August 25, 2025 • 12 mins
Is it ever safe to let your 11- or 12-year-old walk to the park, ride their bike, or visit a friend without you? For many parents, just the thought makes the stomach clench. But here’s the twist: the riskiest thing might be never letting kids take risks at all.
In this episode, Justin and Kylie Coulson unpack the independence dilemma that defines modern parenting. You’ll hear why today is the safest time in history for children (despite our fears), how to balance risk and safety, and the practical steps that build confidence — in both kids and parents.
KEY POINTS:
- The difference between danger and risk — and why it matters.
- Why 24/7 news and social media fuel parental anxiety.
- How staged independence builds resilience and confidence.
- The power of community connections in keeping kids safe.
- Teaching situational awareness instead of “stranger danger.”
RESOURCES:
- More parenting resources at happyfamilies.com.au
- The Case For Risky Play in an Age of Overprotection [Article]
#1198 The Worst Mother Who Got it Right [Podcast Episode]
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
Hello, Welcome to the Happy Families podcasts. My name's doctor
Justin Coulson. And today a question that most parents grapple
with frequently. How do you feel about your eleven year
old riding their bike to the park to play for
a few hours without your oversight? What about if they're
going to walk to the corner shop alone, or they're
just going to walk the dog around the block or
(00:26):
meet a friend at the local playground without you hovering nearby.
If those scenarios make your stomach clench and your mind
raise through all those worst case scenarios, I'm sure you're
not alone. But here is the question that might make
you even more uncomfortable. What if the riskiest thing you
can do as a parent is never letting your child
take any risks at all. Today we're tackling the independence
(00:48):
dilemma that is defining modern parenting. Stay with us. Hello,
Welcome to The Happy Family's podcast, Real Parenting Solutions every Day.
This is Australia's most downloaded parenting We're Justin and Kylie Colson,
and every Tuesday on the podcast we ask your tricky questions.
If you would like us to answer your tricky question,
we'd love to do it. Here's how you go about it.
(01:09):
Visit Happy Families dot com dot you. We've got a
super simple system where you just click the button and
start talking. So that simple, and we might feature your
question on the pod just like Teresa from Victoria.
Speaker 2 (01:20):
Hi there, my name is Teresa. I'm from Lily Dahl
in Victoria. My question is just regarding independence, like letting
your child leave the house on their own to go
to the park or ride their bike, or go to
the shop or meet a friend. My child is twelve
in year seven next year. Currently, I don't feel safe
letting him go out anywhere on his own. And should
(01:43):
I be letting go a bit? I'm not sure? Thank you.
Speaker 3 (01:48):
This is such a tricky one. The heartstrings of any
mother gets pulled a bit here because we want our
kids to be safe. Ultimately, we want our kids to
be safe.
Speaker 1 (01:57):
Can I sound like a bit of a grump? I
don't think it's tricky at all.
Speaker 3 (02:00):
You're hilarious.
Speaker 1 (02:01):
Well, there's a difference between danger and risk.
Speaker 3 (02:03):
Okay, I understand that.
Speaker 1 (02:05):
So danger can the child assess what's going on, yes
or no? If yes, assess the risks and go for it.
If they can't, assess the danger. Then as a parent,
you step in and say no. And I think, well,
twelve year olds, twelve year olds are pretty good at
assessing whether they can cross a road or whether a
park feels safe, and they're going to do it one
hundred p cent perfectly. No, but I think they can
do it.
Speaker 3 (02:24):
I think that's the difference between the average male and
the average female in this situation.
Speaker 1 (02:31):
I mean, the research would certainly agree with you on that.
Dad's a much more.
Speaker 3 (02:36):
I had that baby inside me.
Speaker 1 (02:39):
When our daughter walks out to nine month But when
our daughter walks through the part of me, my heart
goes with her and my stomach clenches, and I think,
is she going to be okay? And maybe she could
just stay in the street instead of going around the block.
Like I still have that feeling, But as a dad,
knowing that it's good for her to be able to
have those experiences, I'm like, go for it. And then
I just hold my breath for the seventeen and a
(03:00):
half minutes until she gets back. It's really good for
my breath holding activity, right, But it's good for them
to do this.
Speaker 3 (03:07):
We understand that it's good for them. It doesn't mean
that it's comfortable anyone.
