We are continuously trying to create safe
spaces for our kids, whether it is at home, at school, in the playground, at a friend’s
house. We want them to be and feel
physically and emotionally safe. There is a fine line between keeping our
children safe and being overtly over protective of them.
We continuously have
to make these choices about who we can trust. But even though we try to be
overprotective of our kids as far as safety is concerned but we also need to
educate our kids on ways they can protect themselves as well. We need to teach
them about good touch and bad touch. Every day in the newspaper I get to see
heart wrenching news regarding children being molested and raped. There are
many videos online to educate our children regarding the same and on how they
can keep themselves safe.
Here are tips to keep our children safe:
·
There should be trust and continuous communication between your
child and you
·
Don’t leave at child unattended in a vehicle, whether the
ignition is on or not
·
Make sure your child has the numbers memorized
·
Tell your child if they feel unsafe , they should run away
·
Your child should tell an to be careful of an adult who tells
you to keep a secret
·
Take an active role in your child’s activities
·
The goal is to keep your kid smart and keep them safe
Never force your child to be affectionate towards any adult if
he or she doesn’t want to be. Forcing a child means you are violating their
personal space and in the future they will have to agree to be affectionate to
adult even if they don’t want. I have seen in many families children are forced
to be affectionate to their relatives and friend even if the child shows
displeasure.
Majority cases of molestation and rape perpetrators have been
family members. We should teach our children the concept of circle of trust and
who they should trust or not. We need to capacitate our children and keep
talking to them and telling them to keep us informed about the developments
while at school or home. Be like a friend to your child and ask him or her if
there is something which is bothering them.
I don’t ever force my son to hug or kiss anyone who is not
comfortable with. It is his own body and his choice, even if it is some very
close relative parent or friend. By forcing your child in the future he or she
may be force to do something he or she is not comfortable with. You need to
educate family members and friends the reason why you don’t force your child? It not that you are encouraging bad behavior. Don’t let your child be rude and
un-courteous to anyone but it should be their choice if they feel like hugging
or kissing anyone. There are time when my son doesn’t want to be physically
affectionate with his grandparents and I don’t force him to do as I respect his
choice and discretion to be physically affectionate whoever he wants to be
with.
When you hire a nanny do a proper verification and install cctv
camera’s to monitor activities in the house while you are away. Check with
neighbors for any suspicious activities and always come home unannounced and
keep observing any changes in your child’s behavior. Keep communicating with
your child and capacitating them in case they are stuck in a precarious
situation. Give them hypothetical situation in which you train them to handle
situations.
Here are some tips you can give your children when they are
away from you at school:
·
Don’t talk or accept anything from a person you don’t know,
even if it is a person they know but is not in their circle of trust.
·
Tell them to run away from anyone they feel unsafe with and go
to someone they feel safe being with.
·
Teach them about good touch and bad touch, there are many
videos on youtube which educate children about the same.
·
Tell them never wander off to anyplace alone at school or a
birthday party.
·
When they are about 12-15 yrs old make them join a self defense
class.
·
Teach them about bullies and tell them how to handle them and
not get pressurized to do things which are unsafe like any sort of challenges
like in the recent times do many children lives have been lost due to the blue
whale challenge.
·
Be-friend your child so they tell you everything and have the
confidence to share anything. Don’t get angry if the confide anything with you,
it may seem something which is really unacceptable to you but it’s your child
and you need to help them.
·
Don’t panic under any situation because children learn to
emulate your behavior, a stressed parent will have a stressed out child. For
example if a mother goes out in the garden and sees a lizard and screams, a
child of that mother will have similar stresses and fears, but on the other
hand if a mother sees a lizard but doesn’t panic and is calm, tells the child
to observe its beauty at a distance, the child will grow up not being scared of
things which aren’t harmful or a threat to them.
People who are unflappable and
don’t stress easily have better presence of mind to react to any situation. I
would like to share an incident where my son was in the school bus and
apparently due to less number of children they had clubbed the buses. So all
the kids would reach home fairly late because they would be taking a longer
route, the school had been lackadaisical in not informing the parents about
this development. So my son noticed that the bus was going to take a different
route called me from the conductors phone and informed me of the same. I was
able to pick him up mid way and his classmates as well who very stressed about
how they would get home. I was very proud of the way my son had the presence of
mind to call me and not panic and handle the situation. It’s important to
instill life skills in our children, so that they are equipped enough to handle
situation when we aren’t around.
I am always worried about the safety of my children, especially
when they get all sassy and think they can talk back to me - anon
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