Reply to Nervous About Raising Kids in the City

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]My husband and I grew up in rural areas but live in DC now and are raising a family. I feel like at this point, we can shield our kids (9 and under) from some of the rougher stuff that happens in cities (homelessness, crime, drugs, gangs) but I know it can't last forever. I recognize that the city can also offer so many good things in terms of culture, so I don't want to sound too much like a country mouse, but I'm wondering how families with kids older than ours feel about this issue. I'm not crazy about moving to expensive suburbia just to shelter my kids from reality, but a lot of other folks do it and have suggested that we are nuts to stay in the city to raise our kids.[/quote]I understand your concern but I found that my kid, who grew up in the city, got into more trouble when she traveled out to the suburbs to hang with her rich friends.  OP, we are white, upper-middle-class professionals and we live in a low-income neighborhood where there is a fair amount of drug-dealing and crime.  But here's the thing, our daughter didn't really have anything in common with the kids in the neighborhood so she didn't hang out with them.  Instead she was on the metro regularly heading up to the upper Northwest and Bethesda to hang with her friends from a similar background.  It is from these kids that she got drugs and alcohol.  It was only after she transferred from her DCPS high school to a private school that she was sexually assaulted - by a white kid from a wealthy family.

If you're worried about your kids using drugs and alcohol and you want to prevent them from being assaulted, that happens all the time in expensive suburbs.  In particular, kids are more likely to be sexually assaulted by people they know (friends, acquaintances, boyfriends) rather than strangers in the neighborhood.  I think the most important thing is to work on communication with your kids.  But I hear ya - it's scary to be the parent of an adolescent and I know you want to protect them as much as possible.  It's hard knowing that we have less control over them as they get older.  There are no guarantees that if you stay in the city your kids will be safe but there are no guarantees in the suburbs either.  Good luck with your decision![/quote]

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