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My dad won't let me do as much as my brother
So my dad won't let me do as much as my younger brother because, sadly I was born a girl. He thinks I'm going to get raped, or kiss a boy, so I can't hang out with boys. My brother can hang out with girls though,and he doesn't have a dress code or has to stay home for baseball games or anything like that. My dad is also thinking about homeschooling me! I need help please 😥😥
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Since I don't know your age dear, I don't know what to say. What I can say is that someday, when you are a parent of a girl yourself, you will understand the fears Dad has. What about how Mom feels? Thats if you have one...both parents should be making decisions together, not Dad overriding what Mom thinks or feels and telling her how its going to be. That is dictatorship. So talk to Mom and let her know how you feel. Or talk to a female relative.
But first, I will share what I believe is appropriate for any age a girl may be, pre teen and High school age. I raised 3 daughters and I am a Mom. Even I had concern over my daughters safety.
It is much easier for a girl to be raped or overpowered. I know your Dad is looking at this through a males eyes, and he knows how horny young men can be because he used to be one and the simple fact is that you don't have to dress sexy or seductive or inappropriate for your age for a young guy to ogle you, make inappropriate sexual comments or to pretend he's just a friend and get you alone to force you to do something you don't want. So I understand why he feels that way. However, a parent needs to walk a fine line and teach cautiousness and do what is right as a parent to make sure you are safe but also not cloistered away like a nun. You should be able to attend school, have male friends, but maybe not a 'boyfriend' meaning someone you date. I was pretty plain with my daughters and they knew they could discuss anything with me without my flying off the handle. From a young age, if they wanted to go to a friends house after school, I would walk over with the kid to meet her parent. One had a single dad only and I had to feel safe that the Dad was an honorable man and would not act the pedophile and go after my daughter. I would meet the parents and try to catch them at odd times, dropping by to see that instead their home was a good safe one. One time we walked around the corner to meet the parents of a couple twins who wanted my daughter over and there were drug addicts all over the floor sleeping and Mom half out of it on the couch. I told my daughter she could never go over there but they were welcome at our house.
When they were older, I had the talk about boys. First, I said that I had no problems with them having Male friends, just like female friends come over to our home. I said it was a good way to know she was safe, get to know the character of the guy and when he's in her room hanging out, the bedroom door had to be open. I don't know if Your Dad hasn't thought of this or whether he is unreasonably scared and subsequently curbing your social life because of it. When no guys ever came to our house except one guy once for a Birthday party, I asked why. The girls said they invited guy friends at school but not one took us up on visiting. I think they felt intimidated. But I know of people for whom this strategy worked great and one example is my own niece. My sister let her have any friends over she wished, girls and guys and that house became a teen hangout, safe place for girls who were abused at home, and guys who were friends.
When my girls entered HS, I asked them to watch the popular girls who always had a new boyfriend becauese at their age, relationships don't last long. I said it would be emotional to get dumped by a guy and watch to see how it affects those girls grades at school and report back to me. All of them saw girls whose grades got real bad, who couldn't focus on learning and only wanted to kiss guys in hallways and skip class to be with their guy. I told them, this is a main reason I wished them to wait until they graduated HS to date but they could have male friends. In fact, it is a healthy thing for a guy or girl to have a friend of the opposite sex simply because the opposite sex can be hard to understand because even just in how we think or come to conclusions, guys and girls are very different. It is better to learn from a male friend how to talk to guys and understand natural instincts that are part of that sex so there are no misunderstanding and many break ups once you are a young adult looking for your true love. There are people who are so crippled and have never learned that they make the same relationship mistakes over and over. They end up in their 30s or 40 with no one and a long string of crash and burn relationships behind them. Another thing I can share is that for an adult couple, depending on whether there is the right chemistry for feelings of love, only when there is that chemistry, will there be love and romance, but both also should have great friendship between the two. This part has nothing to do with sex. This is why it is good to learn how to be friends with a guy because a marriage should be built on a foundation of both friendship and enough chemistry for the romance and more. I am remarried. The first time around, I married at 20, and I had no experience with understanding guys or even just having friends, not because I wasn't allowed but due to severe social anxiety, so I only had a few girlfriends. I knew nothing when I married and he ended up being abusive and also having some mental disorders. So if your Dad thinks he is protecting you now with extreme measures instead of teaching you how to be cautious and when you can or can't trust a guy, etc. you are not going to learn anything as my daughters did. They all decided guys were okay but they all chose to wait until they graduated to date and have sex knowing that if by some chance they did meet a decent guy who did spend lots of time with our family so we got to know him, we would have let a daughter date a guy we met and knew and trusted. Trust takes time as your parents know, its not instant so the condition of having a male friend over often is a pretty good one. I did not come up with it on my own but through watching other parents successfully do this. Lastly, though I hate to make your parents feel bad that another parent is involved in giving advice on this situation, even though I am anonymous and don't know you or them, it is hard for an adult to hear suggestions from another adult. But I am sharing this all in hopes you have an aunt or grandma, someone who could read this and if they agree, then as a loved relative and blood relation, if they are willing to speak with your Dad about this there is a better chance of Dad giving this some thought and actually agreeing to you having male friends, not boyfriends and those male friends only allowed to hang out at your house, not you at his in case his parents are not home. As I said before, you will understand once a MOm, why even I did not rule out something going sideways as far as my daughters safety is concerned. I hope this will help you somehow. Share this response of mine with an adult relative who might speak up for you.
Lastly, some parents try to shield their children too much from everything, not allowing them as teens to start having some responsibility and the okay to make some decisions on their own and learning life skills. The result is colleges offering classes to teach young adults how to be an adult because they were too sheltered or not allowing to do anything at home, the parent doing stuff first cus they can do it faster and better and didn't want to be bothered to work with a child training them patiently until they got something. These college classes teach basics like balancing a bank account, shopping for and cooking food, how to do your laundry. YOu can't be told to do the laundry as a chore without a parent watching you each time to make sure you understand about not mixing certain colors, checking all pockets for odd items, etc. This is how a crayon in a pocket melted and the wax ruined everything in the dryer. That happened to a friend of mine.
Homeschooling should not be done as an odd attempt to shelter you from the world, because at 18 you are legally an adult but if crippled by not having been allowed to go shopping on your own, or do other things on your own as many people do every day, you will have no clue and be terrified of what will happen if you have no friends, are thrust into a job or school and have no idea how to socialize or even speak to people, etc. My anxiety alone was enough that I knew it would cripple me in my adult life so my last year in HS, I sought out a way to be cured of my anxieties and I was cured. Being hidden at home, not allowed to learn to drive so a parent always has to take you places, (this happened to several 20 something girls who wrote to me) is not healthy. YOur Dad meaning well, could very well be setting you up to make grievious mistakes once you are out on your own and you end up being very hurt, mistreated, maybe raped or worst of all killed. And then Dad would have the guilt of that weighing on his mind for the rest of his life. I know this sounds drastic and like I am exaggerating, but he is not the one running an advice column and hearing from those 18 or older whose parents still don't let them drive or date. Some are in the range of 26 to 29 years old and that is definitely ridiculous at that point. I wish you the best.
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