Dear Care and Feeding: How Do I Get Over My Daughter’s Severe Lapse in Judgment?
Parenting advice on trust, postpartum depression, and STDs.
How Do I Get Over My Daughter’s Severe Lapse in Judgment?
Dear Care and Feeding,
My daughter, 11, has been wonderful throughout the pandemic. She social distances at all times, we never have to remind her to put her masks on, and we found a fully virtual scholastic program so she can avoid the significant risks of large crowds in the public schools.
A few weeks ago, however, her other parent and I had an obligation that we both had to be present for (we are both vaccinated, it was socially distanced, and we were wearing masks). Usually one of us would stay home with her, but because of her maturity level and the short time we would be gone, we assumed we could trust her on her own.
When we arrived home, we found her with a friend of hers who lives about a block away. She has visited on occasion throughout the pandemic but they know the rules. They are to stay outside and on opposite ends of the driveway or patio. The patio only offers about 5 feet of distance, but we decided that should be enough as long as they stay outside and keep their masks on.
Anyway, when we arrived home on this particular day, both her and her friend were in the living room, sitting on the same couch, not wearing masks, not socially distanced, and each putting their hands into the same bowl of chips. Why she would take this kind of risk, I still don’t understand.
I immediately told her friend that she had to go home and to please inform her mother to call me at her earliest convenience. I then expressed my disappointment with my daughter and informed her how dangerous what she did was. I reminded her about the delta variant and how it’s caused so many children her age to end up in the ICU. I told her that she only has to wait a few more months until she’s eligible for the vaccine, and this isn’t the time to become complacent.
We took all the necessary steps to remain safe. She immediately quarantined in her bedroom for the suggested two weeks. I cleaned the house thoroughly and opened multiple windows to circulate the air. Luckily, we all came out of this debacle safely.
I still don’t feel I can trust her, though. I understand it’s normal for her to make mistakes, but this wasn’t forgetting to turn a light off or close the refrigerator. She put her life at risk. How do we start building the trust back?
—Trust Issues
You can’t expect adult maturity from a child. If your daughter has been cautious and otherwise “wonderful” over the past 18 months, and this is her first time violating your household rules around COVID protocol, I’d encourage you to extend her a bit of grace. A year and a half is a long time for an 11-year-old to go without hanging out with friends. It’s also a long time to expect them to remain vigilant around a threat that seems to be lessening for the adults around them (as vaccination rates continue to rise and the world reopens). Her age group is among the last for whom vaccination isn’t an option, and it’s challenging for kids to watch the trusted authorities in their lives relax their own protocols around socializing, while they’re still being kept away from the people and things they care about.
Your daughter had a temporary lapse in judgment, which is to be expected for a child who hasn’t even reached adolescence yet. It sounds like you’ve sufficiently reprimanded her for inviting an unmasked friend into the house when you weren’t home. Aside from thinking twice before leaving her unsupervised again anytime soon, there shouldn’t be many additional measures you need to take to reestablish trust.
