On Supporting Children’s Autonomy

This past year I started babysitting a little girl named Eva. I had just moved to a new city and was excited to meet Eva because at that point my entire social network consisted solely of people my age—a phenomenon which I dislike and find totally bizarre, like freshman year of college or accepting a job at a Google campus. As an investment in reaching my fuller humanity, I maintain cross-generational relationships for, if nothing else, the refreshing break they provide from the twentysomething conversation circuit of who we are dating, why we have chosen polyamory, why we are now considering sex work, what trauma we still blame our parents for, yet empathize with as we stretch toward self-actualization and so on.  Sometimes I just want to talk about why we have thumbs. Or fill my hands with slime until I can’t tell where my hands end and the slime begins.

When I arrived at Eva’s house for the first time, I saw her face light up through the window before she excitedly ran to greet me. I was met with a whirlwind of energy that remains unmatched by any other kid I have interacted with. She immediately threw me from the driver’s seat, showing me around the house, giving me a tour of her room, and dictating our plans for the day. I tucked away my childcare instinct to guide, steer, scaffold, or affirm Eva. Her self-assuredness was so strong any of these would prove to be trite, I assessed. Instead, Eva would conduct our time together and I would set boundaries when needed.

As our time together went on, I realized I didn’t love every minute of being with Eva. It was draining keeping up with her and some things she said were plain off-putting. Like when she pointed out, in disgust, that I have a “mustache” (uh, barely…). Or when she told me my black worker boots were ugly and asked why wasn’t I wearing pink ballet flats like her? (*sigh* brainwashed). After the three vexing hours together were up, I started questioning my desire to continue childcare, more specifically, childcare with Eva. Aside from being wiped out from caring for other people, I seriously adored the last kids I nannied, which pardoned many of their obnoxious moments. While working with Eva, on the other hand, felt more like constant work. 

Regardless, it was extra money I could use and so I continued to spend time with Eva. Initially I felt a bit guilty. Was it wrong of me to continue babysitting a kid I didn’t particularly like? It later occurred to me that it wasn’t particularly important or necessary that I like Eva, just that I respect her. And while Eva was not a sweet or charming child that kids regularly get held to an unfair standard of being; she was unapologetically herself, which I felt extremely compelled to protect. 

Everytime Eva and I went out we’d meet someone new. I learned that it wasn’t just with me that Eva was blunt, it was with everyone. I started noticing a few different reactions people had when meeting Eva: some were surprised, yet charmed by her forwardness; others felt uneasy in the face of her audacity. I was most curious about the uneasy reactions some parents showed. This happened, for example, when Eva randomly joined a family’s picnic and started offering them her own snacks. Or when she yelled from across the play structure at another family for allowing their child to pee openly on a nearby tree. After reproaching the family from 100 feet away she walked directly up to them to share a formal conjecture: “that is disgusting.” 

 Instead of expressing their discomfort and confronting the situation I watched them look away awkwardly and wait for the moment to pass, as if she wasn’t there. But, with Eva, this was rarely foolproof. She would continue to linger until she was satisfied. As we all stood at an impasse, I witnessed parents silently wince in frustration. I was confused as to why a child being herself was so uncomfortable for them. And if she really made them uneasy, why not use this as a teaching opportunity and address her honestly? Were they forgetting she was a child: empirical and continously learning? 

I got the feeling that the other parents were deferring to me to “handle” the situation and “dutifully” move Eva along. Aware that this was an expectation they may hold, I chose not to fulfill it. I felt like I was breaking some unspoken code of conduct, but I did not want to act on an assumption of what another person’s boundaries might be and police Eva’s behavior based on this. I imagine that would model a fraught understanding of agency for Eva, as I would be acting based off of fear of judgment, rather than in response to a real and expressed request. 

I didn’t see a need to intervene and pretend the adults could not speak for themselves or that Eva couldn’t handle being spoken to like a fellow person. Doing so would do a disservice to both. A better lesson would come from direct communication from the adults regarding their boundaries. And their misplaced frustrations spoke more to their own limitations in this regard, than it did to Eva as a person or me as a babysitter. Eva is her own person, after all, and not an extension of me. 

When our schools regularly operate by shushing and silencing students in the classroom,  when we use language which chastises “backtalk” and demands that children “hush down when adults are talking,” the deeply embedded disrespect we have for children’s autonomy is clear. When children are regularly and unquestionably marginalized in these ways, asserting autonomy is a vital rebellion from this dehumanizing standard. Unfortunately, many adults have been shamed out of or discouraged from exercising our autonomy ourselves. And I imagine it is hard to see a child empowered in the ways that you are not. But this does not mean we should use this as breeding ground for the inheritance of the “obedience to authority” trait. 

No question, Eva is ruled by her own autonomy. She pulls a lot out of you. She is demanding, remains where she wants when she wants, and says what is on her mind–be it kind or stinging. She isn’t unkind or ill-intentioned, but she certainly isn’t susceptible to pressure to be polite when she wants to be honest. She also isn’t unreasonable. But, just like any reasonable person, she needs the opportunity to be reasoned with for her to consider a change in her actions.

Eva will learn an incredible amount in her lifetime. She is bold and empirical. And if we are to say that we care about kids, about their safety and protection it is so necessary that we nurture this intuitive sense of autonomy rather than view it as a nuisance and attempt to repress it either through scorn or force.