The father shakes his head in disgust. His son had been recruited to play hockey with the crème de la crème of pre-teen talents, but it wasn’t working out. “He’s not trying. He holds back because he doesn’t want to get hit.” When it’s suggested that it might be a smart strategy for an 11-year-old to avoid getting his teeth knocked out, he’s shocked. “But that’s what the game’s all about!”

Eventually, the same father is banned from attending team practices by his wife, who realized that his expectations for his son had turned hockey into an all-out war instead of a game and that in the interests of domestic harmony, it was time to declare peace.

Dr. Alvin Rosenfeld, child psychiatrist, co-author of Hyper-Parenting/The Over-scheduled Child (available on Amazon.com) and frequent talk-show guest, has seen more than his share of over-achieving parents trying to instill the same competitive mentality in their offspring, with the result often being frustrated parents and unhappy kids.

“Play and leisure often have been professionalized; winning is everything. Adults run the show, and the other team is the enemy. That attitude has even insinuated itself into middle school sports. Orthopedic surgeons report between 2.2 and 3.5 million recreation-linked bone fractures, dislocations, and muscle injuries annually among 5-14 year olds. Two years ago, my son broke his arm, through the growth plate, playing 7th grade football; this year, three of his high school teammate shattered their legs in scrimmages or games. Does it really have to be so hard, dangerous, and time consuming?” he asks.

Dr. Rosenfeld notes that the results of hyper-ambition don’t end on the sports field, but impact every aspect of family life. “Just when we need better family relationships, hyper-parenting has eroded them. In the past 20 years, structured sports time has doubled, unstructured children’s activities have declined 50%, household conversations have become far less frequent, family dinners have declined 33%, and family vacations have decreased 28%. Hyper-parenting is weakening marriages and getting many insecure, discontented students diagnosed as learning disabled, ADD, anxious, or depressed.”

Parents set the example, he says, and now even younger children are getting the message that they should be over-scheduled workaholics, winning no matter the cost. And he also notes that parental pressure might account for the diagnosis of anxiety in adolescence being predominantly a middle and upper class disorder, with close to 9% of affluent teenagers suffering from generalized anxiety disorder, overanxious disorder, excessive shyness, panic disorders, and obsessive compulsive disorder, eating disorders – and worse.

Depression is a common outcome of pressure that makes kids feel they’re always being measured and failing to make the grade. “One teenager told me that he is the only one of his friends who does not cut himself to feel better,” he says, adding that others take drugs or alcohol to relieve emotional distress.

One Big Happy Family

Here are some tips from Dr. Rosenfeld on how you can escape the hyper-parenting trap:

• Ease up on the family schedule: Think before you sign up for new activities. “If you say yes to too many enrichment opportunities,” he warns, “the whole family will pay the price.”
• Be discriminating: “There are trends and styles in science, health, nutrition and education, just as there are fads in fashion and home design,” Rosenfeld says. “In most cases, moderation and good judgment are the best standards.”
• ‘Do as I do’: “How you live your life in front of your child matters more than how you tell him he ought to be living his. Character lasts a lifetime. Live the values that are important to you, because your children will emulate your daily conduct.”
• Be unproductive: “The fact that you, the parent, enjoy spending time with your child with no apparent goal lets her know you find her more interesting than just about anything else in the world – nothing else will bolster her self-esteem more effectively.”
• Childhood Is preparation, not a performance: Children are not adults and shouldn’t be expected to perform to adult standards. “Resist pressure from coaches and the media that tells you how to push your child to excel early,” he advises.
• Rediscover pleasure: “Every child we have ever known has done better if he knows his parents are happy, and are getting pleasure from life and their relationships.” The family experience should be pleasurable for all, according to Rosenfeld, who says, “If your child enjoys his time with you now, it will stay with him forever and bolster him as an adult.”

Dr. Rosenfeld has formed The National Family Night Organization, which is dedicated to alerting parents about the dangers of over-scheduling. On his website at www.familynightamonth.org, parents share their personal tales of successfully jetting down and getting their families back on track. As he points out, there as many ways to do this as there are families. When it comes to raising happy children, he echoes Dr Spock’s famous dictum: “Trust yourself – you know more than you think.” And he adds, “We blink and our children have grown up and gone. Enjoy them for that brief flicker of time they are with you. It will reward you every day and make a big contribution to your feeling, as you get older, that yours was a life well spent.”