Overprotective?

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My cousin has IMO alot of Aspie traits. As a mother she doesn't want to leave her kids alone and says she doesn't like people and doesn't want to make friends. Her life/world ARE HER CHILDREN! She doesn't trust anyone to watch her kids. She sees other parents who socialize as irresponsible. I was curious if other parents overall are overprotective. (While the mom IMO has alot of traits I'd go so far as saying her children/family are her special interest she talks about them in great detail) I mainly put this here to get a parents perspective. Thanks

I am definitely somewhat overprotective. I was very under-protected as a child, and I may overcompensate. My husband is far worse and always has been. He absolutely freaks out when our son wants to take off on his own for a bit. I'm trying to convince him to let our son walk the one block home from school by himself next year. Another thing I'm working on is both of us encouraging him to do more for himself (pour his own drinks, etc.) instead of coddling him so much.

But we certainly use babysitters! We have a date night tonight, in fact. It's good for our marriage and our mental health.

I've got some traits of autism, but I think that I have some balance regarding my children.

I am not a social type person, but I do have a couple of friends and try to get out in the community (to family drop ins and such).

I have not left my kids with any "babysitter" except for his ABI worker (who is fantastic) and my own parents (the grandparents). This is more to do with affordability and the fact that my son is verbal, but not fluently verbal and may not be able to articulate if there were a problem with any babysitter.

This is probably a topic for another thread - but I tend to think that not EVERY quirk/belief/behavioiur issue stems from autism/aspergers. Goodness knows that enough NTs can have quirks, weird beliefs and challenging behaviour in their own right. When can I say "autism be damned, smarten up buttercup!!" I say this from a personal perspective, I do not want to hide behind my autistic traits and use them as an excuse. I also want to make sure that I have firm boundaries and not let others with ASD use their diagnosis as excuses.

I would say my kids are my special interest. It's nice having the same special interest as my wife.

That said, our work situation does require us to leave the kids in the care of others at times. I don't think we've socialized without our children, though. We always take them along to restaurants and dances that we go to, for example.

My son is almost 5, and I have only left him with my mom who lives out of town, so that hasn't been very much. I do take him to his little pre-k sometimes on Saturday night because they have a parents night out. He likes it there,and I feel safe with him there. I did leave him with a friend a couple of years ago for a night out, but she is an OT. The older he gets, I am becoming more comfortable with leaving him with a trusted sitter, but like another poster said, sometimes it boils down to money. I do get together with my girlfriends from time to time for dinner and my husband watches him.

I think since my son is an only child and because I know he sometimes has communication issues, I am overprotective of him. Unless someone understands about autism, I just don't really trust leaving him with just anyone.

Oh, btw, I am NT, so I agree that maybe some moms are just overprotective.

Hi, I would have to say yes most def. I haev a son 7 with aperger's and one sone that is 3 with autism so I am very over-protective. I think that most ppl dont understand all of there needs and think that most of their behaviors are strange adn that they are just being bratty kids. I guess it would have to depend on how the family or friends act and behave with the child. I have serious problems though with trusting the school and people like that. With family it more like this: My oldest with AS he is almost scared of everything in the world, he gets panic attacks, when im over my sisters house they think well let him see all the scary horror movies and tell him scary stories he will just get over it. Or niether of my sons like loud noises, so they will yell and bang things loud to try to make them get over it.
So my kids dont go to places where i feel the ppl dont get it! I think that any parents would agree that there kids shouldnt be subjected to anything that they dont like.

hmm I don't know if I'd attribute that necessarily to her having Aspie traits. There's a whole wave of parents out there who lose themselves in their kids and just don't do anything else with themselves. I really don't know any other way to put it, but I've seen a lot of Moms especially go through that, especially when their kids are young. Some of them snap out of it and begin paying attention to themselves again and stop following a foot behind their kids through the whole playground. I was a bit like that until the second bebe came around and I snapped out of it and realized keeping my own interests and hobbies would actually contribute to the few shreds of sanity I have

For the last few days of school, I dropped my son off on the school grounds and let him scooter to his class by himself and I was so unnerved by it! It's hard to let go. I so often feel like it's us against the world.

i dont think you can really equate not letting other people watch your kids with being overprotective. there are simply some parents, like me and my SO, that believe children should be raised by their parents. we made a conscious choice years ago to live on the lower end of the income scale to allow one of us to always be home with the kids. not everyone can or is willing to do that, but we thought it was one of the most important things we could do while they were young. we generally take our children with us if we go places. rarely they are watched by other family members, such as an aunt or grandma (when we lived near her). i can literally count on one finger the number of times they have been watched in the past ten years by someone who wasnt a close family member. if we choose to socialize, we do so at family friendly places/events. that doesnt make us overprotective, it makes us parents.

our oldest is now watching his younger brothers on occasion, which allows us to go out by ourselves once in a while. but its for things such as grocery shopping, not for social events. he likes the responsibility, his brothers like being home without their parents, and we enjoy some walmart time without the two little guys wreaking havoc. im sure walmart and the other shoppers appreciate it too =)

I don’t think that being an aspie or autie means you are over protective. She may have experienced something as a child that doesn’t allow her to trust anyone with her child (that happened to me). She just can’t help it; she doesn’t mean to upset anyone, that’s just the way it is.

Overprotective means that by protecting your child in a certain manner, it would somehow be to the detriment of that child. I see far too many under protective parents. The most successful children when I was young were the ones of "over protective parents". They guided their children, and most importantly, loved them more than anything. Love is demonstrated through action...not just through words. I believe that many "parents" hadn't lived life enough not to feel robbed of it before having children. I applaud your cousin. Your children should mean everything to you. A child that means everything to you means you are there for him. Social events should be family ones. Live your life before you have children so you can fully give to them when they arrive. Maybe you cannot see it...parents that are always with their children...do it because they love doing it...more than having a shallow night out with friends.

Some very good points from everyone thanks. My sister has a son and yet she still finds time for herself to get out with friends. My mom not so much though. but all very good points.