Trust is a double-edged sword. My parents trusted me fully at the start. At an early age, I was taking good care of myself. I was compliant when taking pills, doing treatments, doing chores, etc. I told my parents when I didn't feel ok, and was always honest with them. I suck at lying and I probably can't write fiction very well because of that. But to stick to the point, my parents gave me pretty much all the freedom I could ask for at a young age. Of course, I still had curfews and responsibilities, but when I was as young as 7 or 8 years old, my mom was perfectly ok with me running down the block, knocking on all the neighbor kids' doors, and playing with them in the front yard and on the street. From what she saw, we were always on the lookout for cars and looked out for each other. My parents told me to be proud when I came home sweaty and scraped, and said that the harder and longer I played, the healthier and more mature I got to be. 

Meanwhile, it seems like less and less parents are trusting their kids like that. Even my mom has gotten considerably more protective over my 9-year-old little half brother, than she was of me when I was 8 years old. I think that could be because of how accessible news and information are today, and I've seen a few news specials here and there, where preteens and teenagers reveal all their little secrets on their phones. But many helicopter parents have been like that since they became parents, such as the girl's parents from my Christian school.

I'll never understand helicopter parenting, but I do understand the inability to trust. This is only because I've trusted a lot of people, but have been hurt, often purposefully, by them. But in the case of helicopter parenting, the kids never had the chance to break their parents' trust or learn to grow up in the first place. How can you trust someone who doesn't know how to fend for themselves in the real world? You can't. How can you trust helicopter parents if they suck at parenting? You can't. It's a bad place to end up, and I'm glad my parents have made me solve a lot of my own problems. After all, I was born with a disease only I can fight, and I'm one of the healthiest CFers in the world. I'm obviously trustworthy, but I struggle to trust everyone else, including and often myself.