Speaker 1 (03:11):
No, I'm not suggesting that it's comfortable at all. I'm
saying it's good for them to do it. Look, here
are the stats, and this is not going to make
anyone feel better, But the stats tell us that the
twenty four hour news media cycle makes us think the
world's a dangerous place and that everyone's going to get kidnapped.
It's just not the reality. Safest time in human history
for children is where we're living right now. Also the
(03:32):
most anxious time for parents right now. Why because we.
Speaker 3 (03:36):
Have access to more than we've ever had.
Speaker 1 (03:38):
Actually, we have access to all of this information, and
so we find out about this one thing that happens
on the other side of the country or the other
side of the world, and we think that it's going
to happen right now, right here in our neighborhood. And
the evidence doesn't support that there is risk.
Speaker 3 (03:50):
But I also think this collective fear that has taken
hold of communities in general, whereas back when we were growing.
Speaker 1 (04:01):
Up, every did not exist at all.
Speaker 3 (04:03):
Everybody let their kids go and do whatever they whatever
they want.
Speaker 1 (04:08):
Hay Writ's about in the next generation, we've moved from
this play based child and the screen based child. And
it's partly because of this twenty four hour news cycle
that tells us that we are supposed to be anxious
and paranoid every time our child leaves our front door steps.
Speaker 3 (04:19):
Well, at our house, we've got complete control over what happens.
Speaker 1 (04:23):
Yeah, So I'm not arguing for being lax. The anxiety
that you feel as a parent is appropriate because your
job is to protect your young But I just think
the reality checks important. I sound like I'm getting cranky
at Teresa. I'm not cranky. I'm probably more cranky at
the world than anything. If anything, context matters.
Speaker 3 (04:40):
Like anything, Understanding what it is that you're actually deciding
on makes all the difference. Do you feel safe in
your suburb? Do you know people along the route that
the kids could stop in if they felt unsafe or
needed a drink of water, or needed to go to
the bathroom. Are they meeting friends at the park? How
far away is the park? How many roads are they
(05:01):
going to have to cross? Do they have to cross
busy roads? Are they going to be at traffic lights
or are they going to be having to assess the
crossing of that without any external help?
Speaker 1 (05:11):
Yeah? So I'm not suggesting that we just send a
twelve year old out of the void if they've never
had that experience before. You want to start with small
things like walking the dog up and down the street,
and then let it expand from there. We had a
friend in her friend acquaintance, somebody that we knew in
one of the previous places that we've lived, who had
a seventeen year old son who wasn't allowed to ride
his bike a kilometer down the street to the road.
And it was on back suburban streets, it wasn't on
(05:32):
busy roads. Because this mother was so overprotective, so anxious
that her son was not allowed to do this stuff.
I thought it was bonkers. But here's the other thing.
We might be making too big a deal out of this,
because guess what, the kid was still pretty well adjusted,
and he went on to live a pretty fun life,
and he's turned into a pretty decent adult by all reports.
But at the time, I mean, this poor kid, he
was told that he had to stay in his house,
(05:54):
and I just don't I don't think that that's useful.
Independence is going to work best when you are guiding
your children through things bit by bit, giving them, staged
opportunities to develop and experience practicing shorter trips, building that independence,
building the community, making things feel safer.
Speaker 3 (06:12):
Even though this is really difficult for mums, and especially
that first time. If this is the first time you've
ever let your kids out of your sight and they're
doing something solo, there is something just so crazy hard.
It hurts. It hurts, you're scared, you're anxious, all of
the things. But there's something awesome that happens when our
(06:34):
kids get to do something that that number one they
knew you were worried about, and they get to prove
you wrong. They get to prove you that to you
that number one they're capable of it. Number two that
nothing happened, and number three, the sense of independence that
they get. It's just its sores. It's such a confidence
boost for them, and it is absolutely a confident boost
(06:58):
for parents, yeah, as they experience it's the same thing
alongside their kids.
Speaker 1 (07:01):
In the nineteen eighties, when I was roaming neighborhoods for hours,
our parents had no way of tracking this at all. Today,
we've got mobile phones, we've got GPS tracking, constant communication
options that our parents can only dream of. After the break,
Let's talk about some really practical steps that we can
take to help our seven year olds, nine year olds,
or twel year olds or fifteen year olds to become
that little bit more independent and have time outside away
from parents and away from the house to grow up
(07:24):
a little bit. Okay, Kylie, a couple of practical steps
things that we can do to help our children to
encounter the world safely. I'm going to go first, starting young.
