He used to play baseball in high school and in college. I even played in a thirty-plus league in the mid-eighties. When my daughter Sarah was born in 1991, baseball was not something I thought she would ever be interested in. But when she was about six years old, I took her to the park to play baseballs. He picked up the balls after I hit them and got up to hit. He hit some balls and even ran the bases. Sarah had and still has athletic ability: good hand-eye coordination, flexibility, strength, and agility. Well, when Sarah was 7 years old, she came to see me one day and said, “Hey, Dad, can I play soccer?” I said, “Sure.” So I went out and bought him a soccer ball, shin guards, and cleats. I enrolled her in the recreational league in town. I must admit I was quite excited. We practiced kicking the ball in the backyard, and we were both very excited about their first game.

Well, the Saturday of the first game came, so Sarah and I headed to the soccer field. After some warm-up activities and a pep talk from the coach, the game began. To my surprise, Sarah was in the starting lineup. He ran up and down the field for the first ten minutes or so, finally getting a chance to kick the ball. He took his first kick, missed the ball and landed on his back. He got up and came crying to the touchline and begged, “Don’t make me play anymore, Dad, I can’t do it.” She refused to return to the game. The game ended, and on the way to the car she continued crying: “Don’t make me play daddy, please, I don’t want to.” I mustered all my courage and said sternly, “You’re playing. You’re playing. Now get in the car.” He got in the car and we headed home. On the way home all I heard was a lot of whining and whining in the backseat. I didn’t have a very long drive home, but I can tell you this. She exhausted me. I was exhausted with emotions when I got home. We pulled into the driveway and I sat miserably in the car as I watched Sarah walk out and into the house, sobbing and shaking as she walked through the front door.

I sat in the car cooking and said to myself, “Who wants to play soccer anyway, I play dumb?” Then I tried to rationalize my thoughts even more by saying to myself, “Soccer is for kids anyway.” I walked into the house, stood at the bottom of the stairs and yelled, “SARAH.” She sobbed through a “Yes, Dad.” I said, “Come here.” She came down the stairs and I said, “Look, honey, you don’t have to play soccer if you don’t want to play. I’m fine.” She said, “Oh, thank you daddy.” He gave me a big hug and a kiss and ran upstairs. Honestly, I felt like his hero. I was his knight in shining armor. I had just helped her and had given her exactly what she wanted. He was sure he had made a wise decision; I didn’t even have to ask his mother’s opinion. I thought what the problem was, it hadn’t done any harm. I was glad to know that I had allowed my six-year-old daughter to make her own decision.

Well, I have another daughter named Grace (Grace is 6 years younger than Sarah) who came to see me when she was six and said, “Hey dad, can I play soccer?”

I said, “Sure, honey.” He started the same routine again, shin guards, cleats, soccer ball, practice, and finally the game. But this time, the result was very different. Grace ran enthusiastically across the field from one end to the other. He never got close enough to touch the ball, but he had a blast. Grace walked off the field with a look of utter joy in her eyes and said, “Wow, that was fun, Dad.” He played the first season and had a great time. He played the next season and he really improved a lot. He really wanted to score, but didn’t get the chance. She still loved the game. For her, each game was an event, an outing that ended with a snack and Gatorade, lunch, and a fun time with me.

While this was going on, Sarah was into cheerleading, gymnastics, track, palate, and even a little weightlifting. She loved designer clothes, getting her nails done, tanning, putting on makeup, and looking good. He looked at his weight and realized that to look good, he had to spend a lot of time exercising. She once told me that some of her friends on her track team had less body fat than she and that they could run faster than her. It was just a passing comment, but I remember her saying it, and I definitely noticed that she was upset about this.
One day Sarah and I went to the soccer field to pick up Grace from soccer practice. We got to the field and Grace got into the car sweating; his face was as red as a tomato. Sarah handed him a Gatorade and a sandwich in the back seat, and Grace just sat there, sipping her drink with satisfaction. Sarah looked at Grace again, then looked forward, looked at Grace again, and then stared at me. She said, “Hey dad, why didn’t you make me play soccer?”
I said to him (defensively): “I wanted you to play. Don’t you remember? You kicked the ball once, you missed and fell on your head. Then you begged me not to make you play again.”

She responded with “So? Why didn’t you force me?”

Now it was me who was breaking into a sweat. I said, “You didn’t want to play. You wouldn’t give up until I agreed not to make you play. Sarah then told me that I’ll never forget it as long as I live. She said,” But Dad, you’re supposed to be in charge.

Where had I gone wrong seven years before? At the time, it seemed the right thing to do was to give in to what Sarah wanted. But it turned out that he hadn’t done what she needed him to do. He had allowed a six-year-old girl to decide whether she wanted to play soccer or not. What had he really needed at that moment? She needed me to tell her that I was going to play soccer because I, as a father, knew what was best for her and I was not going to give her a way out. She wanted me to be in charge, not allow her to be in charge. Without knowing it, he had let her down.

When I teach my graduate courses, I ask my adult students the following question all the time. How many things did your parents let you get away with when you were a kid that you wish you had never gotten away with? I usually get a lot of shocked looks from my students.

Too often we allow our children to make decisions and choices that they don’t have to make. I see it all the time in supermarkets, stores and malls, parents who give up when their children demand that they buy something, or parents who try to convince their children to stop crying or run away from them. Children ignore the pleas of their parents. Parents usually tell their children something like “What do you want to do?” Well honestly, who cares what they want, they are three years old!

I’m not entirely sure where all this attitude came from, but I have my own theory that Dr. Benjamin Spock had a lot to do with it. Spock’s first book, Baby and Child Care “was first published in 1946 just in time for the baby boomer generation. In his book, he talked about on-demand feeding, respecting his children, the need for flexibility, and the lack of the need to worry. The paperback sold more than 50 million copies and was translated into 30 languages. Critics of Spock claimed that he was “the father of permissiveness.” In later years, Spock claimed that he never changed his basic philosophy on childcare, that it was imperative to respect children because they are human beings and deserve respect. But he seemed to stray a bit from his teachings when he made statements such as “I’ve always said ask your children for respect, ask for cooperation, ask out of courtesy.

Give your children strong leadership. “Years later, he became more self-righteous and said that parents should give their children strong values ​​and encourage them to help others. This is just a guess, but I suppose Spock may have decided that he did not like what he saw in society and realized that it may have played a role in confusing generations.In later editions of the book originally titled The Common Sense Book of Baby and Child Care, he emphasized that children needed standards and that parents also have the right to be respected He stated in his book that parents were beginning to fear imposing themselves on the child in some way.

I don’t claim to be a parenting expert, but I do know that if children are fed on demand, they will be picky. If they are allowed to say what they want, they will be disrespectful. If they are not held responsible, they will be irresponsible. And if there are no consequences for inappropriate behavior, they will not comply. Today’s parents always ask: What can we do with our children today? My question is, what are we going to do with these parents?

Once I gave up my natural right as a parent to make decisions for my children, I could never truly reestablish my parental authority. From the moment my daughter convinced me to let her make the decision not to play soccer, she learned that she had the power to make basically every decision that came up in her life, big or small. And the saddest part of all this for me is that she blames me because I wasn’t strong enough NOT to let her take on a role that she was never designed to play in her own young life.

Dr. Spock has passed away, and I think many of us are looking for a new voice to offer us some solid advice to help us solve the mess we find ourselves in today.