called Samara who is evil and comes out of the television and lives down a well. She's scared about it. Then I find out that one of their friends is allowed by his parents to watch horror films (he is 8) - Samara is a character from The Ring a horror film.

Then I find out that one of the kids that they play with has been teaching them 'rude' things that little ones ought not really know.

Now my eldest has been bullied. Two of the children on the street locked her in their house, threatened to throw her out of a window. The one of them kicked her in the stomach so hard it winded her and made a red mark. The girl that did this then appeared at the bottom of our path taunting my eldest. I have spoken to her mother. But to no apparent avail, this girl has no fear or shame, but in front of me was calling my daughter names.

You see. My ideals have been shot to nothing. I feel I have failed to protect my children, not from 'stranger danger' but from other children!

I know that I can't wrap my children up in cotton wool and protect them from real life. But honestly. I feel like the only parent on this street who knows what their children are doing and cares what they get up to.

And now, I am so sad to say that the freedom I so want for my children - like those long summers I remember as a child playing with my friends on the street - are unlikely to happen for my two. Ideals are there to be shattered eh?

But I don't want to be like other parents when every second of their lives is scheduled and controlled - yes I believe in supervising and taking responsibility - but I think children's lives these days are too scheduled and 'busy busy'.

So there's the background to my question, how much freedom do your children have to play out, do you schedule lots of 'play-dates', do you go out often, do you keep them in your own garden, do you let them play only with Christian friends? Just wondered.

Thanks in advance.