M E R I D I A N     M A G A Z I N E

Respecting Personal Space
by Claudia Goodman

Some principles of life are so important to free agency and happiness that when our forefathers wrote the United States Constitution, they felt compelled to insure some of these rights by adding the first ten amendments. One of these, the fourth amendment, is the right to privacy—our homes and property cannot be searched or seized without a warrant.

Even though this right is publicly guarded and protected by the Constitution, how often is it abused in individual families? The challenge lies in finding a balance. Family members need supervision, but it is equally important for each of us to have our own personal space, where we can handle things ourselves, experiment with new ideas, and try things on our own. If we are guarded too closely or never given our own place, we forfeit that chance.

Privacy
Even small babies need their own personal space—in small amounts to begin with, but nevertheless they need it. I remember trying to hold our one-month-old baby as we looked for a crib. We had been to several stores without success. He wasn’t hungry or hurting, but no matter what I tried, he screamed. The salesperson suggested that I lay him down in one of the floor model cribs for a while. I was convinced that putting him down would only make him cry harder. After a few more minutes of his screaming, the salesperson gently took him from my arms and laid him in a crib, explaining that most fussy babies in their store responded well to this treatment. He immediately quieted down and enjoyed looking around until we were ready to leave. All he needed was some personal space. I had been holding him too long.

One of our daughters and her husband stayed in a studio apartment with their one-year old baby while her husband completed a summer internship. It was so tiny that the only place for the baby’s crib was right up against their bed. The baby, who had previously slept through the night, began waking up every half hour and inevitably ended up sleeping with his parents. After a week or two of sleepless nights, they finally located a slightly larger apartment with one bedroom. They put the baby in the master bedroom where they could close the door at bedtime. They no longer had to confine themselves to the bathroom or talk in whispers so the baby could sleep. Now the baby had his own privacy, and the parents had theirs after he went to bed. Left to himself, the baby chose to again sleep through the night. Sleeping on the hide-a-bed in the living room was a minor inconvenience for the parents, compared to the freedom and personal space they had all acquired.

Belongings
As children grow, so does their need for personal space. One of the best ways to meet these expanding requirements is to provide and respect personal belongings. A child needs his own room, even if it is shared with other siblings. He needs specific places to keep his clothes, money, and treasures. And he needs the freedom to know that those places will not be invaded. As our children grew older, we found that it was very beneficial to establish a policy of knocking and waiting for an invitation before entering a child’s room. In shared bedrooms we also taught our children to respect each other’s wishes to be alone occasionally. In this way our children had a secure place where they could be alone to think, cry, create, or pray.

It is so important for us to teach our children to respect each other’s belongings. Specific rules really help. Some of the ones we found to be effective were:

Never look in another person’s drawers without permission.

Never borrow another person’s clothes without permission.

Never borrow another person’s money without permission.

We discovered that it was really important for us as parents to abide by those rules as well as the children. Otherwise we couldn’t enforce them. There were times when it was really hard—when someone spilled on her shirt and didn’t have another clean one, and her sister who did have one had already left for school. Or when a child needed some money for a field trip and the only person who had money wasn’t around. I also had to resist the temptation to straighten my children’s clothes or drawers when they weren’t looking and throw away all their junk. (I discovered that even husbands can become very frustrated if you straighten their things without their permission!) But we learned that as we made ourselves stick to the rules, we eventually found other solutions to each small crisis, and the children’s respect for each other’s belongings increased immensely. We also eliminated a lot of conflicts over missing clothes, broken toys, and misplaced money. Furthermore, the children gained increased confidence that their own private belongings and treasures would never be tampered with.

Writings

All of us need time to think and explore our own ideas, and writing is one of the most effective ways to refine them and record them. However, there is a stage in the creative process when we might be embarrassed if anyone saw what we were thinking. We’re not even sure if we agree with it ourselves. Also, there are certain communications that truly are confidential. One of the greatest ways we can show respect to our children and to our spouse is to respect their private writings.

Mail is one of those areas. In most cases even husbands and wives feel much better if they get to open their own mail, unless the other has specifically delegated that privilege. And children feel great pride—and even excitement—in opening their own letters. There is such a feeling of importance in receiving a letter addressed just to them. It becomes their own private treasure, which they can choose to share or just keep to themselves.

While letters are rather difficult to break into undetected, emails and journals are relatively easy. You can always check “keep as new” after you read someone else’s email, and most people can’t detect the fingerprints you might leave on journal pages. It takes a great deal of integrity not to go those places without permission. But invariably a person habitually invading another’s privacy will eventually be found out, and then the trust is broken.

