Hi folks!!!

Guess what? I'm back from my holidays in Bali. My Mum just recently allowed me to have my own blog and I'm slowly posting all my pics in my blog http://myownbildungsroman.blogspot.com/

Got lots of things to look into.

Cheers!!!

Did you have a good time?

Its a very interesting blog BB. I think the rules your mum has set are fair. I know that my sister password protects images of her daughter on her blog and that I would want to protect the identity of my sons when they get to the stage of wanting to use chatrooms.

Hi Miss Ross,

Yes I had a fabulous time. Thanks.

Hi Jod,

Are you like my Mum? She's got this paranoid delusion that the whole world would want to kidnap me. She doesn't even allow me to take any public transport in our city, which is one of the safest in the world. Frankly, I think kidnappers wouldn't want to hold on to me more than a few hours. I'd give them a tough time. Hehe.

Please keep reading my blog. It'll be updated with more photos including some I got from a frightening cremation ceremony with people dressed as demons and men carrying broad swords and machetes.

Beamish Boy, I don't think Jod is being extra paranoid. Putting extra info about yourself on social networking sites or whatever can lead to identity theft, which is why it is safer to be as limited as possible about what you put on the internet about yourself! Which is why I am still on Facebook...

No, Miss Tickle Thea, I did not say she was exactly like my Mum. Most mothers aren't. I'm ranting more about my mum's not allowing me to go on public buses than the rules she imposed on my blogging which are fine.

Apologies.

No worries.

I went on public buses aged 13... and hope my children will too. For goodness sake you're a teenager not a china doll!

jod, why don't you talk to my mother? She's got the most made-up mind, the most impenetrable skull and the most unchangeable ideas. I've spoken to her many times about taking public transport with my friends. Her reply is always the same. She's got a dedicated driver to take me anywhere I want. I tell her I want to go with my friends. She says my friends can come in the car too. But they used to go with me when we were little but nowadays nobody wants to go with me because the driver is a paid spy. He will tell on us. It's not that we do anything bad but my friends suspect and I know he will tell my Mum everything. It doesn't help that I'm the only child. When I complain, my Mum will just look shocked and remark that I've got everything a boy could possibly want. It's true that she's very indulgent and at the drop of a hat, I get all kinds of expensive presents and I feel sometimes like I'm an ingrate complaining when I'm practically living in the lap of luxury (and some of the forumites have chided me for this and they've called me spoilt brat and all that) but still, life is not complete when there is no true freedom, which is why if you look at the top of my blog, I call myself an activist who's h e l l -bent on removing discrimination based on age.

Just because you want some freedom does not mean you are a selfish, spoilt brat. However much money your mother lavishes on you, that is something money can not buy.

Your mother sounds as if she loves you and cares for you and wants the best: that is why she treats you in the way she does. She probably has issues with idea of loosing you and having an empty nest when you finally grow up and fly the nest.

My suggestion is that you talk to her about the way you feel. You must reassure her that you love her, but that now is the time to loosten the apron strings.

Remember your Mum is going to find that painful and difficult, but this is a necessary step for you both to make.

Good luck, keep calm and listen to your Mum's side too. She loves you. However old you get you will always be her baby. Oh and be honest you got this advice from a mum of two who's in her late 30s not a teenage friend.

jod, thanks for the suggestion. But I really don't think it'll work. If I tell you what drastic security measures they take to protect me, you'll think I've made it up.

The good thing is all along, they don't allow me to go on a holiday with friends. This time, they've decided that I'll get to go somewhere with two friends. Initially it was supposed to be Bali on my birthday - end of this year. They then got report from heaven knows where that it might not be safe at that time of the year because of the Christmas-New Year celebrations (and you know the sort of trouble that might emerge there). I was livid and I told them they couldn't just change their minds. I've roped in two friends who are happy to go to Bali with me even though my grandpa and another chap who's always around to ensure my safety will accompany us. Suddenly, at the end of last week, they told me I could pack for Bali that very day. They will arrange for a nicer holiday for my friends and me on my birthday. Of course I agreed provided it's a nicer destination. They said it'd be Spain or Portugal. My friends were elated when they heard that. Of course I agreed. I surfed the net and I've found so many castles in Spain. I just love castles. I was absolutely in love with Caerphilly Castle when I was in the UK with my Dad last June.