I think that we want to be walking roots with
our kids, pointing out landmarks, discussing what to do if
(07:46):
something goes wrong. Giving our kids these I'm going to
call it a dry run or a supervised run, giving
them experience being out there and doing it.
Speaker 3 (07:54):
We're telling them they're going to be the leader, and
they're the ones who are actually going to navigate the trip.
Even though you're with them, they get to make the decisions.
Are we turning left or right at this intersection? Do
we have to cross the road here, Helping them to
kind of feel like they're in charge of the family outing.
Speaker 1 (08:08):
You tell me when it's safe across the road, and
then we'll go yeah, and then you pull them back
when they say okay, let's go at it, done that
more than once, done that more than once the second
thing you touched on already, and it's really important to
highlight this come up a couple of times in the podcast.
When you have built community, when people know who you
are in the neighborhood and you know them, it makes
(08:31):
it much better so that if your children are ever uncomfortable,
they know that they can knock on this door here
or that door there. This is one of the reasons
that I'm much more for public schooling than private schooling,
because you get to know the neighborhood, you get to
know the families a lot more, and the kids know
that they can bang on this door or that door
if they're feeling nervous or worried. We've covered that off
a couple of times. Independence is just easier when there's
multiple families on board. And of course, when there's multiple
(08:54):
families on board, your child is probably going to be
hanging out with their kids at the park anyway, like
they'll pick one another up the route, so they're not
going to be traveling solo everywhere.
Speaker 3 (09:02):
And you also don't feel like you're doing it on
your own. The more connection you've got with other families,
the chances are that their children will be doing the
same things alongside your child, So your child isn't actually
doing anything solo, They're actually doing it with a handful
of trusted friends.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
Third thing that I would add, and again we've kind
of touched on this, but I want to be extremely
explicit about it. We've got to teach our kids. I
don't think there's benefits of teaching stranger danger. I don't
think that's helpful because usually you are going to be
expecting your child to approach a stranger if they're worried.
Speaker 3 (09:33):
Well, not only that, I think it creates an unnecessary
anxiety in our children that everyone's unsafe, which is just
you can't trust anyone.
Speaker 1 (09:39):
It's such an unhealthy way to approach the world. So
rather than teaching strange danger, I'd rather just teach them
this thing that we can call situational awareness. So help
them to identify anybody who might be behaving in a
tricky or an undesirable manner and to avoid them, and
help them to identify safe adults because if they ever
need help, they can go to those safe adults. And
(10:00):
at a hierarchy in our home, you look for parents
with kids, usually mums, I mean, unfortunately, I hate to
say it. If any child ever came to me, I
know they'd be safe, and most men are. But statistically
your child is much more likely to be harmed by
a bloke than a woman. So we've always said find
a lady, find a lady with children. We'll go to
a shop owner, or find somebody in uniform. Worst case scenario,
(10:20):
you walk up to any stranger, because the likelihood is
that almost any stranger is going to be safe compared
to the stranger that's making you feel or the tricky
person who's making you feel unsafe. So having that situational awareness,
knowing what cars are around and that kind of thing
will just help your children to be safe.
Speaker 3 (10:37):
And the last thing is just recognizing what would be
considered an age appropriate expectation. If you've got a twelve
year old, they're quite capable of walking to the park
as long as you've ticked all those boxes and you
feel like everything's okay.
Speaker 1 (10:52):
Yeah, probably not for a seven year old though. No,
unless you're in Japan and you're sending it down to
the shops to kill them. It's way for some milk,
because apparently that's what they do there that have you?
That TV show, It's amazing Anyway, I digress. In Australia,
the expectation would be that your children will be old
enough to be able to assess the risks and take
appropriate action.
Speaker 3 (11:10):
So as a twelve year old heading into year seven,
I would suggest that maybe he's a little bit behind
in independence compared to the average child.
Speaker 1 (11:20):
Yeah, I think know about in twenty twenty five, but
certainly throughout history, absolutely throughout history. In twenty twenty five,
I'm seeing more and more parents who are doing this.
I don't think it's healthy. I don't think that it's appropriate.
I don't think that's what our kids need. But yeah,
actually he probably is still a little bit behind the
average even in twenty twenty five. Yeah, depending on the neighborhood.
Speaker 3 (11:38):
And I don't think this is about him pushing too hard.
I think it's actually about giving him the opportunity to
catch up.
