Posted 2015-03-23

Q&A: For Child, Does “Prison” Provide Maximum Security?

by Scott Noelle

This question was asked after I posted Parenting: Take No Prisoners!

Q:  My friend’s daughter had a rough start in a home filled with chaos and violence. Eventually my friend left the father, joined a fundamentalist religion, and changed her parenting style from “unmanaged” to highly restrictive authoritarian (as dictated by the religion). Over the years, the daughter went from being an insecure brat to a stress-free, self-secure young woman. She seems to be thriving in captivity. Does this mean kids are better off “imprisoned”?

A:  When something “works” in one context, that doesn’t mean it’s right for every context. French fries are better with ketchup; ice cream is not.

It’s all relative. Strict controlling “works” relative to chaos and violence if the control tactics are less threatening and more predictable. And part of the reason it helped the daughter is because it helped her mother, too. The shift from completely out of control to highly controlled brought immense relief, so naturally they came to value the controls.

However, for parents whose personal development includes reasonably healthy boundaries and self-esteem, an increase in “power-over” dynamics doesn’t feel quite so good. Power-over is an upgrade from powerless, but it’s a downgrade from Power-WITH, which is the essence of partnership.

When a parent is mired in a highly dysfunctional situation and feels stuck in powerlessness, shifting directly into partnership mode may be too great a leap. That’s because partnership parenting requires a degree of trust, openness, and creativity that’s not readily available to a parent in survival mode. Being chronically stressed and overwhelmed by the chaos, this parent needs definite answers, not open-ended questions. Many religions (and other ideological groups) are happy to provide answers, but they’re not so cooperative when a member outgrows their answers and starts to question them.

You, on the other hand, are not in survival mode. You have enough security and self-confidence to be in growth mode, looking for better answers. But there’s an ironic twist here: Since there is never a crowd on the leading edge, growth mode deprives you of the security you’d feel if you stuck with the herd. You’ll face uncertainty more often, and your kids will sense your shakiness. If they start to push against you it’s not because they’re brats, it’s because they need assurance that you’re a solid presence.

But solid is not the same as rigid. You can be strong and flexible — confident and uncertain. If you develop these abilities and stay in partnership, your kids won’t have to live under constant threat of punishment and rejection, which will ultimately provide more security than is provided by the imprisonment of authoritarian rule.

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