As a parent you may be objecting, “Yes, but I thought I was supposed to know what my child is doing. How can I be a caring parent if I leave my child (or spouse) to his own devices?” Please keep reading. This issue will be addressed at the end of the article.

Conversations

Another area where we can insure personal space is in conversations. Obviously there are certain conversations between parents that they would prefer not to have others hear. Sometimes husbands need to discuss confidential business matters with an associate. Occasionally mothers need to discuss circumstances involving their children that would be better for the children not to be aware of. There are many callings in the church that by their very nature require confidentiality. If a wife is in the Relief Society presidency or the husband is in the bishopric, for example, there will be items that they are not free to discuss even with their spouse. Having a companion who does not pry to find out those things can be a real blessing. It’s usually better not to know about problems you can’t solve anyway.

In the same way, children need to be allowed private conversations with their friends occasionally. They talk about different things when parents aren’t listening in. They need enough freedom to be themselves without feeling like every word will be weighed by their parents.

The same guidelines apply to phone conversations. In addition to allowing people the freedom to walk in the other room to complete their talking, we can also teach our children not to interrupt phone calls by asking questions unless it is an emergency. Likewise, parents need to respect their children and not interrupt their phone conversations unless absolutely necessary. If children chronically interrupt phone calls or get into trouble or cause other distractions in order to get attention, they can be calmly placed in a childproof room (such as their bedroom) away from you until you are off the phone. If you consistently refuse to be interrupted and try to limit your phone calls during children’s high demand times (such as dinner time, right after school, bedtime, etc.), they will soon learn to respect your personal needs.

Sometimes parents need private one-on-one talking time either with each other or with a child. Over the years our bedroom served as a quiet place for such conversations. If the door was closed, children had to knock before they entered. If we were in the middle of a private conversation, we would explain to the children that we needed to talk to their brother or sister alone for a few more minutes and asked if they would mind waiting until we were finished. They soon learned to respect that time, knowing that they, too, would have their turns.

Creating unsupervised space in the midst of closely supervised space

Most of us agree that it is important to respect the personal space of others. The challenge is to find the balance between allowing them their freedom and still keeping control of the situation. A great deal depends on the age of the child and his temperament. Young children need very close supervision most of the time they are awake and monitoring even when they are sleeping. But as a child grows, letting go more and more is part of the process.

Children need to earn their right to more personal space by their behavior. Some firm guidelines also help. For example, one day our fourteen-year-old daughter called me on my cell phone in tears. I had dropped the unsorted mail on the table before I left, and she discovered one letter that was addressed to her. She eagerly opened it and began to read. She had finished a couple of paragraphs and looked at the picture before she realized that it was pornographic. She was very upset for hours afterward, even though she didn’t finish the letter. As we assessed the situation—one we had not anticipated nor encountered before—we formulated some new guidelines together. In addition to our rule to never open another person’s mail, we now added two more: Never open a letter without a return address, and never open a letter from someone you don’t know. We all try to anticipate problems before they arise, but sometimes we have to make adjustments as we go.

Phone calls can also present some challenges as children enter their teenage years and friends become more important to them. We had not had much need to regulate phone calls until a certain junior high school boy began calling our thirteen-year-old daughter. Within a week they were spending a great deal of time on the phone every afternoon. My husband had a visit with our daughter, which helped her to see that homework, practicing, family responsibilities, and church activities didn’t really allow her to spend that much time talking to him on a daily basis. We also pointed out to her that spending so much time one-on-one with a boy at this age might lead to the dating stage sooner than she wanted to get there. With our encouragement she chose to set some new guidelines that limited their conversations to a few minutes a couple of times a week. Soon he quit calling. While it was a little uncomfortable for her to make the change initially (we let her handle things in her own way), that daughter has expressed her gratitude to us several times since, for helping her see where she was headed. That same boy ended up doing some things he regretted with someone else, and our daughter was so grateful for some strict guidelines that actually increased her freedom and kept her on course.

Computers and TVs offer a huge challenge in supervision. Our leaders have suggested that they be placed in common areas where children are not so likely to be left alone with them. It helps if people are coming and going, even if they aren’t actively monitoring. The rules for mail can also apply to email, with possible additional rules that children never open forwards or attachments without a parent’s approval. Individual situations vary so much that families must establish their own guidelines. The key is to prayerfully work together to establish guidelines that allow parents to be fully aware of what children are doing without interfering with their personal space any more than necessary.

Joseph Smith said, “We teach them correct principles and then let them govern themselves.” Basically, the more time we spend setting those limits up front, the less supervision will be required later on. All family members need their own personal space. The challenge is to respect it while teaching them to use it to full advantage. In doing so, we will help them expand their free agency and their happiness.

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