Speaker 1 (11:43):
Okay, Well, we really hope Terris, that this has been
a helpful conversation for you. Thanks so much for getting
in touch. If you have a tricky question for us,
please send us a voice note podcasts at Happy Families
dot com dot you or if you don't want to
send us a voice note, you can just go to
happy families dot com Do I you and click on
the record button start talking. It's literally that simple. Another
(12:05):
tricky question next week. The Happy Families podcast is produced
by Justin Rulon from Bridge Media. Mimhammonds provides additional research,
admin and other support, and for more information and resources
about making your family happier, visit happyfamilies dot com. Do
You
Hello, Welcome to the Happy Families podcasts. My name's doctor
Justin Coulson. And today a question that most parents grapple
with frequently. How do you feel about your eleven year
old riding their bike to the park to play for
a few hours without your oversight? What about if they're
going to walk to the corner shop alone, or they're
just going to walk the dog around the block or
(00:26):
meet a friend at the local playground without you hovering nearby.
If those scenarios make your stomach clench and your mind
raise through all those worst case scenarios, I'm sure you're
not alone. But here is the question that might make
you even more uncomfortable. What if the riskiest thing you
can do as a parent is never letting your child
take any risks at all. Today we're tackling the independence
(00:48):
dilemma that is defining modern parenting. Stay with us. Hello,
Welcome to The Happy Family's podcast, Real Parenting Solutions every Day.
This is Australia's most downloaded parenting We're Justin and Kylie Colson,
and every Tuesday on the podcast we ask your tricky questions.
If you would like us to answer your tricky question,
we'd love to do it. Here's how you go about it.
(01:09):
Visit Happy Families dot com dot you. We've got a
super simple system where you just click the button and
start talking. So that simple, and we might feature your
question on the pod just like Teresa from Victoria.
Speaker 2 (01:20):
Hi there, my name is Teresa. I'm from Lily Dahl
in Victoria. My question is just regarding independence, like letting
your child leave the house on their own to go
to the park or ride their bike, or go to
the shop or meet a friend. My child is twelve
in year seven next year. Currently, I don't feel safe
letting him go out anywhere on his own. And should
(01:43):
I be letting go a bit? I'm not sure? Thank you.
Speaker 3 (01:48):
This is such a tricky one. The heartstrings of any
mother gets pulled a bit here because we want our
kids to be safe. Ultimately, we want our kids to
be safe.
Speaker 1 (01:57):
Can I sound like a bit of a grump? I
don't think it's tricky at all.
Speaker 3 (02:00):
You're hilarious.
Speaker 1 (02:01):
Well, there's a difference between danger and risk.
Speaker 3 (02:03):
Okay, I understand that.
Speaker 1 (02:05):
So danger can the child assess what's going on, yes
or no? If yes, assess the risks and go for it.
If they can't, assess the danger. Then as a parent,
you step in and say no. And I think, well,
twelve year olds, twelve year olds are pretty good at
assessing whether they can cross a road or whether a
park feels safe, and they're going to do it one
hundred p cent perfectly. No, but I think they can
do it.
Speaker 3 (02:24):
I think that's the difference between the average male and
the average female in this situation.
Speaker 1 (02:31):
I mean, the research would certainly agree with you on that.
Dad's a much more.
Speaker 3 (02:36):
I had that baby inside me.
Speaker 1 (02:39):
When our daughter walks out to nine month But when
our daughter walks through the part of me, my heart
goes with her and my stomach clenches, and I think,
is she going to be okay? And maybe she could
just stay in the street instead of going around the block.
Like I still have that feeling, But as a dad,
knowing that it's good for her to be able to
have those experiences, I'm like, go for it. And then
I just hold my breath for the seventeen and a
(03:00):
half minutes until she gets back. It's really good for
my breath holding activity, right, But it's good for them
to do this.
Speaker 3 (03:07):
We understand that it's good for them. It doesn't mean
that it's comfortable anyone.
Speaker 1 (03:11):
No, I'm not suggesting that it's comfortable at all. I'm
saying it's good for them to do it. Look, here
are the stats, and this is not going to make
anyone feel better, But the stats tell us that the
twenty four hour news media cycle makes us think the
world's a dangerous place and that everyone's going to get kidnapped.
It's just not the reality. Safest time in human history
for children is where we're living right now. Also the
(03:32):
most anxious time for parents right now. Why because we.
Speaker 3 (03:36):
Have access to more than we've ever had.
