54: When “Safety” Becomes Control: Rethinking Parenting Anxiety

What happens when our desire to keep children safe hinders their growth? 

In this episode, Lenore Skenazy - an author, speaker, and advocate who has become a leading voice in the movement toward giving children greater independence - discusses the inadvertent consequences of overprotective parenting, from limiting free play to making children feel they must be safe at all times, with not allowing enough room with sitting with discomfort and learning  from it  

We explore why reasonable risk, independence, and time away from adults are essential parts of childhood.

Lenore shares how free play helps children develop confidence, problem-solving skills, resilience, and the ability to navigate the real world. A movement that is designed to reach all of our communities.

To Connect with Lenore:

https://www.freerangekids.com/
https://letgrow.org/author/lskenazy/

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:03

Welcome to Unmasking Social, where we talk about building real friendships and meaningful connections without masking who we truly are. I'm your host, Sharon Baume, a speech and language pathologist with an expertise in social thinking and how it relates to autism and ADHD. Specifically with our teams and queens. Let's dive in.

SPEAKER_01 0:32

Hello everybody and welcome back to Unmasking Social. Today we have a really special guest who will be speaking to a very important movement, Lenore Scanese. After her column, Why I Let My Nine-Year Old Ride the Subway Alone, she created a media firestorm and wrote the book Free Range Kids. This grew into the Free Range Kids Movement, which grew into Lecro, the national nonprofit promoting childhood independence, co-founded by Lenore, Jonathan Hay, Danielle Schuchman, and Peter Gray in 2017. Lenore's feisty belief that our kids are smarter and safer than our culture gives them credit for, landed her on the Daily Show, The Today Show, Dr. Phil, one of my favorites, PBS, CBS, Fox News, NPR, BBC, CBC. The list goes on. So she gave us one of the 10 essential TED Talks of 2025, The Reasonable Childhood Independence Law, inspired by uh her work uh with Congress. It has been passed in 13 states and was recently introduced by Congress. A former New York newspaper columnist, Lenore lives Lenore, sorry, whoever lives in New York City with her husband and beloved computer. Her sons have flown the coupe, which is good for proof of concept purposes, but she misses them. And for the record, she used to write for Mad Magazine. Yep, Mad. So that is quite an introduction for a guest. Lenore, you have Lenore. I keep doing that. Lenore, okay. Sharon. Sharon, Sharon, Lenore. But uh, you have quite the experience in dealing with kids researching children, and really your work began with your own child. Your own, at that time, your child was nine years old, right? And you let him ride the New York City subway alone. And for those listening who live in New York City, such as myself, the subway's quite interesting, right? So many parents shy away from even letting their children go on there. And what prompted you at that time to let your child go on the subway completely alone? And how did everybody around you who heard about it take to that?

SPEAKER_03 2:51

Well, first of all, thank you for having me. And the subway is interesting, but I think six million people take it a day. So some people don't put their kids on it or don't take their kids on it with them, but but most of us do. It's how New Yorkers get around, as you know. And the the reaction to my letting him do this, which was something that our son Izzy had been asking, can I take the subway alone? Can I try to find my way home from someplace by myself? He was asking because it was something that we were doing all the time anyway. Just like, you know, your kid might want to, if you're if you're riding your bike around the neighborhood with him all the time and he's nine, and finally he says, Can I ride my bike to school by myself? Can I ride my bike to, you know, the store by myself? So it was it was that question. It wasn't out of the blue and it wasn't like we weren't on the subways all the time. And so we finally decided that made sense. Our son, you know, can speak the language and he can read a map and he knows the route. And so we let him do this. And I wrote the the newspaper column about it. And the reactions were really mixed. I mean, obviously it struck a nerve. I ended up on all those shows, but many people thought it was, you know, nutty and dangerous, many of them from out of town who don't know, you know, that the subway is something that we're taking all the time. And then there were a lot of people who were sort of intrigued because they thought about it and they thought, like, you know, I used to do so much by myself at nine. Oh my God, at nine, I was having this adventure or that adventure, rural, suburban, urban. And then it suddenly they suddenly realized, like, wow, kids aren't doing that anymore. You know, that was just normal when I was a kid. And so that's that was the sort of the the tension between, you know, I loved doing that. I don't see anybody doing that anymore, is sort of what propelled the story to um prominence. And the and the fact that if you're not in New York City, you think of the subways as hell.

SPEAKER_01 4:39

So yeah, I mean, some days I view it as hell too. I mean, it's true.

SPEAKER_03 4:43

Some days it feels like hell. It's true.

SPEAKER_01 4:45

But yeah, I but I just remember even as a kid, I think I was 10 years old, and my parents finally let me walk along. And I remember crossing the streets and thinking, oh my goodness. I was living in Brooklyn. I was like, I hope I'm okay, you know. And I walked a few blocks, and that was kind of the extent of it at 10 years old, and that's how I became a little more independent. So I can relate a little bit, but I hadn't gone on the subway yet. But speaking to that, your call to action sounds like also a response to how things have changed. Thing things had changed then and now even at school anymore. Yeah. So what do you think is happening with our parents in terms of not letting maybe the children leave the coop, so to say, a little earlier on?

SPEAKER_03 5:29

Yeah, I uh, you know, I don't know if people are watching or listening, so I won't I won't bore you with my graphs that I have next to me, but I will look at them. There, there's something very interesting, which is that there was a survey done last year, published this year, of 24,000 American parents. So that's a big survey. And they asked, what age do you let them, you know, leave the front yard, leave the leave the block, leave the neighborhood? And even by age 14, the majority of American parents won't let the kids leave the block. That's that that is a wow. And then I love to refer to this book from the 80s, it was 70s, and republished in the 80s called Um, it was a series of child development books. And the one I'm going to talk about today was called Your Six-Yearld, Loving and Defiant. And it was just, you know, it tells you what's going on in their brains and how their bodies are developing. And then it gives a page that's a list of things that neurotypical six-year-olds were expected to do before they entered kindergarten. Can they stand on one foot for 10 seconds with their eyes closed? Can they tell their right hand from their left hand? Are they getting some baby teeth, you know, baby teeth falling out and, you know, grown-up teeth coming in? Can they walk four to eight blocks in any direction to the store, to school, to a friend's house, to the park? And so what we're talking about is six-year-olds walking four to eight blocks in in living memory, this just being normal before they start kindergarten, and 14-year-olds who are about to start high school not being able to walk one block. And that is, I mean, that's that's a that's a massive reversal. That's as if we were all suddenly, you know, as if the average height in America was three foot eight or something. I mean, it's like it's like people would go, like, wow, that's strange, because I remember when the average height was 5'4, and now suddenly it's three eight. You would you would notice it if it was a physical manifestation. You would notice it if suddenly everybody had a third eye in the middle of their forehead. You know, you would notice it if people went out in fur coats in the summer, if something really strange had happened. But this is very strange, and it it is considered prudent as opposed to bizarre. And that interests me, right?