So my parents will always work out something that I'm sure to accept and they still get their way in the end. Sometimes I don't know whether to laugh or to cry.

I just reason that the time will come when I will have complete freedom. Of course it will come. So I might as well enjoy now all the compensation that I get for my curtailed freedom.

BB- you sound a lot older than 12 in the language that you use and the way that you speak. While I am not questioning your identity, perhaps your mother is trying to protect you from the fact that you are more mature in some ways than you are in others? I know some mums who have quite precocious children and they are always more protective of them, simply because there is quite often a lot more that they will think of getting up to.

That being said, what you have described does sound a bit extreme, but I certainly was not allowed to holiday with anyone but family when I was 12, neither did I use buses until I was about 16 (although that wasn't to do with kidnappers, but more to do with the fact that I didn't know how to buy a ticket and was too scared to ask LOL).

Hi littlelady,

Thanks. You're not the only one. Lots of people think I'm much older than I am because (I hope the other forumites won't crucify me for this as they did in the past) I do sound quite mature. As you can see at the heading of my blog, I believe I am actually an adult trapped in a child's body. I don't just sound like an adult, I think like one and I behave like one. So it's very frustrating when my Mum thinks otherwise. My Dad pretends to treat me like an adult but he is no different from my Mum.

I can understand if you had to be protected because you felt too scared to be out on your own. That's quite all right because if parents don't protect their young girls, who will? But I'm a boy and I play rugby for my school. And I'm not scared of going anywhere on my own. In my country everyone has an electronic card that can be used on all the trains and buses. You don't have to buy a ticket. I've not even got to use my card on my own. The only time I got to use was when I was accompanied by my parents' most trusted spy. He's the one who'll be with me when I'm abroad without my parents. I hear he's a one-time national martial arts exponent but it's not like I'm the heir to some throne. As soon as I'm on my own, I intend to get myself a flat in the middle of nowhere and I'm never gonna have a single servant or any paid help. I'll live the way I want and travel the way I like and I'll probably be miles from my parents. It's not that I don't like them. They're very kind but I need a break.

Spies and martial arts - sounds like a James Bond movie!
That bit about parents protecting their young girls though - and there being no need to protect 'tough' boys is very sexist - all children need protection, and all children can avoid most danger by following rules (not going out without a parent until old enough, all the stanger danger stuff etc.) Girls are not helpless any more than boys are.

About the over-protective parents... well aside from all the stuff you wrote about the chauffeurs and the holidays and so on mine were exactly the same... I mean I think twelve or thirteen is too young to go on holiday alone to another country with only a few friends, but the public transport thing and so on - that's just what my parents used to be like. As Jod said though, after I sat down and discussed it things got better. They were still over-protective, but not to the same degree.
Hope that helps, but maybe not.

Also, when I was twelve I thought I was an adult too.... I think all children think that - because you can reason things through and you're intelligent and so on, so you think you can cope with things... I'm sure you probably are as intelligent as many adults... emotional age is different though... As I've got a bit older I can see how I would've been unable to cope with many things that adults face every day. I don't think there's a twelve year old in the world who wouldn't be overwhelmed by adult problems and situations - it's good that you can be treated like an adult though, by your dad, as if you are treated as one, naturally you begin to act like one.

Probably just waffling on there saying nothing useful whatsoever... I'm glad you had a nice holiday

Lucy (17 and still a child.)

*Edit* I just remembered the quote I was thinking of when I wrote that... I know you're not talking about your parents being wrong, but it seems to me that it fits anyway...
"When I was a boy of 14, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be 21, I was astonished at how much the old man had learned in seven years." ~ Mark Twain

You know, at least you know you're loved. There are kids out there who are abused, neglected, abandoned or who don't even know who their parents are. Whilst it may be a bind just now, at least you know you're safe from whatever dangers may be out there preying on you.

On the other hand though, perhaps wrapping you in cotton wool just now isn't going to do you any favours in 6/7 years time. There are all sorts of people in the world and at some point we're going to have to encounter some of them, even if it's just to learn from our mistakes.

