dragonlady wrote
I feel more inclined to let him go, but my DH really doesn't. I feel
my DH is overcautious and too loathe to let go (he didn't want him
going on overnights until he was 8 -- he's our oldest), but the fact
is that I don't want to force the issue and then have my DH spend the
week feeling extremely nervous about our son. The issue of missing him
is one I think we would have to accept; it wouldn't be fair to prevent
him from doing something good for that reason alone. But my DH just
doesn't think he should be away from us for that long, that far away,
at that age. I will talk to him one more time about it today, but if
he still feels "no" as a gut reaction, I guess I'll have to go with it
even if I don't quite agree.


I guess I'd talk to DH about what he thinks could be a problem with him
going with a friend's familiy for a week. What does he think will go
wrong? Is he afraid your son will get homesick? Is he afraid that
he'll lose touch with you and DH? Does he think your son will misbehave
without you and DH there to keep him in line?

It is pure gut feeling on his part. I recently read a relevant quote
somewhere that said (perhaps not the exact words): "You can't reason
someone out of something they didn't reason themselves into." Now, he
would defer to me if I insisted, and I have in the past insisted that
the kids be allowed to do things he was not ready for them to do, such
as overnights. But I persoanlly do not feel comfortable insisting in
this case because it is such a biggie. It's one thing to do without
your kid for a night when you didn't feel OK about them going. Quite
another for an entire week, with the kid being so far away. I cannot
take responsibility for that without his true consent -- not yet
anyway.

I would also suggest he do some "reality checks" with other parents of
kids your son's age (what you are doing here).

Yes, I think that might help in general, if not this time. I myself
was pretty surprised to have gotten only positive responses to my
question (keeping in mind it was an incredibly small group of
respondents). I really expected the responses to be more like, "A
whole week that far away at that age!?" LOL. Thanks!