SPEAKER_01 7:42

Yeah, I mean, I'd love to quote you on that. Prudent. It's considered prudent rather than bizarre. And yes, this is really weird. And I had no idea about the statistics that at 14, so many of our teens are not even walking, like alone. That's that is a wild I don't want to.

SPEAKER_03 8:00

So wild. I, you know, I I uh it it went beyond what I thought, and I was happy that somebody else did the study because I didn't have to do it. But yeah, usually I have my little graph here. I okay wherever anyway, doesn't matter.

SPEAKER_01 8:12

Go on. Yeah, I I mean it seems like again, we've I don't want to say regressed, but it seems like we've kind of went back in time. We've traveled back where we uh are just so worried about our children being uncomfortable. And I'm curious from your perspective, are we confusing a child feeling uncomfortable with being maybe unsafe? Mm-hmm. Yes.

SPEAKER_03 8:34

As a matter of fact, so after I let my son ride the subway and I wrote the book Free Range Kids, about 10 years ago, Jonathan Haidt, it's actually Height. Everyone thinks it's hate, it's height. Jonathan Haidt and Daniel Schuckman, two of our founders, were speaking with each other and they were talking about something strange that was happening on campus. John is a professor, and Daniel was for 10 years the chairman of FIRE, which fights for free speech on campus. And they were noticing exactly what you're framing, that kids who felt uncomfortable literally interpreted their feelings as making them that they were unsafe, which explains why they they asked for things like trigger warnings on a book that you know might contain ideas that they thought were terrible or weird or new. It's why they were asking or demanding that speakers not come to campus whose views they vehemently disagreed with, rather than boning up on their facts and going and sitting in the audience and raising their hand the first second it's like questions, and it's like, yes, you've said this, but I've heard that. You know, rather than engaging, they demanded security, right? And you need security when somebody is coming at you with an axe. You need security when there are firebombs. You don't need security from ideas because that's the idea of college, is that you get there, and even if it's something repugnant to you or wrong, you, you know, you you hone your chops by thinking together, why is this so wrong? You know, is it just that I feel it's wrong, or is it factually wrong, or is it morally wrong? Let me figure this out. And and so the discomfort was interpreted instead as danger. And my completely unproven theory about that is that they grew up with so much, so many other things that weren't dangerous being presented to them as actual dangers. Honey, I'm going to cut the hot dog into sixteenths. Honey, you know, you d don't walk to the bus stop. That's too far. It's two blocks. Oh, honey, you know, that that car seat that was okay last week has suddenly been declared not safe enough. And now we have a 20-point harness. You know, let me strap you into that before we walk, you know, drive three blocks to the, you know, to the CVS. So I think they grew up in sort of a house of mirrors in terms of what they should be exposed to, what was considered too much for them, and what was considered too dangerous. And they didn't they didn't get a real chance to to calibrate a a riskometer that made sense. And so everything was pinging at a lemon.

SPEAKER_01 11:06

Yeah, I mean, from a psychological standpoint, sometimes we confuse our emotions. I mean, I'm a speech pathologist, not a psychologist, but I see kids doing it all the time where discomfort means danger. So for example, if let's say someone hears something that uh contradicts a belief, like for example, if it's something political, which I don't bring up, but someone else brings up, right?

SPEAKER_02 11:26

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_01 11:28

And it contradicts their political base or let's say what they are used to hearing, almost it looks like they're very anxious and they respond in a way where their tone of voice indicates that perhaps they're super fired up. And there is less room, it seems like, for dialogue, even amongst our teens. Yeah. I mean, just working in the schools, I see that uh if someone says something that is just contrary to the other person's belief, uh, there is this discomfort. And sometimes, again, that's an alert of, oh my gosh, I'm feeling anxious or, you know, let me be a little bit aggressive right now in my in in the way I present things, because that is absolutely not acceptable, because that is not how we, you know, we learn things in in our home about what's going on in the world. It's interesting because uh it seems like what you're saying is that parents are stepping in and cutting up those hot dogs, you know, and making sure that everything is taken care of. Sorry. No, no, no.

SPEAKER_03 12:25

I I I am, but I just wanted to say that, and I don't blame parents. They've been told if you don't cut your hot dog into 16ths, your kid is gonna choke and it's all your fault. If you don't walk your kid to the bus stop, they're gonna be killed and it's all your fault. If you don't stand next to them at the bus stop, they're going to be snatched and it's all your fault. So they're, you know, they've been warned right and left of the the worst case scenarios in any everyday situation to the point where, you know, the social norms become that we're all standing next to our kids at the bus stop waiting for the bus to come to make sure that they get on the bus and nothing bad happens.

SPEAKER_01 13:02

You for making that distinction that parents are actually also being taught this. And also there's a lot of shaming going on that I've observed where, you know, parents will shame other parents, especially in social media.

SPEAKER_03 13:13

Yeah. I actually want to hear about that because I people mention it and I'm not, you know, I my kids are grown. So what do you see in terms of shaming?

