Reply to "My child is so mature and so independant for her age..."

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Reply to ""My child is so mature and so independant for her age...""

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[quote=Anonymous]I was also parentified, physically abused by my parents, and then molested by other older kids (who clearly had problems in their own homes).  I agree that it's a flag to me when I see kids who have already learned by age 7 or 8 that the way to please their parents is to be a quiet mini-adult.  Everyone praised me and my parents for how well-behaved and mature I was, but it's because I was always trying to avoid my parents' unpredictable rages (which did not always or automatically stop when out in public).

That being said, I was also a kid who liked to do puzzles and read books and was often quite happy to be left in peace to do so for hours on end.  (Of course, sometimes the reading material was Stephen King at age 11 because I wasn't being supervised, but not always.)  I gravitated toward older kids not only because I was old for my age based on my experiences but also because I was interested in things that were a bit ahead of my age (healthy things, like being able to ride my bike farther from home or wanting to help take care of the horses that belonged to the family down the road or participate in creating an ice-skating rink in the empty field near our houses in the winter, etc.).

For me, it's the combination of the need for approval from adults and being mature for your age that is the flag for me.  I don't know how I'll respond when my child is older and these kids are his peers, but as a friend-of-the-parents or a neighbor, I'm very sympathetic and try to create space to let the kid have some non-demanding adult attention and let them be a kid.  For example, I'll watch our acquaintances' kid and we'll work in the garden or cook together or go to the pool, and I try to model a way of hanging out that doesn't have me breathing down his neck. It's harder as kids get older, because it takes more for them to let their guard down and snap out of that mode of being.[/quote]

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