Are We Iranians Over-concerned Parents?

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varjavand
by varjavand
22-Aug-2009
 

There is nothing more exciting for kids than returning to school after the summer break. I could see the widespread enthusiasm for the new school year yesterday when I helped my son move back to college and then take him to dinner during which we had a nice revealing conversation. Why are they so excited about returning to school? Is it the love of learning or meeting their cool friends again? Or, perhaps the end of long boring summer months especially this one when there was no chance of finding a good summer job because of dismal economic condition? While these are all pertinent, I think more importantly, kids are so happy about returning to college simply because they want to get away from their parents, especially us the overprotective, over- concerned, over-whining, Iranian parents, at least, that is how they characterize us.

 

 Do we take out parental responsibilities too seriously? I think we often do. We believe the biggest challenge we are facing is how to deal with our kids and how to raise them the way we think is right. Don’t relax; such a monumental task is not getting any easier or less demanding when your kids grow up. The challenge of “good parenting” is always with us, what changes however, is the nature of the issues and their needs that we have to deal with.

 

I want to pose two questions; one of them is a kind of dumb question because I know the answer to it; are we over-concerned parents? And if so why? The second one, however, is the one to which I seek your inputs; what kind of impacts such over-parenting might have on our kids, especially on their future career and success in their education. Do we think that we are making them better off by trying to interfere in every aspect of their life? Why are we so apprehensive that they may not be able to do things right so they need our supervision every aspect of every decision they make? How can we balance between their happiness and their material success? Is there a tradeoff between these two?

   

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Ari Siletz

American parents

by Ari Siletz on

Most of the ones I know are dedicated and loving parents who delight in their children.

Iraniandudeee

No, absolutely not...

by Iraniandudeee on

iranians parents unlike Americans actually take care of their kids instead of looking at their kids like a burden on them (How americans look at their kids)...... Trust me man, if you raise your kids by iranian/persian culture, and raise them as an iranian, there will be nothing in this world that they can't achieve in the future.

 You really don't want you kids tobe Americanized, you'll regret it if you do.


varjavand

Dear capt_ayhab; Thanks for

by varjavand on

Dear capt_ayhab; Thanks for your insightful comments. It seems to me that you are a kind of parent every child would like to have. Since you have only one child, you can shower you son with the cherished gift of an undivided attention.

I believe one of the critical issues we have to deal with is an acceptable balance between assimilation and acculturation. After nearly 36 years of living in this country, I have tried persistently not give in to the temptation of total assimilation, acculturated? definitely. I believe our indispensible cultural balancing duty often creates a slew of parenting questions for us making the raising of bicultural children quite an overwhelming challenge that requires an extra measure of patience and an extra measure of wisdom. One problem, in my opinion, is that most of the Iranian parents I know are obsessed with our native culture. They want their children to learn and to respect our distinct native cultural values as well as the religious values which as you pointed out rightfully may backfire and cause resentment by our kinds especially later on in their life. It is I believe up to our judgment to decide what is  the best way to reconcile the differences between our native culture and the dominant culture in America – where I live- and find the practicable methods of assimilation or acculturation. 

And, why some of us fail to realize that we shouldn’t expect our children to lead exactly the same life style that we have lived in our native country or even in our new country. It will be, I think, counterproductive if we try to mold our children in this way, or subject them to excessive restrictions. This will eventually make them rebellious and perplexed.  

 


capt_ayhab

Craig

by capt_ayhab on

I  like you,  hated going back to school after summer vacation, or any holiday for that fact.

Of course the school we attended back then was much different than the modern schools in US.

-YT 


capt_ayhab

varjvand jan

by capt_ayhab on

Before I answer your question allow me to clarify couple of points. Firstly I believe wholeheartedly that majority of Iranian parents, unlike many western cultures, do truly love their children UNCONDITIONALLY, and they do everything for them. Secondly by treating like adults I by no means am implying that they should be forced to forgo all the joys of childhood and grow up prematurely.

Speaking of our own experience, starting very early in his life, we let him to participate in family decisions, as small as it might have been. In doing so, we let him experience consequence of his decision making. We never tried to silence him at all, as a matter of fact one of the first things he learned was to speak his mind truthfully and honestly.