SPEAKER_01 13:22

So what I've observed is it could be a conversation or it could be even in a Facebook group or Instagram, you know, where people are sharing their ideas about what they're doing as a parent. One example, the most common one, is breastfeeding versus not breastfeeding. And then all of a sudden it turns into a whole back and forth about, well, you know, as a parent, you should be comforting your child and you should be doing that. And then, you know, another person chimes in and before you know it, because social media is kind of not warm and friendly, just you know, that's an understatement, it's a back and forth. It's like, why why why do we care so much about other people's parenting? It's very odd. You know. Yeah, I mean, I think it's interesting because I see it amongst professionals too, like in terms of let's say as a speech pathologist myself, like I see on boards on social media particularly where people are getting into arguments and fights. And I guess behind a screen, when you're a keyboard warrior, right, it's easier to call people out than to their face. But people are awfully judgmental of the way someone else is practicing something, even like I'd love to hear what what their what the big fights are on in speech pathology. That's quite interesting. Well, it's interesting because I just had an ABA specialist, for example, on my podcast, uh Rose Griffin, and I wanted her on because a lot of SLPs feel like SLP is speech and language pathologist, right? Yeah, we have too many names. Yeah, right.

SPEAKER_03 14:47

No, I thought also it's like I thought it was like that school leadership something.

SPEAKER_01 14:51

Yeah, yeah. But no, it was speech pathologists that were called speech teachers in the school. It's it's a whole yeah, yeah. So we have a lot of names and acronyms. But anyway, so Rose Griffin was on here because again, ABA is an example of dealing with the behavior of, for those who are listening, applied behavior analysis. And over the years, it's gotten a bad rep because people have interpreted it to be a very strict way of approaching children. Um you're looking at a behavior. And in the past, the archaic system, I guess, would would make the kid basically do something, you know, force them to do something, and then they'd get a reward. And now it's evolved into a more independent system, and it's not just like a token system, like, here you go, you did what I asked you to do. More uh applying what you've observed and then, you know, channeling it into okay, so what are we gonna do from here? What kind of behavioral implementations are we gonna do? But again, a lot of people say, no way. Like I've heard things like I hate ABA, I would never do ABA. I I've had only bad experiences with ABA. You know, ABA is a danger to children, ABA is dismissing children's freedoms, ABA is awful. Oh, so everybody's back and forth thing about Yeah. And so that's a big one um in terms of incorporating ABA into practices, especially when children can't communicate their what they're trying to say. Uh it could be a non-speaking child or, you know, someone and so ABA is incorporated and or even with frustration tolerance, you know, it's incorporated um because again, communication and behavior go hand in hand, but that's a big one. And then there's also a big one in when it comes to feeding, which, you know, in terms of how to approach feeding, you know, there's a myofunctional way of dealing with it, which is at like the the mouth, uh, movements, is it from a motor standpoint? You know, is the mouth opened? Uh are are you able to use all the movements in order to swallow appropriately? While others say, well, we're not looking at it as a motor, we're looking at it as just, you know, just an organic medical kind of situation. So yeah, so even with feeding and swallowing, and then people go back and forth and yeah, and then and then to your point, there there's a lot of shame, just like in parenting, right? I think of so many difficult problems too, you know. And that's why sometimes you think like, okay, maybe we should just focus on what's going on with the child or what's going on with the teen, which is exactly what you speak to. Like, let's focus on on what they they actually need, which can be different, obviously, for each individual, right? But again, while respecting each other. So yeah, it is kind of weird that we're in this kind of like judgment thing. I mean, my perspective, I don't I don't do the research, but uh, is that social media also has allowed things to really go in a direction of let's just judge.

SPEAKER_03 17:46

Right. I think there's that, you know, I started Free Range Kids in 2008 or nine, and there, you know, social media was bubbling up, but it wasn't obviously at the boil it's at now. And there had certainly been plenty of judgment already happening. I mean, it was less voluminous because it wasn't, you know, 10,000 comments on something. Right. But in terms of parenting, I'm sure that people have always judged each other's parenting. But it felt like if you think that all roads lead to hell, unless you're on this very tiny, skinny balance beam of perfection, then you're going to judge more because it's not just like, God, look at how she dresses that kid. Or, oh my God, she's so overbearing. It's not that. It's like she's ruining him. Mm-hmm. And that's a different, you know, that allows you more moral umbrage because you care about this child and you see them being not abused, like literally, like hit or or or starved, but like, you know, I would never do that. And if she does that, it used to be he's gonna end up in therapy and now it's worse. It just, you know, she's he's gonna be like, you know, useless. So so I think, I think the overstatement of the impact of any parenting decision is what allows us to be so judgmental. Because if you really think that, like, you know, if she doesn't sign him up for travel soccer, she's ruining his chances at a decent life. That's different from like, you know, she's not signing him up for travel soccer, A, who cares? Or B, you know, he had a he has a lot of talent. I hope he develops it, you know, in the on the school team.

SPEAKER_01 19:26

Aaron Powell To your point, it seems like the moral compass, right, is a big part of this, right? And I think people view that their moral compass as being the guide for someone else's moral compass. And and they believe that p other parents or other professionals are not using the same moral. Right.

SPEAKER_03 19:43

They feel they certainly feel more evolved. But what I think I'm trying to get at, and I'm just thinking this through with you, is that your moral compass could be that's a bad decision or she's a bad parent. But if your moral compass goes to, and the child is gonna die or and the child is, you know, going to have their life ruined, then it allows you to take much more umbrage because you care whether the child lives or dies, and that parent doesn't. She let him walk to school. You know, what if there's a car that, you know, jumps the sidewalk? What if there's a predator? I care about him living till tomorrow, and she doesn't. There was this amazing study done. I just did on Instagram about it, about, I don't know, maybe five or ten years ago at the University of California, Irvine. And they they devised a, you know, a little story. A child is sitting in a car and they're left there for half an hour while their mom goes to do something. But then they told five different groups of people, all demographically the same, a slightly different reason for why the child was in the car. And they told group A that the kid was in the car because the mom was returning a book to the bookdrop and she fainted or something and didn't get revived for half an hour. And they told group B that the mom had to do something for work. And group C and D, I never remember, and group E was the mom was going to meet her lover for that half hour. Okay. And then separately again, they asked each of the groups, how much danger was that kid in by herself half an hour in the car, not too hot, not too cold. And it it, you know, it wasn't quite this neat, but on a scale of one to ten, the people who thought that the mom meant to be with her child but couldn't because she fainted, they said the kid was like in a five. And then the ones who thought that the mom had to do something for work, okay, the kid's in a six. You know, why'd she have to do that work? But maybe she really did. Seven or eight, whatever is exercise. But by the time they were asked about the mom meeting her lover, they said ten. Yeah. The kid was in a ten. And what this just proved very, very cleverly, I'd say, is that we think we're judging danger, but we're really judging the mom. The more immoral we think the mom, somehow we see that she put her kid in more danger. And who puts their kid in danger? Only an immoral mom. So it becomes this cycle of like, you let your kid walk to the bus stop. Who would do that? If she, you know, what if the kid dies? You must be a horrible mother. A horrible mother puts her kid in terrible danger. That kid could have been killed. And it becomes this new level of judgment of, you know, not judging you as a maybe slightly lazy or slightly careless or whatever, but as a mom who doesn't care whether her child lives or dies, the most immoral mom on earth.

