Parental Autonomy and Control - Boundary and Space

The freedom to grow requires the protection of society.

A child needs space to grow and a boundary to protect this growth. Achieving the correct balance for your child between freedom and control has life-long effects. Too much freedom of choice can be interpreted by the child as uncaring neglect on the part of the parents, and can result in the child learn­ing that her life's decisions can be made without reference to the outside world, without taking into account those around her. It gives the child an unrealistic view of herself and others, and results in an adult who has difficulties relating on an equal basis to the people around her. It makes children into bullies or overly passive adults, both of whom are unable to form equal relationships with those around them.

On the other hand, too much control stifles the child. It prevents her from making decisions on her own, learning what she is capable of and ultimately makes her over-depen­dent on people who will not always be there. Over-control causes both the child and the adult to believe that the child cannot do things for herself and this notion becomes an accepted part of the psychological map of the family unit. It is this combination of over-dependence and lack of aware­ness of her capabilities which is most damaging to a child. Over-dependence on others means that in any situation where she has to decide, choose, or solve a problem, she will not have had enough practice in choosing or acting on her own judgment. Nor will she have the confidence in her own ability to choose, so she will be more susceptible to bullying and to being dominated by others. In this she is then con­ceding control to the other people in her environment and of course losing the chance to have a say in her own life. The effective child is one who has experienced both freedom of choice and parental guidance in reasonable amounts and who has the confidence of others in her ability to choose, to make decisions and to solve problems.

To become good at something we must practise it whether it is a physical, a social or an emotional skill. If we don't get the opportunity to practise, we will not be able to develop the skill, nor have the competence or confidence to use it when the need arises. Too much freedom, or too much control, denies the child the opportunity to practise the social, emotional and physical skills which are integral to the effective child.

For the very young child, the boundary provided by the family circle is her guarantee of safety, her ring of confidence, their extra-uterine reminder of the security she had in the womb. If this boundary becomes broken - perhaps through hospitalisation of mother or child, or through abandonment - then the child's space is contaminated and she feels threat­ened by fears of destruction. It is the parents, in particular the mother, who forms the boundary; and within this family circle the facilitating environment for the child's growth is held. The boundary can be broken where the mother fails to perform the holding function to reassure the child in the face of impending anxiety It can also be damaged where the father fails to give the mother the protection and support she needs to enable her to give the child the support he needs. And of course it is damaged where either father or mother is absent, or where confidence and trust in adults is broken through violence or neglect.

Where the boundary is broken or damaged through absence, the child's growth is interrupted, or even halted, and the difficulty of restarting the process is greater because of the anxiety that the child associates with the failure of the system. Where separation has occurred for a prolonged period through, for example, hospitalisation, school, parental separation or bereavement, it is often necessary to begin back at the point where the separation occurred, because the child's emotional development may have become stuck at this point. It is dam­aging to skip over any part of a child's growth, such as happens when a child is pushed too hard, or when he starts school before he is ready. This damage can only be remedied by allow­ing the child to go back to the point where the damage to his boundaries occurred. The child's development is not some­thing which can be put together piecemeal like a jigsaw. Each stage has its place, not only in the spatial and time senses, but also in the emotional sense; and each succeeding stage depends for its success on the success of the stage which goes before.

When a child is traumatised, her emotional development will be interrupted and her psyche will put it on hold until it is ready to continue. As parents and teachers, we need to be in tune with this, and be able to wait until the child is ready to continue. This can be very difficult for adults, as society tends to demand standardisation in everything. If our best friend's child is able to socialise and mix at a certain age, we tend to demand that our own child should also be able to. Where the child is abandoned or severely neglected, there is no secure boundary for the child and she feels intense anxiety and worry about her safety. Where parents give the child total freedom to choose, in the mistaken belief that this will make her more popular with other children, or indeed because it is too much trouble to care for the child, they will find that this freedom has the same effect as broken, damaged or no bound­aries and causes anxiety for the child. It has the additional effect of driving the child to seek a secure boundary else­where, often leading to children seeking identification and approval from 'non-legitimate' role models in the community.

In the process of making our children effective in their own lives and environment, the question of power and con­trol is important. The effective child has control over her own world and at the same time does not resent reasonable con­trol and authority. It is in the very first years of the child's life that she learns the 'power of power'. It is our approach as parents to power and autonomy which teaches the child how to use power. It is from the parent that she learns the need for power, the value of power and 'how to use it'. If the parent keeps too tight a rein, gives the child no say in his life and dictates to the child, then the child learns this model of using power. Even though she is at the receiving end of the process, she will quickly learn how to survive in it and will become more at home in the role of passive acceptance. At the same time, she will see that it is the person with the power who has the control and will try to emulate this way of behaving. Where, however, the child experiences no control, and has total freedom to do as she pleases, she never learns how to compromise and never develops the 'other awareness' which is necessary for all relationships. Total freedom is in reality an abdication of responsibility and care, and the child experi­ences it as an emotional wilderness where there is no sense of having a secure boundary.

The balance that is required to enable children to be effective is one where there is control and autonomy hand-in-hand, where there is boundary and space hand-in-hand, and where there is mutual recognition of the other.