Our closest parent friends are becoming kind of intense parents. Anyone BTDT and have advice?

[Anonymous]

We are on spring break with another family with different parenting style. We get along great as adult friends. I really really hope I do not make them feel the way OP does.

We both have 3 kids. 2 of my 3 kids are very athletic and play multiple sports well. Their kids did some soccer and scouts but stopped during Covid so now they are doing nothing. They used to have a nanny but now work from home juggling work and kids. I stay home and I am sure it sounds like our kids do a lot. All our kids are strong students.

[Anonymous]

I was very anti screen anti sugar when I had my first. My third child has candy often from parties, Halloween, Xmas, etc and I don’t care. When my oldest was 3, we had a friend whose daughter could bike up and down hills and I felt behind. My kids played tennis on a team but we didn’t spend that much effort while our friends had private coaches and were playing in tournaments. Now my kids are amazing bikers and play tennis all day.

There will be kids who excelled when they were young who don’t do much as teenagers. However, all the elite kids in high school all started when they were 5 or younger.

My husband pushes my kids at sports because they have raw talent and they enjoy it. It sounds like OP and her husband may not have anything specific they want their kids to try or do. This is the time to start.

I remember I once met a parent whose kid played ice hockey at age two! I thought she was joking when I met her but she wasn’t joking at all. My friends with kids in gymnastics seem to be pretty damn advanced by age 8.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP it is a 100 percent guarantee that your kids will not stay super close forever. They will grow apart and have conflict and seek out friends they chose for themselves. So if the parents are bumming you out, don't stay all in for your child's sake.

I agree with others, just back off slightly and widen your circle.

This is not true. Some people really are friends from birth into adulthood.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why do you care how they raise their kid, and why does it stress you out? If they are telling you to do it with your kid, that's different. But who cares if they want THE BEST ART SCHOOL for fingerpainting and you dont'? So what if Larla loves arugula and your kid doesn't? That should not impact the basic tenets of friendship.

Maybe you need to let this stuff bother you less, seems to me like you're comparing too much. Don't. Let them do them, and you do you. Don't be smug in your choices and don't care about theirs.

DP, but most parents who are this intense about things like activities, food, etc., can't just live and let live. They talk incessantly about these things, compare choices, on and on, and it's tedious AF to those of us who are more laid back.

Slightly different example, but still relevant: we went on vacation last summer with three other families. We all had separate living quarters, but got together at the beach, for meals, etc. Three of us are chill, one half of the fourth couple isn't. When that translates to repeatedly yelling at all the kids for being too noisy, limiting food options because they're not healthy enough, etc., of course it impacts the rest of us. It's not fun to see an adult yelling at kids *while on vacation* FFS.

+1

It takes very special friends to be able to do vacations together

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I was very anti screen anti sugar when I had my first. My third child has candy often from parties, Halloween, Xmas, etc and I don’t care. When my oldest was 3, we had a friend whose daughter could bike up and down hills and I felt behind. My kids played tennis on a team but we didn’t spend that much effort while our friends had private coaches and were playing in tournaments. Now my kids are amazing bikers and play tennis all day.

There will be kids who excelled when they were young who don’t do much as teenagers. However, all the elite kids in high school all started when they were 5 or younger.

My husband pushes my kids at sports because they have raw talent and they enjoy it. It sounds like OP and her husband may not have anything specific they want their kids to try or do. This is the time to start.

I remember I once met a parent whose kid played ice hockey at age two! I thought she was joking when I met her but she wasn’t joking at all. My friends with kids in gymnastics seem to be pretty damn advanced by age 8.

Oh dear

[Anonymous]

OP here. Reading through the replies has been interesting, thank you. I do think some of you are projecting some of your own experiences onto mine -- this really isn't a high conflict situation at all. Mostly I was looking for advice on how to stay friends but maybe reduce how much time we spend talking about kid-centric topics. I just increasingly don't like how those conversations go because they want to talk intensely about something like after-school enrichment and I can't do that. I also think they are the sort who are always tweaking things a bit (let's try a new soccer league, let's look into privates, let's hire a different nanny, etc.) and we like to ride things out a bit and see how it goes. It's really just a different approach. I could never do it the way they do because it would make me too anxious. But that doesn't mean they are wrong. It takes all kinds.

I do really want to preserve the friendship because I think it's special for our kids to have this kind of friendship, where they take vacations together and get to spend time together in ways that are hard to do with other friends. Having a friend you get to see all the time when your parents get together is really special -- you get to know them in a different way. I never had that growing up but my older brother had it with our neighbors (who were his age, but not too old for me to really bond with) because our families spent so much time together. They are lifelong friends. It's a special bond.

I guess I just need to decide if this is something I should address directly (maybe by asking directly if we could take a break from all the activities/diet/screentime talk when we get together) or finding ways for it not to be so draining for me. I will say that this problem is more pronounced with the husband, who has a more intense personality generally and can just get fixated on certain topics (and is more inclined to sort of interrogate us about what we are doing around a certain issue). The wife is more laid back, or at least more aware that not everyone wants to talk about this stuff all the time. Perhaps I'll try to set up more playdates where it's just moms, maybe try to stick to one annual vacation together but otherwise decline. I don't want to offend them or push them away, but I definitely need a little more space.