SPEAKER_01 22:22

Right. And so there are so many extremes that are impossible. Yes. That's right. And that's what you're getting at, right? That's what you're you're really saying is that it sounds like we go from the child's walking to a bus to the child's gonna die. Uh or you're the worst parent in the world, rather than be like, oh, I wouldn't do that because I'm a little bit, you know, nervous about doing that. And so I'm not sure why you are, which, you know, is is okay. Those are fair statements, but we've suddenly gone to this extreme. Now the children are brought up with these extremes, and there's no room for any black and white, it sounds like, in terms of what is right and what is wrong. And it's just basically you're wrong, and that's it. And this this concept of, oh my God, this kid's gonna die, or this, you know, you're gonna be, you know, if you showed them that book so early on, they're reading that. That's a lot of things I see a lot, you know. How are they such an in yeah, like for example, uh if a teenager is reading a romance novel and in it there are, you know, things that might be a little bit not provoking, yeah. Yeah, racy, you know, a little bit more exciting, you know, and someone sees those books. I've I've seen that before. One parent will say, like, how could they do that? They're exposing their kids to really, really dangerous material, right? How people do that? Have they ever served TikTok?

unknown 23:41

Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_01 23:42

Their kid is gonna grow up to be, you know, something, you know, again, the extreme. Wear a bodice.

SPEAKER_03 23:48

Yeah, that kid's gonna grow up and rip a bodice.

SPEAKER_01 23:51

Yeah, that's it, and be on a stripper pole, right? I mean, that's it, that's the end of their life. So, yeah, that extreme is also prominent, just even from the books, you know, the teens are reading to even just, you know, how how much independence they're given really in terms of where they're at in life. Like, should they be going to a party? How could they go to a party, you know, at that age? That's also gonna ruin them. You know, they're gonna be involved in drugs before you know it, right? Um, if they're at a party with friends. So it's it seems like there's a lack of uh independence or there's a confusion between giving independence, right, versus and being heedless.

SPEAKER_03 24:29

Yes, well, I mean, from that early example of the 14-year-olds not off the block, I think that what's happened is that all independence has been rewritten as risk. And in in a culture that keeps telling us about the risks of everything, that's not surprising. But I mean, I write about the times that moms are sometimes dads, but usually moms, are investigated for neglect because their kid walked to the store or rode his bike. There was a big piece in the New York Times yesterday, actually about our work, because the the shark has been so jumped that boy, you know, that that moms have been. The the most famous recent case was the mom whose 10-year-old walked to a store, it was about a mile, while she was taking her other kid to the doctor. And she didn't know that the kid had left the house. He was supposed to be home. He was there with his grandpa. The grandpa didn't know he left either. And uh, some woman saw him. This was in Georgia and in small town Georgia at that, saw the kid, talked to him, Are you okay? What are you doing out here? Does your mother know you're here? I'm like, I'm fine. I just went to the store. No, my mom doesn't know. So the woman called the cops, and the cops came, and the cops called the mom and said, Do you know that your son is at the Dollar Tree? And she's like, Oh no, I didn't. He was supposed to be home. Oh, you didn't know where he was. And then they came and arrested her. And and the the obviously the animating impulse behind all this was was twofold. One was that a woman wouldn't take the kid's answer like, I'm fine, at face value. He's fine, right? She saw him, she talked to him, he wasn't in distress. And then also that that a mom is is wrong to the point of arrestable if she doesn't know where her 10-year-old is at any given moment. And that's a a new way of seeing parenting. It becomes surveillance as opposed to parenting, right? And yet those two have been conflated. And I'd say one of the reasons they've been conflated is that we have phones that follow them all the time, anyhow. So you should somehow you're supposed to know. In fact, one of the one of the uh things that the child protective services wanted the mom to do after they got involved as well was to install a tracking device on his phone that would allow her to track him. And they wanted her to do it in front of the caseworker to make sure that it actually happened. And so it's it's an odd parenting moment. Parents have been have gone from raising children to surveilling children, and that's become the norm. And a couple things happen. One is that you know everything that your kid is doing. Two is you worry more because you see, oh my God, why did she stop there? You know, is she talking to a stranger who's exposing himself or is she petting a dog? You know, is she picking dandelions or is somebody forcing her into a trunk? Why did she stop there for five minutes? I don't know. So you get you get to the point where you have all this information and you're expected to know everything that's going on and every location of your kid. And and in the meantime, if anything does happen that's sad or bad, you get blamed because you should have known. You had every tool available to the KGB, and somehow something bad happened, it's all your fault.

SPEAKER_01 27:29

Yeah. And I wonder if that's also putting parents in in this kind of overprotective lens, because when they see that you can get arrested just by not knowing where your 10-year-old child is, then suddenly they think, oh no, I may get arrested. And then they're also, you know, responding to this by maybe uh like putting in a tracking device or, you know, telling their child that they need to know where they are or following their child in some cases because of that fear, right?