My parents were pretty protective of me until last year. They still are to a certain degree but not so much so that I feel completely isolated from what's going on outside. However it's a slightly different situation from yours now. Whilst I had no qualms with relying on them to organise things (like how I would get home from a drama class which finished after dark), they're now taking the stance that it would be best for me to make decisions myself, which I actually enjoy doing now that I have no option! (Before I wouldn't say boo to a goose ). I can see their logic - I'm (hopefully) leaving home to go to uni in a year's time, and they're not going to be there. I hate to think of your parents either effectively having to push you out on your own or trying to cling onto you forever.

But, I'm not a parent and I don't know much about you so I guess I'd suggest speaking calmly to your parents or going along with things until you're legally old enough to have a say.

Fiona (16 and yes, I can still be a 'child' when I feel like it! )

My parents were ok with me going out in the end, however I do to a degree know how you feel BB. Whenever my parents went away I was looked after by my grandmother who did not trust me to go out on my own at all, and not even with friends. There was a point when she nearly came to the cinema with my friends (one of whom was 14- I was 13) because she was afraid that there would be "funny people" there (we managed to quash it somehow). The shocking thing was that my parents wanted to go along with it because they didn't want to stand up to her (bit formidable)- we had to get my friends' mum to intervene. I love her very much, as I know she does me, but her being there would have spoilt the day out!

At least it makes you appreciate freedom when you get it! Anyway, enough about me

MTT (18, even though now in a job there are points when I feel very childish!)

Thanks guys!!! It's nice to know that I'm not alone. There are others too who had protective parents and grandparents.

Sorry if I sounded sexist. But what I meant was littlelady said she was too scared to buy a bus ticket. If she's scared, then it's only good that she was protected. I was contrasting her situation with mine. I'm not scared so I thought my lot was different. But now, I get to read what the rest of you face too so it's not that different.

In my countries, most people know martial arts. It's a cultural thing. Many exponents of martial arts work as bodyguards, so it's not uncommon.

Thanks again for the response.

Haha ok then... when my brother was too scared to buy a train ticket my mum glared at him and told him to stop being silly. It worked too, and he was pretty proud of himself... Though at fourteen, he was old enough frankly.

(He wasn't even travelling alone, my mum was there waiting on the platform!)

My parents practically shove me out of the house! They say I should use the bus, and the only reason I don't is I'm scared of doing it myself... And apparently my piano teacher has 6th formers that still get driven to lessons, despite only living a few streets down!

I'm scared of buying bus/train tickets - and taxis!! Therefore I walk everywhere, even at 10pm, which funnily enough I'm not scared about....

Hi Rosemary,

Why are you scared? Presumably you live in the UK and everyone's so friendly there. You may be better off taking a taxi than walking alone in an unsafe area.

Not everyone in the UK is friendly, there are creeps here just like everywhere else.

However, contrary to the image set in the media, you still are as safe now as you were when I was a child on the whole. When I was an undergraduate, I was asked by my mother did I know where the red light district was. I was rather taken a back - my finances hadn't got that bad! However the reason she asked me was for my safety. She did not want me to accidentely walk through it at night and be accosted by curb-crawlers. Get to know where the dodgy areas are and avoid them.

I still think a heart-to heart with your Mum is the way to go. Its the best way forward for all of you. However you both need to listen to the other in order to go forward.

Just curious Beamish Boy, but why does it say on your blog, 'About me: PiedPiper'?

Hi, that's because I wanted to put BeamishBoy but that sounded a little too juvenile for my blog which seeks to affirm my view that the line between adulthood and childhood ought to be removed. Then I thought of something that has clarinet in it. And the closest is Pied Piper. I did think of William Blake's piper but that's a bit obscure. Pied Piper is a figure known to both children and adults and that suited my purpose best.

I'm not worried for my safety at all. I just don't like talking to strangers or risking doing silly things like going the wrong way round the system. Silly I know, but thats me! I was scared of the phone when I started work at sainsburies too.

Where is this blog located? Bobifier wishes to see!

You know, you'd be much better off playing Go. Go produces deep levels of thought and maturity, apparently...

BB's given the blog address on his first post of this thread.

Ta muchly