Thanks for the input.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was very anti screen anti sugar when I had my first. My third child has candy often from parties, Halloween, Xmas, etc and I don’t care. When my oldest was 3, we had a friend whose daughter could bike up and down hills and I felt behind. My kids played tennis on a team but we didn’t spend that much effort while our friends had private coaches and were playing in tournaments. Now my kids are amazing bikers and play tennis all day.

There will be kids who excelled when they were young who don’t do much as teenagers. However, all the elite kids in high school all started when they were 5 or younger.

My husband pushes my kids at sports because they have raw talent and they enjoy it. It sounds like OP and her husband may not have anything specific they want their kids to try or do. This is the time to start.

I remember I once met a parent whose kid played ice hockey at age two! I thought she was joking when I met her but she wasn’t joking at all. My friends with kids in gymnastics seem to be pretty damn advanced by age 8.

Oh dear

Gotta start five years ago! Or you’re lame and forever behind and you ruined their potential! That’s the only way to live but jeez she’s just a custodian of raw talent maybe your kids lack raw talent mkay???

[Anonymous]

It's such a spectrum. In some circles, I'm the intense low-screen healthy food parent. And yet I have friends that are even more intense, like no refined sugar whatsoever anytime and opt out of standardized tests at school or even go Waldorf to avoid it all.

I think you're right about how nice it can be to have long time friends. We have neighbors like that, both of us with an only child born two weeks apart. Over the years or kids have gone through different phases and we parents probably have, as well. Now in middle school, the kids aren't always best friends anymore, maybe more like cousins, with a common history. It's still nice to get together.

I'd approach conversations more liked you would with family members who insist on talking politics or some other potentially divisive topic. Subtly change the subject and take about things that are now interesting. And if that doesn't work: "I think we see things differently; we might just have to agree to disagree on that one."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was very anti screen anti sugar when I had my first. My third child has candy often from parties, Halloween, Xmas, etc and I don’t care. When my oldest was 3, we had a friend whose daughter could bike up and down hills and I felt behind. My kids played tennis on a team but we didn’t spend that much effort while our friends had private coaches and were playing in tournaments. Now my kids are amazing bikers and play tennis all day.

There will be kids who excelled when they were young who don’t do much as teenagers. However, all the elite kids in high school all started when they were 5 or younger.

My husband pushes my kids at sports because they have raw talent and they enjoy it. It sounds like OP and her husband may not have anything specific they want their kids to try or do. This is the time to start.

I remember I once met a parent whose kid played ice hockey at age two! I thought she was joking when I met her but she wasn’t joking at all. My friends with kids in gymnastics seem to be pretty damn advanced by age 8.

Oh dear

Gotta start five years ago! Or you’re lame and forever behind and you ruined their potential! That’s the only way to live but jeez she’s just a custodian of raw talent maybe your kids lack raw talent mkay???

I am the pp. my oldest is now 13. We were very low key all through elementary. The kids who excel in whatever they do did start early. Many kids try different things in elementary but few excel. I don’t want to say my kids are behind but we are currently at a spring training camp and the coaches were shocked at how little my kids trained for their age.

[Anonymous]

This is why I often try to avoid talking about parenting with my friends who are parents. You can talk about the kids, of course, because they are so darn funny. But not parenting.

[Anonymous]

Pp again. My parents didn’t put me in these sports and activities. My kids started everything young. I’m not saying you can’t learn to ski or swing a golf club when older but my kids do these things so naturally, just as they ride a bike. You always want for your kids what you didn’t have. I am neither athletic nor am I particularly skilled at anything. I’m so glad my kids don’t take after me. I was book smart.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was very anti screen anti sugar when I had my first. My third child has candy often from parties, Halloween, Xmas, etc and I don’t care. When my oldest was 3, we had a friend whose daughter could bike up and down hills and I felt behind. My kids played tennis on a team but we didn’t spend that much effort while our friends had private coaches and were playing in tournaments. Now my kids are amazing bikers and play tennis all day.

There will be kids who excelled when they were young who don’t do much as teenagers. However, all the elite kids in high school all started when they were 5 or younger.

My husband pushes my kids at sports because they have raw talent and they enjoy it. It sounds like OP and her husband may not have anything specific they want their kids to try or do. This is the time to start.

I remember I once met a parent whose kid played ice hockey at age two! I thought she was joking when I met her but she wasn’t joking at all. My friends with kids in gymnastics seem to be pretty damn advanced by age 8.

Oh dear

Gotta start five years ago! Or you’re lame and forever behind and you ruined their potential! That’s the only way to live but jeez she’s just a custodian of raw talent maybe your kids lack raw talent mkay???

I am the pp. my oldest is now 13. We were very low key all through elementary. The kids who excel in whatever they do did start early. Many kids try different things in elementary but few excel. I don’t want to say my kids are behind but we are currently at a spring training camp and the coaches were shocked at how little my kids trained for their age.

