Gave his son a lot of independence growing up. It was the right choice.

• I’m a single mother and I gave my son a lot of independence growing up.
• I left him alone at home when he was 7 years old. At the age of 7, he roamed the city alone.
• My parenting may be unconventional, but it worked because of the way I raised him from a young age.

I wanted my child to have the same freedoms I had growing up in the ’80s in the country: climbing trees, driving go-karts, and playing outside until the lights came on. My parents were relatively carefree and let us wander around with minimal supervision, as long as our chores were completed.

When my little boy was 18 months old, I was a single working mom in the city and sole breadwinner, which meant my approach to parenting would take a different direction than I had imagined.

I didn’t have the luxury of a partner to help me, so I was constantly on duty. To coexist peacefully, I needed my son’s cooperation, especially since he had a terrible need for independence from a very young age.

I let him solve problems, which sometimes led to a skinned knee

Cooperation required clear, age-appropriate communication of my expectations of him and his abilities.

When he was 2 years old, he was one of the youngest at our local park to climb Jacob’s Ladder. When he got stuck at the top, I explained to him that if he could go up on his own, he should also be able to go down on his own.

Very quickly, he becomes aware of his limits and his strengths. Sometimes he fell and scraped his knee or the palm of his hand, but that never stopped him from going for another round of climbing.

Just because he was a little scratchy didn’t mean I didn’t pay attention to him – I just let him work out his problems on his own with gentle encouragement and minimal interference.

Using this approach, I managed to keep him out of the emergency room despite multiple falls from his skateboard and jumping from the top of the jungle gym.

The day I will never forget

Even though I encouraged him to be independent and confident, I still felt the need to keep him close as a child.

That’s why I’ll never forget the day he was 7 years old and wandered over to his friend’s house alone without telling me.

He scootered down one of the city’s busiest streets and crossed a huge intersection to get there.

I thought he was in our apartment complex on his scooter. When he called me 30 minutes later to tell me he was at his friend’s house, I asked him why he hadn’t told me where he was going.

He said it was because he knew I wouldn’t have let him go alone. He was right.

Then he added that I taught him how to press the crosswalk button and he knew what he was doing. I realized that he was right about this too.

That day, my confidence in his abilities increased exponentially. I started letting him stay home while I went shopping.

By the age of twenty, he was confidently navigating the city’s bus system and biking across town – activities none of his friends did.

Other parents often questioned my free-spirited parenting approach, but I wasn’t worried. We had a reliable recording system and I trusted it completely.

I set clear boundaries and imposed consequences if he broke the rules, like if he didn’t call me as soon as he arrived somewhere, he wasn’t allowed to go back.

I don’t regret the way I raised my son

My style may have been unconventional, but now, at 19, he still marches to the beat of his own drum and we have a strong, trusting relationship.

Watching him pilot the coop with the tools and confidence I instilled is one of the greatest accomplishments of my life, and I can’t wait to see where the next 20 years take him.