SPEAKER_03 27:58

You know, and I feel like, yeah. I was just gonna say that's one of the reasons that Let Grow, which is the nonprofit that grew out of free range kids, is is worked uh to try to pass what we call reasonable childhood independence laws, um, which have been now passed in 13 states, which is quite amazing, that make it very clear that neglect is when you put your kid in obvious and serious danger. Nobody likes real neglect. But it's not anytime you take your eyes off your kids. And so that's there's a there's a reasonable childhood independence law that has been introduced into Congress now, hasn't been voted on yet, hasn't even been debated yet. But but there is a backlash against this assumption that anytime a child is unsupervised, they're automatically in danger. So a good parent supervises and and accompanies their child all the time. So that's there's the pendulum is swinging, Lecro is pushing that pendulum. And so, you know, we're we're on the way. And the article yesterday about parents who had been, you know, arrested or investigated simply for letting their kids play outside or whatever, has I I just looked at it yesterday when it was 2,000 comments, God knows how many today. And they were very, very much on in favor of like this is crazy.

SPEAKER_02 29:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 29:11

You know, kids need some independence. Parents need the grace to be allowed to decide when they think their kid is ready to play outside. So so the the needle is moving, the pendulum is swinging, uh, it takes its time, but it's going in that direction.

SPEAKER_01 29:25

Yeah. And I mean, the first thing I thought of was about the reasonable childhood independence that was inspired by your work. Now maybe in this situation, they weren't really uh honed in on that in terms of telling arresting someone and and well that state then passed a law.

SPEAKER_03 29:41

The the Georgia, the Georgia after that mom was arrested because her 10-year-old, God forbid, walked to s to town, they they turned around and passed, you know, I think they were the twelfth state or something, 11th or 12th state to pass our law.

SPEAKER_01 29:54

Right. And I wonder if also you've seen in your work, because we're so we have so much access to information now, like it's at our fingertips, whereas in the past, you know, you would hear from somebody, you heard from somebody, mom, you know, let someone walk all this, you know, two miles somewhere and made their own doctor's appointment at, you know, 10 years old. Oh my God, how could they do that? Do you think that having access to this information so quickly of all these different people doing all these different things with their children is impacting this sort of kind of going backwards and bizarre behavior?

SPEAKER_03 30:26

Yeah. I mean, there's two things that we're talking about access to. One is access to everybody else's parenting decision that people jump on and analyze. Actually, there's three things. Another thing is hearing about anything terrible that happens to any kid anywhere. And so you say, oh, well, that wouldn't be me, and you immediately do the victim blaming. You know, I would never let my kid walk outside at 6 30 in the morning on a Tuesday. I would never let her go to a party or whatever. So there's the victim blaming. And then there's the tsunami of information that we have about our own kids. And Wendy Mogle, who wrote The Blessings of a Skin Knee, So Wise, once said this statement that has stuck with me, which was that don't feel terrible that sometimes you might like your kids' friends a little more than you like your own kids. And what she meant by this was that it's it's not surprising because if you look at anything very closely, you see the flaws. And of course, you see the flaws in your own kids. And and you see only, you know, the kid coming over to your house and being polite and you don't see the tantrum at home. But but the the the the granularity with which we see our kids today. I mean, there's there's the portals that show us their grades immediately. There's the constant you know, contact with the school, there is the tracking, there are the you know, the devices in the rooms that, you know, from and and the wombs you know, you see your kid, you know, before they're born, and you see them in their crib and you see them as a dot on a map. And the gizmo watch, which I think of as truly evil, allows you to listen in on a kid's conversation, even with the kid not knowing it. I mean, it's a bugging device. Oh my god. Right? Right? And then you can hear them say, like, I hate mommy, or I'm mad at my sister, or I I pretended to eat my broccoli and I hid it under the chair. You can, you know, kids are allowed to have a life. Right. But not that much anymore. They're sort of treated like inmates in a way, in that you're allowed to, you know, know everything. Uh there my friend sent me screenshots from her preschool, the the comments that the preschool sent home on a daily basis. You know, Cindy ate all of her nuggets and three out of four of her, you know, apple wedges. And then, and then there's a schedule of when she went to the bathroom. She went to the bathroom at 857, and then again at 1052, and then at 12.02, guess what? BM, not just P, BM. And so it's it's this bizarre level of information that used to be, first of all, impossible. And then the next, the next level was you used to get that kind of information if a child was an inpatient somewhere, if they if they were, you know, in the neonatal intensive care, you would want to know. And then I'm so old, I, you know, I'm I was about to actually put on Twitter and and other social media today for stories of what are grandparents most stunned by that the that their children are doing with the grandchildren. Because the idea of recording every diaper change seems onerous.

SPEAKER_01 33:27

Let's put it that way. You know, it sounds to me like, and I would love to hear your take on this, uh, that there's a level of control, right, that maybe parents need to feel in terms of letting their child kind of go because it's it's scary to them. And you know, from the research I've seen that sometimes they feel dysregulated themselves because they feel like they can't control what's happening to their child. And then the child then also feels dysregulated and nervous in terms of, you know, all the things that they're trying to do, and then they kind of feel like they need that support. And and then to the other point that you were saying, in terms of the the not the learned helplessness, but also there was something else that you said that I that really resonated with me, just in terms of with the family, right? So in within families, I think that we we show, at least I know I show my worst side because easy, because you know, hey, there's some level of love, they they know me so well, and so uh it's so easy to see the flaws, like and then in your own children see your own their their biggest flaws because they're not they're gonna show you their darkest moments. Yes, that's true. There's also judgment within families, because I ha I observed a parent indicating that another that their their sister isn't like them in terms of, you know, the way that they nurture their children. This parent essentially does everything for their child, um, including doing homework with them, which is fine, right? Or doing the homework for them, but the the meter was, you know, the sister doesn't do homework with them or lets them kind of do the things on their own. So therefore, who's the better parent? Who gets the parent of the year award? Is it the one that is it the one that, you know, is is doing all these things for their child and and is there all the time and never traveling and never going anywhere because they need to be there for their kids? Do they get the parent of the year award? Or is it the one that is actually letting their kids be on their own and is actually separating from the child and is traveling for self-care and is enjoying it?

SPEAKER_03 35:38

Yeah, I feel like the extreme judgment between, you know, siblings or within families is probably as old as Cain and Abel.

