When Our Own Outsize Fears Affect Our Parenting Decisions

I am the parent who does not want to click on the links about child disasters but inevitably does. As if knowing will somehow insulate you from being a victim of kid-harm. So I had to laugh, just a little, when a site last week covered someone's research about playground accidents and distraction. The study said if parents looked away from their phones, purses, or friends, kids wouldn't get hurt so often.

I laughed only because playground accidents are not on my list of outsize fears for my children. At least at the playground, you hope you are only looking at a broken bone. It's also a hard one for parents — sure, you can follow your kid on the play equipment. You can jump on the bouncy bridge, and you can stand under the climb-up caterpillar. Does that count, then, as playing? I have to shadow my toddler so she doesn't walk off a high edge. But every kid on our playground engages in potentially harmful behavior; what kid doesn't walk up a slide? They all do it. I've also seen this at the playground: parents are watching their kid, and their kid does something so unbelievably fast that everyone is in shock, trying to wrap their heads around the fact that the kid just performed a belly flop off a high perch, like Superman. It's difficult to stop kids from doing weird things.

Given the number of incidents per year, maybe I should worry more about that broken arm than what I do fear, which are cars hitting my kids on a sidewalk or street, dogs biting my kids, and kids drowning. Maybe these are less common, less rational fears. I wouldn't go so far as to say I have nightmares about it (that's another category), but the idea of these is enough to make my heart race. And I think about them more than I would like. Partially because I need to — my 20-month-old is really very attracted to the open street right now. She's not afraid of walking right up to dogs. Every parent knows that a certain vigilance is required in, well, so many daily situations. Parking lots, parks, your friend's pool.

What's funny is that I don't consider myself fearful. I am not afraid of dogs myself, or cars, or swimming pools. They are not phobias. They are things my parent brain has decided are the most likely, most terrible, or least preventable. Maybe they are the things that happen too fast, faster than you could think. I don't know. I'm certain that seeing all the ways children may be and are harmed in the daily news is tough on parents. Do we really need to know? In some cases, we do. It helps us maintain vigilance. I remember distinctly, after my first was born, reading with horror how frequently toddlers were maimed by dogs in the California Bay Area. Or it seemed that way to me, when I opened the paper. In other cases, it only serves to feed my madness. As Summer nears, I confess I'm nervous about trying to take two children — both can run, neither can swim — to a busy pool.

My fears for my children are probably shaped by my experiences as a child. I went to grade school with a boy whose cheek and eye were deeply marked by a dog bite. I adored dogs, and at one family party, my own dog, who had never displayed aggression toward a person, snapped at a visiting toddler — her face was just right at his eye level. My parents never trusted dogs around small children again. I also distinctly remember the day that we were leaving school and a boy walking home was hit by a car. His leg was broken. I didn't see the event. But I do remember the fear and panic that surrounded that afternoon. Finally, I remember my parents' concern about unfenced pools in our neighborhood — there were only a few. But my mom often told us the story of a friend's daughter, who, at 3, wandered onto the pool's tarpaulin cover and nearly drowned in the puddle that sat on top of it. My parents focused on learning to swim early. So perhaps these fears are stuck so deeply in me, I can't help but be anxious. I'm primed to view them as very real events that could happen to my own children.

It's the could, though. How do you deal with what could happen? I've read enough stories to know that being able to swim does not prevent a child from drowning. For me, fear is offset by a sense of control. In my neighborhood, almost every dog is on a leash. But is that good enough? I'm aware that in a crowded place, like a farmers market, with food, noise, and people to stimulate or provoke, your kid may encounter a dog before you can reach them. I know I can't control these situations: what cars do, the unfenced pool, or that moment your kid runs away from you. When we wait for the bus each morning, it appears that no one in all the passing cars is even looking at the road. This is actually a new fear, the helpless sense of being a parent in the age of constant distraction. As the playground study showed, to some extent, we are all less vigilant with our phones around.

I'm still trying to develop a strategy for being safe in an age in which I can't expect another driver/dog-walker to be paying attention, as well as managing my own outsize fears. How much fear is not useful? How much fear is harmful to your kids? If your fear isn't rational, what can you do? Does indulging it, and thinking through strategies for prevention, help? Should I be looking at stats and adopting more rational fears? The kicker is, obviously, just being afraid can't prevent an accident from happening. I suppose that's what I want to know — what is the usefulness of being afraid, of feeling fear? Does it help me as a parent, or is it only a barrier to having fun?

My sense is that I do need some of the fear. It could be called healthy. But I'm not sure I want it.