Parents Say ‘Yes’ More Often, Enjoy International Travel With Kids

As my 2-year-old son happily touched the door handle, walls, and lock of the festival bathroom — a portable toilet that smelled anything but fresh — I shuddered inside.

“Not need a wee-wee after all,” he said to me, with a wide smile.

I barely repressed what I could only describe as a growl, as I hurriedly let us out of the claustrophobic pod, trying hard not to touch anything at all.

After covering my son’s hands with antibacterial gel, and wishing for the millionth time there were taps and running water, I pulled myself together and we hurried back to join our friends and family, thinking how lucky we were to be there.

It had been an extraordinary few months. The decision to attend the Green Man festival, which involved camping for three nights in a huge open space in the Welsh countryside surrounded by thousands of other festivalgoers — one that put me way out of my comfort zone — was the final culmination of our family experiment. We had made it.

“No” was my default answer to most things and I wanted to change that

My husband and I made a conscious decision months earlier to say “yes” — yes to our kids, yes to each other — whenever we could.

For me, it was going to be a bit of a stretch. I was very aware that there were some circumstances where I was saying “no” as a knee-jerk reaction.

For example, one day my daughter asked something really simple. “Please can you read to me?” She asked. “Not right now,” I replied, and instantly cursed myself.

I hadn’t thought about my reaction, I’d just said “no” automatically, because I saw it as a hassle to stop what I was doing and do what she wanted instead.

But, why was I turning her down? After all, I know these years where she wants to do so much with me are limited. So I brought up my feelings with my husband and we came up with a potentially fun idea. We would try to make our default answer “yes” when our kids asked us to do something reasonable and also when we were presented with opportunities that could be fun for our family.

Knowing that our daughter was starting school this fall only made the idea sound even better. We were going to be “yes” people even if it made us feel uncomfortable.

We leaned into this experiment with everything we had

The 10 months that followed led to some incredible experiences that I would have never done otherwise.

We were invited to Kenya for my sister and brother-in-law’s wedding blessing and I said “yes” to taking the children, then 1 and 3, on boat trips and game drives that I would have been apprehensive about previously. To be honest, I was still apprehensive, but I did my best to push that aside so my husband and I could follow through on our promise to each other.

We also decided to book plane tickets and go island-hopping around Thailand for more than two weeks in April, because a trip like that wouldn’t be possible after my daughter started school.

I said “yes.” And you know what? We survived it all. I’d even say we thrived.

Our biggest stretch went better than I expected

Of everything we agreed to over the last few months, attending a multi-day music festival which would involve camping was the activity I was most apprehensive about.

We had decided to go because my brother-in-law, his wife, and their children have gone for years and had a great time. When they kindly invited us to go with them, we said “yes” without fully thinking it through. As the date grew nearer, I got more and more worried about how everyone would sleep, whether we’d all smell, and if I’d ever feel clean again. Even thoughts about what to pack stressed me out for weeks.

I will freely admit I’m not a camper, but the children were excited and ended up adoring the experience. They slept well on their roll mats with their novelty sleeping bags and they loved having a wet wipe wash each morning. Attending the festival was a huge success.

Our adventures have obviously taught me a lot and made me more comfortable with the unknown. And my kids have learned how to have confidence in new places, resilience, and the ability to arrive somewhere and assimilate immediately. I’m so proud of them and the people they are growing into, and I’m proud of my husband and I for getting out of our comfort zone, too.