Over-protective parents?

Question

Did you have over protective parents??
If you're older, are you glad for the way they treated you in your teenage years?
my parents (mainly mother grrr!) is pretty strict..... I don't mind/can see where she's coming from with most of the stuff.
but sometimes it's freaking insane! like not letting me sleepover my friend's houses? (she won't tell me why she won't let me go! she likes all my friends and their families!)i'm 16
see i'm arabic, but have lived here all my life, so i respect the arab culture and follow it, but don't you think that my mother should try and stretch her limits by following some of the british culture for my sake?

woah i seriously have NO idea whatsoever that really long answerer is on about?!!
my mum fully trusts me, i know she does, she tells me she does. it's nothing to do with the trust, i'm sure of it.

umm just cause i'm arabic doesn't mean i'm a muslim!
i'm actually christian!

Answer 1

For the longest time I thought my mom was insane. She never let me do ANYTHING. And for a while (particularly when I was in middle & high school) it sucked & I hated it. I never went to a single sleepover I was ever invited to. My friends could come & visit me, and stay over if they wanted to, but never the other way around. I never got to go out on dates, but my boyfriend was allowed to come over to our house whenever he wanted (during the day) and we all went out together as a family, and my boyfriend got to come along. He would go with us to church too ... lol. And now that I'm 25 and a mom of two daughters, I totally see where my mom was coming from.

The world is an awful, scary place for girls & young women. My mom was trying to protect me from all the dark, not-so-great things that my young naive mind just didn't know about. And I am eternally thankful and grateful for what she did.

That same boyfriend is now my husband, by the way :) We've been together since we were 15.. yep, that's over 10 yrs now :) There was apparently some sort of method to my mother's madness :) I guess she knew what she was doing after all :)

Answer 2

RE: your parents (especially your mom), it's a part of life. I was the same growing up but fortunately, there weren't any computers yet so my mom wasn't there hovering over me while online chatting, like you. I was kind of a rebel too and was always upset or angry because my parents were also overprotective. Eventhough I had tantrums and got upset about their overprotectiveness, I still couldn't do anything because I was a teenager and living under my parents' roof. I had to abide by their rules whether I liked it or not. I think it's best to just leave it as is. Your mom won't change for you coz she's a mom. That's how moms are. She's just protecting you and making sure you're on the right path. So maybe don't let this overprotectiveness of your parents be a big deal in your life. You should just enjoy being a teenager. Go to school and study hard. Have lotsa friends, meet new people, join clubs and extracurricular activies, pursue your hobbies, etc. and just be thankful you got a good life. And don't let their overprotectiveness hinder you in enjoying your teenage life, because if it will, in the end you won't win, you'll just be sad and miserable. As one of the people above said, don't start yelling at them, coz it'll only make matters worse. When people are ignorant specifically about gays or lesbians, they'd rather tease and joke than be tolerant coz they don't understand what we people go through. Finish high school and go to university or college, etc. You still have 4 years to go and once u reach 18 y.o. then you can do whatever u want in your life. Also, you're still young, so u don't have to hurry up too re: your sexual orientation, if you're bi or gay. Don't tell your parents yet until you're really really sure that you're bi or gay. There's another time and place for that. Once you're ready, you'll know and feel it. Perhaps you can join an LGBT alliance if you have one in your school or in your community. Good luck and I hope this helps. Peace!

Answer 3

My sister let her older daughters go on sleepovers, and over the years, there were so many close calls with other girls at the sleepovers, or at the same house on different nights, being molested by the fathers. For real.

My sis allows no more sleepovers away from home. She's happy to host them. But it's frankly not safe.

My parents were overprotective. It was bad in that I found real life pretty shocking. On the other hand, being a nerd in a cool world pays off well by the time you're out of school. All values invert and you see trying to meet the standards of 'cool' is the path to a less promising future.

Good luck!

Answer 4

Yes and no, my mum was very strict when i got to my teenage years but my dad was not strict at all with me i'm the youngest of 9 yes nine 7 boys and 2 girls and i'm the baby of the family, when i was 16 my dad told me to try before i buy as in sex and stuff, mum did her top over it but dad told her i need to know this stuff and he didn't want me ending up with a fella that couldn't give me children.

