S/O So how DO you protect your children?

Yodajo

Without being obessive about it?   Or do you have to be obsessive about it? 

I get listening to your instincts, but how do you prevent from even being in that situation where your instincts would tell you something in the first place? 

I think all the time about the age when my boys will be away from me more and it scares me.  I don't want to be that crazy, overprotective mom, but I am so scared to trust anyone. 

When the age comes, how will you determine who you trust enough to let your DC stay the night their house?

I truly am pretty laid backwhen it comes to most things, but this is something I already feel tense about.

KoriBrett

I'm a fairly quiet & watchful person to begin with, that helps.  I have a very strong sense of what people are like almost instantly, which also helps.  And I trust damn near nobody.  It has to be earned.  So I kind of quietly stay watchful, yet oddly I don't stress about it much. 

Again, when they're older and doing sleepovers, it will be a case by case thing and I will have spoken to the parents regularly before-hand, etc. 

FloF9

When we were kids, my parents NEVER let us stay over anyone's house. Ever.  This was their worst fear and I think it's pretty valid.  You just don't really know other people.

My SS had a "friend" his age who asked SS to show his penis.  It took SS 2 weeks (he was 14 yrs old at the time) to finally tell us.  He felt "bad" for his so called friend.  So I can't even imagine the tactics they would use on a younger child for them not to tell.  *shudder*

Dougsgirl4ever

I have no idea.  My SS is 14 & he has a friend that he has been hanging out with over at his house etc. we were looking at the sexual offenders site & the people that are close to our house & this guys face pops up & it is his friends DAD.  SS has never stayed at their house but he has been over there a few times.

I'm the crazy overprotective mom I know DD is going to hate me for it too.  The thought of it just makes me sick to my stomach, because I know that I cannot be with her 24/7. 

 

stillhoping

Kalie has spent the night with the neighbors across the street, they have five children, I have known them for three years and trust them with my children, as they trust me with theirs.

 

I have been very open with my children about good touch/bad touch, who is allowed to see them with their clothes off (I am not even allowed anymore) and who is not. We have very open discussions about "private parts" and touching. 

I put them in safety camp last summer and they had an entire day on good touch bad touch in which the parents were included in the discussion. Since then the kids have been very vocal about their bodies, do not want even me and dad to see them naked. Kalie told me that daddy can not dry her off after a bath anymore. And we respect her on that. 

 

The key is to be open with them, to communicate with them to let them know they can tell  you anything..

Yodajo

Dougsgirl4ever:

I have no idea.  My SS is 14 & he has a friend that he has been hanging out with over at his house etc. we were looking at the sexual offenders site & the people that are close to our house & this guys face pops up & it is his friends DAD.  SS has never stayed at their house but he has been over there a few times.

I'm the crazy overprotective mom I know DD is going to hate me for it too.  The thought of it just makes me sick to my stomach, because I know that I cannot be with her 24/7. 

 

See, this is what scares me.  Like Kori said,  I am a very insightful person when it comes to getting a good read on someone, but child molesters are so manipulative.  And as the pp said, how well do you really know anyone?  You can spend a lot of time with someone and thier family and have no clue what they do behind closed doors, what their fetishes are, etc. 

firefightersgal

I'm uber protective of who my DD stays with.  She has had *very* few babysitters in her life thus far and has only stayed overnight at my mom's house.  I get a sick feeling when my DD is around men.  The *only* man I trust 100% is my husband.  I never let my guard down.  Then again, I was molested as a child, so I'm constantly on the lookout for any little thing.

Yodajo

Belle4KP:

Kalie has spent the night with the neighbors across the street, they have five children, I have known them for three years and trust them with my children, as they trust me with theirs.

 

I have been very open with my children about good touch/bad touch, who is allowed to see them with their clothes off (I am not even allowed anymore) and who is not. We have very open discussions about "private parts" and touching. 

I put them in safety camp last summer and they had an entire day on good touch bad touch in which the parents were included in the discussion. Since then the kids have been very vocal about their bodies, do not want even me and dad to see them naked. Kalie told me that daddy can not dry her off after a bath anymore. And we respect her on that. 

 

The key is to be open with them, to communicate with them to let them know they can tell  you anything..

I understand everything you're saying, Belle, but I want to avoid them ever having anything they need to tell me in the first place.  I don't want them to have something happen to them, not one time, that they have to walk around with for the rest of their lives. 

stillhoping

I am very protective about who they hang out with and have play dates with. They will not just go to anyone's house to play without me. I do not want anything to ever happen to them as you said, so I do try and be very careful about who I associate with and who I let them associate with. They do play with a lot of our neighbors but we all have an open door policy. If my kids are across the street at T's house they know that I may just walk in at any minute and vice versa with her kids and anyone else's around me.

 

I think you have to follow your gut and do what you feel is right for you and your family. 

Yodajo

firefightersgal:

I'm uber protective of who my DD stays with.  She has had *very* few babysitters in her life thus far and has only stayed overnight at my mom's house.  I get a sick feeling when my DD is around men.  The *only* man I trust 100% is my husband.  I never let my guard down.  Then again, I was molested as a child, so I'm constantly on the lookout for any little thing.

Totally agree.  My boys have only stayed with my mom overnight and had just immediate family watch them besides one other babysitter.  Maybe its our pasts that have shaped us, but this is one instance I'd rather be safe than sorry.

 

 

nettie

I will probably be considered way overprotective but I don't know if I will allow sleep overs at all...a counselor friend told me that statistically that is where it happens the most and I know other kids can be the perpetrator if it happened to them before...I don't know I guess like someone else said it will have to be on a case by case basis...as far as stranger danger and all that I plan on doing role plays with my kids incase someone approaches them because I have a feeling if I would have been approached by a weiro/kidnapper when I was young I might have felt like I had to be polite...