Your child has been at sleepaway camp most or part of the summer.  When he/she arrives home, you look at your child with fresh eyes, notice a little more height (especially if they are boys in their early teens) and observe the new skills they have acquired.  As a parent, you, of course, want to support and nurture these newly found skills.  It’s very difficult to resist the urge to question your child and thereby undermine unintentionally any decisions they may have made.

Your child will be eager to show off his new skills.  But, it is too easy to fall back into old routines and habits.  Our brains are used to doing what has become already automatic; things done over and over again.  Doing something new requires more energy and attention.  It’s also the reason parents continue to do things for their children for longer than they should or is necessary.  If your child has been putting sunscreen on himself all summer, he does not need mom or dad to continue doing it at home. 

Parents need to be mindful and intentional to override these automatic reflexes “to do.”  It would be better to ask your child about the responsibilities he/she took on; how proud you are of them, and determine two or three manageable chores they can continue doing at home like they did at camp.  Try putting a little playfulness or creativity into a new routine or chore to encourage cooperation.  Do the same thing for emotional issues as the physical chores.  Do not rush in to fix it.  Acknowledge it, be empathetic and comforting, and give them time. 

Camp allows children the chance to develop confidence and independence away from the parent – a rare thing and very important.  A parent must realize that their child, for perhaps, several weeks, problem-solved, rose to new challenges, and learned to live with being uncomfortable.  They learned how to get along with a bunk of kids with different personalities, backgrounds, and sleeping habits.  They made have been slighted by a friend, betrayed by another, and managed to cope.  All without a parent to complain to or to smooth things over. 

Camp is good for both the development of the child and the parent.  Seeing your child thrive without you can give a parent the confidence to allow their child more space and freedom to take risks.  Children learn that making mistakes and falling down isn’t such a bad thing.  That’s a lesson that parents can learn as well. 

Source: Star-Ledger, August 2018, Jennifer Wallace, special to the Washington Post