tough love.

The article discusses the author's views on being an overprotective parent. She has watched her children eat lettuce out of a hamster cage. From the moment she gave birth to twin sons, she made a promise to herself that she will not hover. She will not panic at every fever, not gasp at every fall. She did not want to make her sons wimpy. Being overprotected had made her someone who was careful, plodding, overly respectful of authority, frightened of change. This was not the life she wanted for her sons. She considers that she has done nothing to have made the slightest alterations in the innate personalities of her children. She comforts herself by saying that loving the child involves the two competing impulses of keeping them safe and letting them live.