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over face-down and pretend to be asleep.

       I was too shy to ask where the toilets were, so at least daily I would wet the bed. The nurses got increasingly angry that I kept doing this and yelled at me in front of the girls.”

       NATHAN – GREEN BAY, WISCONSIN

it was all mum and dad’s fault

      Dahling, My Shrink Said …

      Forty years ago in America, it was chic to have a psychiatrist. Anybody who was anybody (or who thought they were) decorated their conversation with, ‘Well my shrink said …’

      Often the end of their sentence was, ‘It was all my parents’ fault.’

      Whether psychologists actually did accuse parents or not, it was the common cop-out for any shortcomings. People paid dearly for this excuse.

      To the point: Was it your parents’ ‘fault’ that you became shy? Again, the revered and reliable researchers who have dedicated their lives to exploring the roots and results of shyness have come up with the answer: ‘For some it was, for some it wasn’t.’ Overprotected children do, however, run a higher risk.

      A study called ‘Development of Anxiety: the Role of Control in the Early Environment’ found …

       Parents who exert maximal control over a child’s activities and decisions can negatively influence the child’s sense of being able to control his or her own environment.1

      I wish two of my long-time friends had known this. Steve and Lydia are a wonderful couple who have only one son. After he was born, Lydia wasn’t able to have any more children, so little Lenny became obsessively precious to them.

      If three-month-old Lenny started crying while I was visiting, Lydia would hop to her feet and sprint to the nursery. Sounds of her baby-talk would waft into the living room: ‘Ooh, that’s my iddy biddy baby. What was my widdle Lenny crying about? Did some big black bear come to bite my widdle baby? Awww, Mommy’s here now. Everything is going to be all wight.’

      Frankly, I found it disgusting. That doesn’t mean if I had a kid, I’d lock him in the nursery and let him scream like a sick coyote. But I certainly wouldn’t come running every time he hiccoughed.

      When Lenny got old enough, Steve, Lydia and I would occasionally go to a restaurant. Sure enough, little Lenny would be in tow. Except Lenny wasn’t so ‘widdle’ anymore. He was eight years old and, since he was the centre of their attention, adult conversation was futile. Whenever the little prince burped, there was a duet of ‘Oh, Lenny. Are you OK?’ ‘Did the nasty Coca Cola make you burp?’

      One evening, panicking because little Lenny burped three times in a row, Lydia said to Steve, ‘Let’s order him some orange juice.’

      Upon hearing this, Lenny crossed his arms and announced ‘I hate orange juice.’

      ‘Well, darling, you drank it at Aunt Susan’s last week,’ Lydia said.

      Louder than before, ‘I hate orange juice.’

      I was about to gag. I decided that, as much as I liked Steve and Lydia, that was my last dinner with them unless they left their ‘little darling’ at home.

      ‘Don’t you think Lenny would enjoy eating at home next time?’ I asked. ‘I know a wonderful babysitter who cooks, too. My treat.’

      ‘I hate baby sitters!’ shouted the little brat. (Can you sense I was getting a tad emotional about this?)

      Lydia leaned over and whispered, ‘Lenny doesn’t like baby-sitters.’

      ‘I sort of picked that up,’ I said.

      ‘What other drinks can I have?’ Lenny interrupted.

      This was war. I looked right at Lenny and said, ‘Lenny, why don’t you ask the waitress?’

      Lydia and Steve just laughed and called the waitress over. Lenny looked at his mother and loudly declared, ‘I want a root beer.’ Lydia then turned to the waitress. ‘He’d like a root beer.’

      ‘The waitress isn’t hard of hearing,’ I mumbled.

      Where’s Lenny Now?

      We saw each other a few times more in the following year and, of course, the little prince always presided. The following summer my friends moved to Virginia because, they told me, ‘Lenny would be in a better school system.’

      I didn’t see Steve and Lydia for 10 years, but recently I was giving a speech in nearby Washington, DC and called them. We decided on a restaurant and, for the first time, no Lenny!

      When I asked after him Steve and Lydia looked at each other painfully. Lydia said, ‘He didn’t want to come.’

       Hallelujah!

      ‘Oh, that’s too bad,’ I said.

      Steve and Lydia spent the next hour lamenting that the reason was he was ‘uncomfortable around people’. He had no friends. He wouldn’t go to parties. At 18, he’d never had a date. He was shy and felt the other kids didn’t like him. ‘So we home schooled him.’

      I had to bite my tongue. It was obvious. By doing everything for Lenny and indulging his every whim, they’d kept him from ever developing the social skills or the courage to do things on his own.

      Tell Your Kids to Go Play in Traffic

      A slight exaggeration, of course. However, parents, do give your kids progressively more complicated challenges. Say you and your six-year-old are at a restaurant. And little Billy is served a jacket potato with butter and cheese on it. But, alas, little Billy doesn’t like butter on his potato. He wants a new potato with just cheese.

      ‘Mummy, I want just cheese. Tell her to take it back.’

      Mum, your ideal response would be, ‘Billy, why don’t you tell her yourself? I’ll call her over for you, but you must tell her.’ Little by little, give your kids increasingly bigger challenges.

      Mums, Don’t Kiss It Better

      Dads, congratulations. You are actually a better influence on your kids’ shyness than your wife. Why? Because if another kid bullies your son and he comes home with a scratched knee, you are more apt to say, ‘Get out there and tell him he can’t treat you like that.’

      Mothers, on the other hand, have been heard to say, ‘Aww, honey. Let me kiss it better.’

      In one study, fathers were so brusque about pushing their kids to stick up for themselves that even the researchers were shocked. But they had to admit it worked.

       By pushing the child to change, thus appearing insensitive and intrusive, fathers may have influenced their sons to become less inhibited.2

      This definitely does not mean to ignore them. Parents who have a strong bond with their children (love, open communication, dependability) and low control (encouraging them to do things on their own) are the most likely to have confident children.

SHYBUSTER 8:

       Don’t Baby Your Baby

      Mums and Dads, this one’s for you. I know it’s because you love them,

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