Speaker 1 (03:38):
Actually, we have access to all of this information, and
so we find out about this one thing that happens
on the other side of the country or the other
side of the world, and we think that it's going
to happen right now, right here in our neighborhood. And
the evidence doesn't support that there is risk.
Speaker 3 (03:50):
But I also think this collective fear that has taken
hold of communities in general, whereas back when we were growing.
Speaker 1 (04:01):
Up, every did not exist at all.
Speaker 3 (04:03):
Everybody let their kids go and do whatever they whatever
they want.
Speaker 1 (04:08):
Hay Writ's about in the next generation, we've moved from
this play based child and the screen based child. And
it's partly because of this twenty four hour news cycle
that tells us that we are supposed to be anxious
and paranoid every time our child leaves our front door steps.
Speaker 3 (04:19):
Well, at our house, we've got complete control over what happens.
Speaker 1 (04:23):
Yeah, So I'm not arguing for being lax. The anxiety
that you feel as a parent is appropriate because your
job is to protect your young But I just think
the reality checks important. I sound like I'm getting cranky
at Teresa. I'm not cranky. I'm probably more cranky at
the world than anything. If anything, context matters.
Speaker 3 (04:40):
Like anything, Understanding what it is that you're actually deciding
on makes all the difference. Do you feel safe in
your suburb? Do you know people along the route that
the kids could stop in if they felt unsafe or
needed a drink of water, or needed to go to
the bathroom. Are they meeting friends at the park? How
far away is the park? How many roads are they
(05:01):
going to have to cross? Do they have to cross
busy roads? Are they going to be at traffic lights
or are they going to be having to assess the
crossing of that without any external help?
Speaker 1 (05:11):
Yeah? So I'm not suggesting that we just send a
twelve year old out of the void if they've never
had that experience before. You want to start with small
things like walking the dog up and down the street,
and then let it expand from there. We had a
friend in her friend acquaintance, somebody that we knew in
one of the previous places that we've lived, who had
a seventeen year old son who wasn't allowed to ride
his bike a kilometer down the street to the road.
And it was on back suburban streets, it wasn't on
(05:32):
busy roads. Because this mother was so overprotective, so anxious
that her son was not allowed to do this stuff.
I thought it was bonkers. But here's the other thing.
We might be making too big a deal out of this,
because guess what, the kid was still pretty well adjusted,
and he went on to live a pretty fun life,
and he's turned into a pretty decent adult by all reports.
But at the time, I mean, this poor kid, he
was told that he had to stay in his house,
(05:54):
and I just don't I don't think that that's useful.
Independence is going to work best when you are guiding
your children through things bit by bit, giving them, staged
opportunities to develop and experience practicing shorter trips, building that independence,
building the community, making things feel safer.
Speaker 3 (06:12):
Even though this is really difficult for mums, and especially
that first time. If this is the first time you've
ever let your kids out of your sight and they're
doing something solo, there is something just so crazy hard.
It hurts. It hurts, you're scared, you're anxious, all of
the things. But there's something awesome that happens when our
(06:34):
kids get to do something that that number one they
knew you were worried about, and they get to prove
you wrong. They get to prove you that to you
that number one they're capable of it. Number two that
nothing happened, and number three, the sense of independence that
they get. It's just its sores. It's such a confidence
boost for them, and it is absolutely a confident boost
(06:58):
for parents, yeah, as they experience it's the same thing
alongside their kids.
Speaker 1 (07:01):
In the nineteen eighties, when I was roaming neighborhoods for hours,
our parents had no way of tracking this at all. Today,
we've got mobile phones, we've got GPS tracking, constant communication
options that our parents can only dream of. After the break,
Let's talk about some really practical steps that we can
take to help our seven year olds, nine year olds,
or twel year olds or fifteen year olds to become
that little bit more independent and have time outside away
from parents and away from the house to grow up
(07:24):
a little bit. Okay, Kylie, a couple of practical steps
things that we can do to help our children to
encounter the world safely. I'm going to go first, starting young.
I think that we want to be walking roots with
our kids, pointing out landmarks, discussing what to do if
(07:46):
something goes wrong. Giving our kids these I'm going to
call it a dry run or a supervised run, giving
them experience being out there and doing it.
Speaker 3 (07:54):
We're telling them they're going to be the leader, and
they're the ones who are actually going to navigate the trip.
Even though you're with them, they get to make the decisions.
Are we turning left or right at this intersection? Do
we have to cross the road here, Helping them to
kind of feel like they're in charge of the family outing.