We never penalized him for telling the truth, even if it meant embarrassment on his part. We always though him the way of respect and value of hard work. For example, I had a rule with him, anytime he brought home an straight A  report card, I surprised him with something, little gift, a little toy, anything. needless to say this proved to be a bit expensive as he grew.

Honesty, integrity, family values, Persian culture and Persian history was some of the topics I always, even to this date, challenge him with. We tried to show him that speaking his mind, in a respectable and logical manner did not carry any penalty. As a result his own beautiful and strong personality flourished, we were there to make sure he always stayed in the path of honesty, integrity, and love for all creatures. Never ever we forced him to go anywhere with us or do anything that he did not like doing.

In a nutshell, him and I, and him and his mother became friends. We never lied to him, at no cost, and never tricked him. 

All these did was to allow his personality and character, from early age,  to flourish and be sensitive to people and environment around him. After all, there is going to a time that we[the parents] are going to be gone and he is going to be by himself[and his own little family].

Key to all of this...... UNCONDITIONAL love and respect toward the children as opposed to bossing them around and treating them like kids.

Hope I answered your question properly sir. This is an excellent blog and boy can I ever talk about it ;-o)

-YT 


ex programmer craig

varjavand

by ex programmer craig on

My questions are more related to older children, the college-bound kids.  

Well, I joined the Marines right after high school and didn't even start college classes until after I got out when I was 25 so I don't know much about that. I guess my older sister preferred living in the college dorm more than she liked being at home, so you've got a point there. I have to admit, when I visited her at the dorms I really enjoyed it! Especially hanging out with teh college girls, partying all night, when I was only 17. That was a hell of a lot more fun than sleeping in an open squadbay with a bunch of smelly snoring grunts.

Can I ask why you did not like to return to school?

Well, I was talking about my teenage years. I think I just had too much fun on summer vacations. And I never found school to be fun, even though I didn't have to work very hard for good grades and was involved in a lot of sports. Not really sure why. I think maybe I had a problem with authority, even then.

 


varjavand

Ari, Your comments, as well

by varjavand on

Ari, Your comments, as well as your postings on this site, are always enlightening. Over-concerned, freaked-out are the adjectives our kids use to describe us and who can blame them. We Iranian parents think that we don’t do enough for our kids even though we do much more than the typical parents in this country. The best manifestation of over-parenting is that we always blame ourselves if our kids do not grow up to be what we wished them to be or do not do what we think is right for them. Often we blame ourselves for their mediocre performance at school or, god-forbidden, their failures. Anecdotal impression may tell us that over-parenting may be an impediment to the development, or the social skills, of our kids but we still do it, may be we have a wrong, albeit a positive anxiety. Or, may be it is the interference of the native culture under which we grow up. We were not so called bicultural but our kids are.

 

Ex,

My questions are more related to older children, the college-bound kids.  Can I ask why you did not like to return to school?

 

Good point capt_ayhab. When do we start treating them as adults? Often kids think that they know everything even better that we do at even early age.

 


capt_ayhab

parents as safety net

by capt_ayhab on

For sure us Iranians are over protective. But I think one of our main issues with our children is that we do not treat them as adults. But lets not ever stop giving them all the love they need. You can never love them too much, given that they are given freedom to chose and make informed  decisions.

Good parenting to us  was to know when to push and when not to push. That fine line between letting him be his own person and watching so that he does not make a big blunder in his life. The only restrict rules we had with him was his schooling,  we never set any curfew for him so as long as his grades did not go below A. ;-)

I have witnessed many parents that put down their grown up children in front of everyone just to demonstrate that they are the boss.  This is one of the main reasons that some kids become rebellious or even run away from home.

I have to say though, we feel very fortunate for having our one and only son.

-YT 


ex programmer craig

Oh wow

by ex programmer craig on

I never ONCE looked forward to going back to school! I absoultely dreaded the end of summer when I was a kid!


Ari Siletz

Caring questions, varjavand

by Ari Siletz on

Here's my gauge for knowing when I'm over-parenting: when my kids stop coming to me for advice.

 

This usually happens when I have given them a certain advice that they did not follow and I was heavy handed with my I-told-you-so, instead of picking up the situation as it has developed and supporting them with guidance they can use.

 

The primary task of parenting in rapidly changing cultures is teaching decision making skills. Being a source of experience, while important, is secondary. The Iranian parent often reverses these priorities, delaying the cognitive development of our youth.