Stop Expecting Too Much From Your Baby Daughters
Let girls grow up like girls
I am writing this while sitting on a park bench. Lovely and sunny first day of 2024. A perfectly-looking family with two toddler daughters is sitting on the opposite bench. As I feast my eyes upon little girls making their first steps this year, I become an involuntary observer of their upbringing.
“No, you can’t have candy now. We are having lunch first, then your candy.” I hear their father’s voice through the girls’ resentful screams. Sounds legit, I often tell myself the same.
The girls’ father keeps talking to them in a very serious and logical way, telling them that they are going to eat lunch at a restaurant and asking them about their food preferences. I am looking at the father with admiration. These girls will be so intelligent because their father treats them like adults.
As soon as this thought strikes me, I immediately feel wrong.
People were saying the same thing about me. My parents used to take me to conservatory classical music nights when I was four. I wanted to watch cartoons, but they were not intelligent enough for my father.
“Those are only for stupid kids.” He would always tell me.
When I wanted to build dollhouses and wigwams around our living room, they would always stand in my father’s way. He wanted everything perfectly clean and tidy—literally everything in our house must have had its place.
“Go put your toys back where they belong.” I still put everything back in its proper place. It makes it easier to find anything in the dark because you know exactly where it is. But the price is just too high—I always felt I was in my father’s way, not my toys.
When I wanted my parents to read me a book, I was told that I was old enough and knowledgeable enough to do it myself. I was five, wanted to play with my dolls, and did not make any serious decisions, such as selecting a book for bedtime reading.
Sometimes I imagined myself accompanying my father as he read a book about Baroque architecture or did crosswords instead of something more appropriate for a five-year-old. My father always treated me as if I were an adult.
“You must learn to defend yourself.” He would tell me, seeking his protection from the bad boys in the neighborhood.
And I learned. To smile in order not to be beaten. To be smart but quiet because men dislike women who are smarter than them. Not to argue with teachers because my parents would never come to my school to deal with my problems.
“You are old enough to deal with it yourself.”
He was always there to help me with math equations or to play Might & Magic II or other strategy games. Well, at least it was something we could do together. Still, it happened too fast, leaving my actual childhood way behind. Because all the childish things I wanted to do were too boring for him. And I didn’t want to look childish for not disappointing him.
I started saving money to buy my own toys when I was five years old. Because the Barbie dolls and Teddy bears I wanted were never intelligent enough for my father. I never applied to an arts or journalistic faculty because it felt childish to me. My father expected me to pursue a more serious profession. I decided to start my own family much sooner than I was prepared to. Because it was a serious decision, and my father expected me to be a grownup.
Was I?
I am not sure when I stopped being a child. Probably five or six. And now I am watching the father make his two-year-olds choose their lunch. When I was two, I did not want to choose this; I just wanted to be fed enough to keep running and playing.
What does he want to hear? “I’d like a trout with a walnut salad, dad.”
When I was five, I had my grandma, my father’s mother. She was a rule-breaker: she would paint my nails red or share a candy bar with me while my parents were away. I would be furious if this happened to my children. But as a child… I loved it because I didn’t feel under pressure. I felt heard and accepted.
I know diet is important. I also know that being able to run around carelessly without thinking about your savings or busy schedule is priceless. And the ability to simply play silly games with your father is a pipe dream.
Once, I took a flight from Bangkok. I was waiting for boarding next to a French family. The girls, aged 8 and 12, sat next to their father. All three were clapping each other’s laps, cheering, and acting completely childish. It never appeared silly or childish to me. In contrast, I was jealous. I really wished I had it too. I wished I could have my childhood back. Without the pressure or expectation of not being an adult enough.
I do not have any kids yet, so I don’t know much about upbringing. I understand that it is hard and important, though. There is a thin line between allowing children too much and allowing them just enough to be who they are—children. I had always felt disconnected and unwanted by my father, so I tried to be smarter and more capable than my age in order for him to notice and accept me. I would not want this for my children. I wish all fathers saw girls in their daughters. Not as their offspring, nor as tennis partners, but as daughters and even princesses.