SPEAKER_02 35:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 35:46

You know, that was like the first family we knew of, and there was a lot of extreme judging and who's better. But in terms of the control idea, I think that's I think that's the that's the big lie, is that if you have all this information and if you have all these, if you have all this information, you know where your kid is and how they're doing and what are their grades and what's their temperature and who are their friends and what are they watching. And somehow, if you have all that information, you can create the perfect child. And the more information, the more likely you are to, you know, make this kid great. You know, we always say make good choices. And it's like, you actually want your kids to make some bad choices and learn from them, but th there's very little opportunity to do that if you're watching and saying, like, honey, I saw that you just took a right turn. You want to take a left turn there. And, you know, it's just it's all foisted upon parents. I was just listening to a podcast about EdTech, how it sort of infiltrated schools. Yeah. And I feel like all this, all this information gathering infiltrated parenting. The, you know, the the portals and the information from the schools and the surveillance opportunities. And we're not equipped to know this much about our kids, you know. Is it good that he is, you know, dawdling on his way home or bad? Is it, you know, is it good that he got a bee or bad that he got a bee? I mean, it's just too much for us to calculate and then and then we have to decide the exact right course of action, knowing that he's walking home slowly and he got a bee. And he only ate three out of four of his orange segments today. That's like, I couldn't figure out if that's, you know, is that good? Is he, you know, ruminating and developing a growth mindset, or is he anxious and he's going to lash out? I mean, there's just there's the assumption that if you have all the information and ever more, you can, you can use it, you can put it in your algorithm and and spit out the perfect parenting response that then creates the perfect child, and that's a big lie.

SPEAKER_01 37:50

Mm-hmm. I mean, it's interesting because I've seen perfectionism in all areas just backfire a lot because the moment you lose that control, then suddenly, you know, it's it's really hard just to move forward because suddenly you lost that grip. But you know, you what you're saying is interesting because that control also is allowed through all these platforms. And I remember when I was younger, there was no cell phone. So basically, when I went out with my friends, my parents couldn't contact me. Uh, there were payphones around, and I still remember being in front of this mall in Brooklyn where I grew up. And I remember like I had a quarter with me to put into the payphone. I was looking for a payphone because I didn't want my parents to get nervous. I finally found a payphone, put the quarter in, maybe we had a brief chat and that was it. But for hours, they couldn't locate me. And so it's all of human history you're talking about. When I speak to that because I know as a child, I couldn't be located. And I feel like maybe there was less anxiety and less stress involved for the parent. Because again, if you can't locate the child, then it's great. Ignorance is bliss. It's better not to see things, right? You can't follow anyone. And even I see when children get older and they're living with their parents, let's say, and the parents know when they're coming home and they're not home, it's very alarming to the parent, right? Because they want to know exactly when they'll be home. If not, they may be out there, you know, who knows, at a bar somewhere, getting drunk, right? If they're a young adult or the mind goes to the extreme these days, right? Where it's they may be, you know, out with someone who is dealing drugs. It really does go to all those places. Dark places. Very dark places, where so many parents have said, once my child moves out of the home, suddenly I'm not worrying as much. Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_03 39:36

Yeah. It's not just that ignorance is bliss, it's that maybe it is just ignorance is bliss. But but I'd say that the reason it's bliss is because ignorance is a a sort of mean word for trust, right? Or faith, right? Which is that I basically think things are fine unless I have evidence to the contrary. When you're told that you have to be watching all the time and given the opportunity to do so, the base assumption is that you better be doing it, or thank God you can do that, because so much could be going wrong. And so you never really end up developing the what I call the trust muscle. Yeah. You know, the muscle that says, okay, I can't see him. He's probably fine. I know that this is true of me because I'm terrified of cars. And if I think of my kids driving around, you know, or if I'm with them, you know, oh, why are you driving so fast? Or, you know, did you, did you signal your lane change or whatever? But they're driving when I'm not with them and I don't have to think about it all the time. And so it's the same with crossing the street. You should are you looking both? They're they're grown-ups. And I'm like, you know, put down your phone and cross the street, pay attention. And and uh so there's something about knowing too much, seeing too much that we're not equipped to deal with. I mean, it's so new, this ability to to know where they are and to be able to contact them at any moment. I I always refer to, you know, in Harry Potter, they get the Marauders map and they can suddenly see, you know, the Weasley twins are in the joke shop, right? And and that's it's a miracle. It's uh it's magic. It was a cool, it was a cool thing, you know, one of the many cool things that J.K. Rowling invented in those books. And now it's just, oh, the Weasley twins are at the joke shop. I guess that means they'll be home in about 15 minutes. Yeah. And and it's it's just a it's an entirely new ability to know what's going on with your kids. And we are not equipped to deal with it. And and it's it's almost like it's creating OCD. You know, OCD is when you need to check, when you need certainty because you can't deal with uncertainty. Did I turn off the stove? Did I lock the door? Without, you know, what's the the therapy for those is that you have to, you know, leave the house and and sit for 15 minutes without knowing whether the the burners are still on. Yeah. And and there's no chance to do that when you have certainty that you can check anytime you want. And so we're actually creating sort of OCD when it comes to the world and and our loved ones by providing so much, so many points of contact, so many points of certainty.

SPEAKER_01 42:15

OCD, like you said, is just the need to feel certainty. You know, there's no room for doubt, there's no room for not knowing, and then you're always checking, right? You're always checking. Now there's this constant checking with the children. But as you mentioned, something that resonated with me, which is, you know, if you learn how to drive with someone, you know, with a parent, that's worse. Awfully, I mean, I don't recommend it to anyone. I tried with my dad and then had a friend teach me because it was so scary. You know, my dad was like checking, wait, what's going on? What's going on? And like I was freaking out, you know. So I don't recommend that, just as a side note, because it's it's really not good. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But yeah, so we've spoken a lot about this piece of not allowing for independence. But you know, at Let Row, you're really trying to have adults think about how to give the children opportunities to be independent.