I think your mother may be afraid that you may like a brother of your friend if she has any that is, but at the end of the day your mother is trying to protect you, and i don't want to sound ignorant but i know nothing of Arabic culture so i wouldn't want to comment on that, coz i see everyone as my equal no colour, race, dissablilty none of it coz we are all the same under the skin we all bleed if cut we all cry.

Answer 5

Sweetie, your mum loves very much and she's trying her best to protect you from this cruel world. I grew up in Muslim family too. My father never let me to sleep over at my friend's house as well but let me stay in my relatives house though. He even used to listen to my conversations over the phone to know whether I was talking to guys. Later he started to let me go to parties but with strict hour limits if I was late then my older brother used to come to pick me up and lectured me all the way home. Everything is behind now and I'm mum myself even my little girl she only 6 months old but I'm scared and worried cause there are so many things on the news everyday. I pray everyday for God's protection over her. Trust me your mum wants the best for you because she is your mother. You will understand when you'll be a mother yourself one day.
Best wishes and good luck!

Answer 6

My parents were never overly protective of me but i must admit i am super protective of my 3 kids. My oldest is 8 and although i'll let her go to her friends house and vice versa i will not let her outside alone to wander the streets. Unlike when i was younger when you could wander outside for hours without any problems, nowadays it's not the same. You just have to watch the news to see about all the kids that go missing and end up found dead in a ditch somnewhere and it could happen to you. Saying that she does go to sleepovers and hang out with her friends a lot so she doesn't totally resent me *grin*

Answer 7

This day and age the reason we're protective is not that we dont trust our children, its other people we dont trust hun

with all the murders, abduction and rapists out there we want to be extra careful,, and we know a lot of young girls say but its NOT going to happen to me im just going blah blah WRONG! if a little girl can get snatched form her own bath while mother in another room anything can happen hun

we do these things for a reason its called LOVE!

you will all see when you have kids of your own

Answer 8

My parents were really not over protective, however I'm VERY little and my curfews were set to match the times of my boyfriend (had the same boyfriend for 3 years as a teen). He was BIG and scary and known to have rep of never loosing a fight. AND he lived a couple of blocks away from me. My parents felt much safer knowing he was walking me home than me going home by myself.

The times when I felt that my parents were not trusting me, it was not me but friends of mine.

In your case, I think you'll just have to deal with your parents belief system.

They likely do trust you very much. But they may feel that their heritage and customs are threatened by the "british culture" and are afraid of loosing that. Its very understandable, however, doesn't make your life easy.

Best of luck

Answer 9

I'm sure there is something in your parent's past that keeps her from letting you sleep over. My father was overprotective and never let us do anything like that because he grew up in
Germany in WW2, and you NEVER let anyone know anything about you and your family.

The drawback to being in an overprotective environment was when I was finally able to escape to college, I was finally free!!!! And I pushed that freedom to the extreme - I was a terrible party girl and I had some bad things happen to me, and then I got smarter.

Today, I raise my children with the belief that my job as a parent is to prepare them to be well-adjusted adults. I do let them be exposed to vices and pressure that I didn't see until college, because I figure that they will have to make their own decisions, and I would rather be nearby to help them if they falter, rather than to see them crash and burn.

I don't like the fact that you think your mother should "try and stretch her limits" -- it's probably not a limitation she is dealing with, but a bad experience.

Good luck.

Answer 10

I'm only 14! i no how you feel! Lots of my friends are aloud to do far more than me, but my mum is TO protective. But at the end of the day atleast you no that your parents care about you and are keeping you safe. My mum lets me do things now which is great! Just talk to your mum and make her aware that your old enough and mature enough, i'm sure in the end that she will let you do far more things than you used to be able to! I was never aloud to go on buses to my nearest town because my mum was afraid that harm would come to me. I mean you here about weirdo's now aday's and all these murders. But i convinced her that i would always stay with my friends and ring her when i got there and when i was on my way back. In the end she let me go!. Try it!