Speaker 1 (08:08):
You tell me when it's safe across the road, and
then we'll go yeah, and then you pull them back
when they say okay, let's go at it, done that
more than once, done that more than once the second
thing you touched on already, and it's really important to
highlight this come up a couple of times in the podcast.
When you have built community, when people know who you
are in the neighborhood and you know them, it makes
(08:31):
it much better so that if your children are ever uncomfortable,
they know that they can knock on this door here
or that door there. This is one of the reasons
that I'm much more for public schooling than private schooling,
because you get to know the neighborhood, you get to
know the families a lot more, and the kids know
that they can bang on this door or that door
if they're feeling nervous or worried. We've covered that off
a couple of times. Independence is just easier when there's
multiple families on board. And of course, when there's multiple
(08:54):
families on board, your child is probably going to be
hanging out with their kids at the park anyway, like
they'll pick one another up the route, so they're not
going to be traveling solo everywhere.
Speaker 3 (09:02):
And you also don't feel like you're doing it on
your own. The more connection you've got with other families,
the chances are that their children will be doing the
same things alongside your child, So your child isn't actually
doing anything solo, They're actually doing it with a handful
of trusted friends.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
Third thing that I would add, and again we've kind
of touched on this, but I want to be extremely
explicit about it. We've got to teach our kids. I
don't think there's benefits of teaching stranger danger. I don't
think that's helpful because usually you are going to be
expecting your child to approach a stranger if they're worried.
Speaker 3 (09:33):
Well, not only that, I think it creates an unnecessary
anxiety in our children that everyone's unsafe, which is just
you can't trust anyone.
Speaker 1 (09:39):
It's such an unhealthy way to approach the world. So
rather than teaching strange danger, I'd rather just teach them
this thing that we can call situational awareness. So help
them to identify anybody who might be behaving in a
tricky or an undesirable manner and to avoid them, and
help them to identify safe adults because if they ever
need help, they can go to those safe adults. And
(10:00):
at a hierarchy in our home, you look for parents
with kids, usually mums, I mean, unfortunately, I hate to
say it. If any child ever came to me, I
know they'd be safe, and most men are. But statistically
your child is much more likely to be harmed by
a bloke than a woman. So we've always said find
a lady, find a lady with children. We'll go to
a shop owner, or find somebody in uniform. Worst case scenario,
(10:20):
you walk up to any stranger, because the likelihood is
that almost any stranger is going to be safe compared
to the stranger that's making you feel or the tricky
person who's making you feel unsafe. So having that situational awareness,
knowing what cars are around and that kind of thing
will just help your children to be safe.
Speaker 3 (10:37):
And the last thing is just recognizing what would be
considered an age appropriate expectation. If you've got a twelve
year old, they're quite capable of walking to the park
as long as you've ticked all those boxes and you
feel like everything's okay.
Speaker 1 (10:52):
Yeah, probably not for a seven year old though. No,
unless you're in Japan and you're sending it down to
the shops to kill them. It's way for some milk,
because apparently that's what they do there that have you?
That TV show, It's amazing Anyway, I digress. In Australia,
the expectation would be that your children will be old
enough to be able to assess the risks and take
appropriate action.
Speaker 3 (11:10):
So as a twelve year old heading into year seven,
I would suggest that maybe he's a little bit behind
in independence compared to the average child.
Speaker 1 (11:20):
Yeah, I think know about in twenty twenty five, but
certainly throughout history, absolutely throughout history. In twenty twenty five,
I'm seeing more and more parents who are doing this.
I don't think it's healthy. I don't think that it's appropriate.
I don't think that's what our kids need. But yeah,
actually he probably is still a little bit behind the
average even in twenty twenty five. Yeah, depending on the neighborhood.
Speaker 3 (11:38):
And I don't think this is about him pushing too hard.
I think it's actually about giving him the opportunity to
catch up.
Speaker 1 (11:43):
Okay, Well, we really hope Terris, that this has been
a helpful conversation for you. Thanks so much for getting
in touch. If you have a tricky question for us,
please send us a voice note podcasts at Happy Families
dot com dot you or if you don't want to
send us a voice note, you can just go to
happy families dot com Do I you and click on
the record button start talking. It's literally that simple. Another
(12:05):
tricky question next week. The Happy Families podcast is produced
by Justin Rulon from Bridge Media. Mimhammonds provides additional research,
admin and other support, and for more information and resources
about making your family happier, visit happyfamilies dot com. Do
You
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