SPEAKER_03 43:05

Yeah, let me let me explain our two free programs for schools, because that's uh, you know, I think they work really well. They're being studied now as actual therapy. So one of our programs, our sort of star program, is called the Let Grow Experience. And that is a homework assignment that teachers give students. And we were just talking to a a school with special needs, sort of a special needs school yesterday that was very excited to do this. But it's for all kids and it's for K through 12, so all ages. And what it is is this assignment you to go home and do something new on your own with your parents' permission, but without your parents. And each month there's a different theme. Do something, you know, for your family, do something in your community with a friend. And and we give a list of, you know, potential ideas. And of course, they're different for the high school kids than for the younger kids. But the whole idea is for the kids and the parents to talk about it's like, well, I really feel like I'm ready to walk to the bus. Or I think it's time for me to make dinner, you know, that would be exciting for me. And I want to go get the ingredients, whatever it is, anywhere along that continuum, so long as it's a stretch, it's not just like, you know, I put the fork next to my plate. That's not very good. But if it's if it's something new, if you have haven't scrambled an egg, that's significant the first couple of times, right? So the parents and the kids decide what it's going to be. And the kid does this thing without the parents. And so it's it's a fantastic experience for the kid. You know, oh my God, I rode my bike to the park. I played there for two hours. It was so fun. It was so great. Or I made the dinner and I'm so proud. So the kid is very proud, but even prouder is the parent because we live for those moments when our kids do something on their own without us. It's like, you know, you know what my kid did? You know, she drove herself to the mall, or she got herself a job, or, you know, I wouldn't, I couldn't have believed it, but he actually took out the, you know, he took out the trash without me asking. Anything that a kid does of their own volition with their own gumption makes us so proud. And that's what we've sort of drained from parenting. That's why parenting is such a drag today. We're with them all the time. And so, A, it's taking up all our time. B, it's a little boring for both generations. And C, we never get to see, would he have shared his toy without my saying, share your toy, Jaden? You know, or, you know, don't forget to say thank you. It's really cool when the mom of the other kid calls and says, you know what, your kid was here yesterday, and he put his dish in the sink. I was a bright and like my kid. So so we need to be separate from our kids for us to see that they're growing and also for us, for our hearts to fill. And the let grow experience makes that happen on a communal level. And it, and you know, John Heid always has a collective problem, whether it's phones or something else, needs a collective solution. And the collective problem here is that we're not letting our 14-year-olds off the block. And the collective solution is that if everybody does this, then it's not me being a nut, it's not me being lazy, it's not me being the mom you're gossiping about. It's me doing something for my kid. So it reframes letting go and independence as a gift, as homework, because they're going to get bigger and better. It's a gift you can give your kid to say, I trust you, go do this thing. And it it gives back. It gives back to the kid, it gives back to you. And it actually, we keep hearing this, and it it must be true because we do keep hearing it, is that it actually makes the parent-child relationship better. And I don't know exactly why, but my guess is that the kid feels trusted, and that's a great feeling. You want your parents not just to love you, but to believe in you. And now they see, hey, you do.

SPEAKER_01 46:52

Yeah, I mean, that's incredible, the work that you're doing, because it sounds like it really is creating that trust. And the parents know about what the child's doing to become independent, and then also the child is proud, and then the parent is proud at the same time. So everyone's just happy and excited about it. So this is really the beginning of a movement to combat what's going on with parenting as a whole in a collective way, as Jonathan Haidt said, right? Um, because a collective solution.

SPEAKER_03 47:22

So I was gonna mention the other let grow thing that we recommend for schools, and it's called the Let Grow Play Club. It needs a better name for if you use it in middle or high school. But but, anyways, it is that you keep the school open for mixed ages, all the kids together, no phones, free play. And there's an adult there, but they're like a lifeguard, right? They're not organizing the games, they're not making the teams, they're not solving the arguments, they're just there in case of emergencies. And then you put out stuff like, you know, there's balls and hula hoops and chalk and an old suitcase and a bunch of cardboard boxes. And what you've done is you've sort of recreated a old-fashioned childhood in a place that A has enough kids, because if they go home, the the number of kids who are going to end up in the park is generally small. And B in a place that parents trust, right? Because even if your your park is dangerous, or even if they just don't, you know, I have another amazing graph that shows that most parents think that if a kid is at the park, they're, you know, they're 50% of people think of two 10-year-olds at the park, they're in danger of being kidnapped, which is wildly off. Yeah, wildly, wildly off. But um, anyways, and then and then it's great for the kids because then you come back to school the next day, and the third grader has made friends with the fifth grader, and suddenly the school is even more welcoming and more fun, and you see the fifth grader in the hall, and that's cool. And if you didn't have a friend in your class, but you met a kindergartner who was really your soulmate, well, then school is less lonely. And and you've you've like ignited all the great things that happen in free play that happen less in organized sports. Organized sports, somebody's made the teams, somebody's decided if the ball is in or out, somebody's decided when the game begins and ends. But when you are organizing a game, you have to figure out, like, well, you know, if you guys have the, you know, the Thompson twins, then we have to have the oldest kid because those, you know, so you're you're calculating things and you're compromising and you're explaining and you're being creative. Wait, this is bad. Let's play it blindfolded. You know, so it's all the social emotional skills that Mother Nature expected to develop when kids are together in a mixed-age group trying to figure out what to do to have fun, that we now have to give kids on worksheets because we wonder why don't they have any social emotional skills? It's like, well, take out free play, which is exactly what Mother Nature expected to happen. You know, she didn't expect it to be taken out. She expected it to be engaged in every day so kids would learn how to be humans. And then you have to replace it with something artificial, which is classes in how to be a human. Well, why don't you just let them be human? Give them the let grow play club.

SPEAKER_01 49:55

I love that. I love that because I see in the schools and even uh I work in a school right now, but in general, this free play concept, which as a speech pathologist, we espouse that that is free development. I mean, that is right. Um, reciprocal play can't just happen uh with you hovering over the child and seeing if they're playing correctly, right? You can't social. Uh, but uh what I'm noticing is in the school setting that not only is there less of the free play, but there also is a a lack of recess, like a lack of social interaction during recess where recess is taken away or there is recesses in the classroom. And so, you know, you're not Wow, really? Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 50:37

When is it in the classroom?

SPEAKER_01 50:38

Just because it's snowing or what? Oh no, just in general, a lot of places, if especially in New York City, some places just don't have the space, maybe, or they feel like maybe the children are gonna uh have a lot of difficulties with each other, so they they keep it in the classroom so they they're more contained and not having these behavioral quote unquote outbursts with each other. Wow.