Well that's a coach problem. Send them the stories about the rise in overuse injuries in the kids that specialize early and train too hard at a young age.

Or talk to psychologists about the problems caused by throwing kids into too many adult-led activities and sports so that they failure to develop important skills in self agency and independence.

The hard chargers may win in middle school or even high school, but life is a long game.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here. Reading through the replies has been interesting, thank you. I do think some of you are projecting some of your own experiences onto mine -- this really isn't a high conflict situation at all. Mostly I was looking for advice on how to stay friends but maybe reduce how much time we spend talking about kid-centric topics. I just increasingly don't like how those conversations go because they want to talk intensely about something like after-school enrichment and I can't do that. I also think they are the sort who are always tweaking things a bit (let's try a new soccer league, let's look into privates, let's hire a different nanny, etc.) and we like to ride things out a bit and see how it goes. It's really just a different approach. I could never do it the way they do because it would make me too anxious. But that doesn't mean they are wrong. It takes all kinds.

I do really want to preserve the friendship because I think it's special for our kids to have this kind of friendship, where they take vacations together and get to spend time together in ways that are hard to do with other friends. Having a friend you get to see all the time when your parents get together is really special -- you get to know them in a different way. I never had that growing up but my older brother had it with our neighbors (who were his age, but not too old for me to really bond with) because our families spent so much time together. They are lifelong friends. It's a special bond.

I guess I just need to decide if this is something I should address directly (maybe by asking directly if we could take a break from all the activities/diet/screentime talk when we get together) or finding ways for it not to be so draining for me. I will say that this problem is more pronounced with the husband, who has a more intense personality generally and can just get fixated on certain topics (and is more inclined to sort of interrogate us about what we are doing around a certain issue). The wife is more laid back, or at least more aware that not everyone wants to talk about this stuff all the time. Perhaps I'll try to set up more playdates where it's just moms, maybe try to stick to one annual vacation together but otherwise decline. I don't want to offend them or push them away, but I definitely need a little more space.

Thanks for the input.

OP, more than one annual vacation with another family is a lot, and it’s very reasonable to keep it to one, especially if you don’t get along as well as you used to.

It’s also reasonable to do things more with solely the moms and the kids, to gently tell the husband to move on or that you don’t want to talk about whatever intense thing he’s focused on, etc. You don’t have to drop them completely to ease off a bit.

As for how to make it less stressful for you, the only thing I’d say is to examine whether their intensity is tapping into anything that really is an issue for you. It may well not be, and just an annoyance. But, it’s worth at least considering, I think. FWIW, I think some PPs are doing a LOT of projecting onto you, and that’s lame.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was very anti screen anti sugar when I had my first. My third child has candy often from parties, Halloween, Xmas, etc and I don’t care. When my oldest was 3, we had a friend whose daughter could bike up and down hills and I felt behind. My kids played tennis on a team but we didn’t spend that much effort while our friends had private coaches and were playing in tournaments. Now my kids are amazing bikers and play tennis all day.

There will be kids who excelled when they were young who don’t do much as teenagers. However, all the elite kids in high school all started when they were 5 or younger.

My husband pushes my kids at sports because they have raw talent and they enjoy it. It sounds like OP and her husband may not have anything specific they want their kids to try or do. This is the time to start.

I remember I once met a parent whose kid played ice hockey at age two! I thought she was joking when I met her but she wasn’t joking at all. My friends with kids in gymnastics seem to be pretty damn advanced by age 8.

Oh dear

Gotta start five years ago! Or you’re lame and forever behind and you ruined their potential! That’s the only way to live but jeez she’s just a custodian of raw talent maybe your kids lack raw talent mkay???

I am the pp. my oldest is now 13. We were very low key all through elementary. The kids who excel in whatever they do did start early. Many kids try different things in elementary but few excel. I don’t want to say my kids are behind but we are currently at a spring training camp and the coaches were shocked at how little my kids trained for their age.

Well that's a coach problem. Send them the stories about the rise in overuse injuries in the kids that specialize early and train too hard at a young age.

Or talk to psychologists about the problems caused by throwing kids into too many adult-led activities and sports so that they failure to develop important skills in self agency and independence.

The hard chargers may win in middle school or even high school, but life is a long game.

My kids play plenty in my opinion. We are at a place that trains elite athletes. I’m very impressed by them. My kids are not close to that level or at least not yet. These are kids who will be college D1 players or be pro one day. My kids are not that level. These are kids will go to Stanford type schools though.

My children are play and are good at several sports. They enjoy playing. We don’t push them. I’m not athletic at all. They also play musical instruments and do academic extracurriculars. I try not to talk about these things to others because people seem to get competitive.

[Anonymous]

I think you need to work hard to steer your conversations away from child related things. Talk about work, tv shows, trips you’ve taken, plays you want to see, what’s going on in the world, etc.

Try to connect at an adult level about adult things so that the child related things that stress you out don’t come up as much.