SPEAKER_03 50:58

Well, you know, that's so sad because how do you, you know, like how do you learn not to have outbursts by playing? Right. Nobody's gonna play with you if you're, you know, impossible. And so they the kids actually need the opportunity that they're being deprived of to become the socialized creatures that the, you know, that apparently they aren't. Right. Yeah. It's sort of chicken and egg. You have to keep them in the class because they're not socialized. They're not socialized because you keep them in the class.

SPEAKER_01 51:26

Exactly, exactly. And then so now we've instituted a lot of these classes, social emotional classes, to teach social emotional. But again, from my perspective, at least, and I'd love to hear your take, you can't really teach that in a class. It has to happen organically, where you're having opportunities to engage with people as much as possible and do so in a way where, you know, adults are not necessarily watching your every move to make sure that everybody is safe. Of course, right, right, right. So safety, I mean, that's why we're talking about like a lifeguard.

SPEAKER_03 51:58

Yeah. So yes, I agree. I have to go in a few minutes. But yeah, I think that, you know, there is an organic way. Somehow, before there were schools, even, kids learn to get along and grow up and be cooperative and work in a society. And we've we've taken away so many of those sort of natural ways that that happens that we've replaced them with artificial ways. And we wring our hands like, why aren't kids, you know, why are kids depressed? Why are kids anxious? Well, they have no free play and they have no independence. And these are the things that make you feel great and also teach you lessons. If you're mean on the playground, then kids don't want to play with you.

SPEAKER_01 52:40

Right.

SPEAKER_03 52:40

If you, you know, if you go to the grocery and you forget to get your change, you know, that's a lesson you've learned. We we've taken so much real life out of kids' lives that we keep having to give them this plastic simulcrum of, you know, independence and free play. And there's a very simple alternative, which is let grow, especially if you do it in schools. You have all these kids starting to do new things in the real world with their parents' permission, but without their parents. And then you have this wonderful opportunity. I'd say it'd be great if it's every day for kids to be arguing, laughing, creating, becoming friends because they have empty free time it to expand, to become the people that we would love them to be, and take those out of kids' lives and we rue the day. And so just, I mean, let grow's materials are free. Our programs are free. Our website is free. I'm talking to you for free. I mean, it's like we just we we want to change the culture by helping by helping make it easy, normal, and legal, those are our mandates, to give kids back independence and free play. And I'd say responsibility. Kids really love responsibility, even if it seems like they're balking. They want to feel like they're part of a team, they want to feel like they're givers as well as takers. And so all these things together can make an a a healthier childhood without spending any money. Right. Just stepping back and watching the kids step up.

SPEAKER_01 54:08

Yeah, responsibility is a huge one because I see it all the time. When a kid is having challenges with monitoring their frustration, and then you give them a responsibility, suddenly that kind of turns around and they just love the fact that they're able to give back, to do something, to be productive. That's a big one. But yeah, um, Lenore, I can't thank you enough for being on the podcast. You've shared so much important information, so much research that is so important so that we can really uh support our children and our teens in gaining that independence because, like you said, it's so hard right now with parents being taught that they, you know, need to act a certain way and have a certain level of control, or else they're not good parents. And so I love the movement that you're doing um that hopefully can just like spread around the country and around the world and people feel less scared and and and feel confused.

SPEAKER_03 55:03

Right. Wait, wait, wait, wait. Closing my window here. Sure. Yeah, one of our expressions is less fearful, more cheerful. That'd be crazy.

SPEAKER_01 55:10

Oh, I love that. Yeah. And then to your point, you know, there is more cheer involved on both sides. Both parties are are engaged in in that level of independence. So um to close up, uh, for the sake of time, I just um, because I could talk to you for hours about this. I mean, this is such an important topic and one in which it it's just you could go on and on with all these stories. But so everyone can find you on you said your website, but also social media.

SPEAKER_03 55:38

Yeah, it's the website is letgrow gr-o-w dot org. And that's where you'll find, you know, the programs we have. Such cool things. We have a a little card that you can print out that says for for your kid to carry that says, I'm not lost or neglected. My parents know I'm out here, and then you have your phone number on there. Love it. We have a cool thing, I'd say for kids, pretty much K through five, four weeks to a let grow kid. You know, first week you the kid starts doing stuff for themselves that we've been doing for them that they could do. And then the next week they start doing stuff outside, and then things with friends, and then organizing activities. It's just very, very simple and freeing and exciting. And then we have the programs for schools that are all free. And and then information on the state laws are there too. And then you can just look around on online for anything with Let Grow Org is is us. And then me, I'm personally I'm free range kids because it's from the olden days on Twitter. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 56:36

Yeah. On Twitter, but Twitter's not, you know, people still tune into Twitter all the time.

SPEAKER_03 56:40

I I I wish I could quit Twitter. I can't quit Twitter.

SPEAKER_01 56:43

Uh I'm what it goes that like with Twitter be just because Thread started X or whatever. And I and I was having trouble accessing it. So I was just like, whatever, I'm done. But anyway, so thank you so much again for being here. I mean, you provided a wealth of information, and it's so good to see people like you who are so passionate about changing this really big thing in society, because again, these children are gonna be adults and they're gonna have to do things that are contributing to society and and they need this independence and they need to be trusted and so much more. But yeah, I mean, thank you for for starting this big movement and really, you know, my pleasure.

SPEAKER_03 57:23

Starting a movement. Oh, no problem. Yeah, well, you're welcome, and I was really happy to be able to talk to you, and thank you for working in the New York City school. My kids got to them too. Right? Thank you. Thank you.

SPEAKER_01 57:34

Um, but yes, and have a great day. You too. All right, bye, Sharon.

SPEAKER_00 57:38

Thanks for joining us on Unmasking Social, where we neurodiverse advocates and those who support them. Explore how real friendship begins when we start showing up as ourselves. If today's episode resonated with you, please share it with a friend, leave a review, or follow me for more conversations that provide information on neurodivergent ways of thinking and communicating. Until next time, stay social.