Let’s Stop Raising House Cats

There’s something I often say to my wife about raising our boys:

“I will not raise a house cat.”

Stay with me on this…

Toddlers behave like outdoor cats.
They’re scrappy, fierce, unpredictable.
They insist on doing everything themselves.

If you try to help them buckle their car seat, they’ll firmly say, “No I do it!”— as if you just committed a crime against their independence.

But honestly, that’s beautiful.
That’s a little person who believes they can do hard things!
Toddlers have no fear of failure. Just a raw instinct to figure it out themselves.

That’s what outdoor cats do.
They’re out in the elements fending off raccoons, scaling fences, hunting birds.
They don’t wait to be served. They go after what they want.

Now, imagine you bring that outdoor cat to live inside.
You feed it. You provide a warm bowl of milk and a cozy bed each night.
Slowly, it stops doing. It watches the world from the window.

If you kept it in the house long enough and then sent it back outside…
It now stares at a chipmunk thinking, “Ehh, I’m good. He looks fast!”

But here’s the thing: it’s not the cat’s fault that it seems lazy.
It didn’t lose its fierce instincts on its own.

It’s been domesticated.

I believe we do this to our kids, without realizing it.
Not because we’re bad parents. Because we’re loving ones.

We don’t want them to struggle.
We help because we care.
We’re always in a rush, so it’s easier for us to zip up the coat and carry the backpack.

Slowly, quietly, we start doing too much for our kids.
We do the school project.
We speak to the teacher or coach for them.
We handle every challenge before they can even try.

And that toddler who once proudly said, “I do it!”
Becomes a middle-schooler who says, “Can you just do it?”

This isn’t about guilt-tripping my fellow parents.
I’m in the trenches making these same mistakes alongside you.

This is a reminder, to all of us, to catch ourselves before we jump in too soon.

We can support without doing.
We can guide them through a hard thing without stepping in and saying, “Just let me do it.”

Sometimes, we need to let them wrestle with it.
Even if it takes longer. Even if it’s messy.

Let’s be mindful of the kind of confidence we’re building, or taking away, when we step in too soon or do too much.

Because that’s how we end up with house cats.

And what we really want…are outdoor cats!
The kind that leap, fall flat, & get back up.
We want kids who don’t sit by the window waiting for life to happen, but who open the door and chase it.

That instinct is already in them.
Our job is to protect it. Nurture it.
Not smother it.

So in those moments, when your instinct is to jump in because it doesn’t feel good to see your child struggle or experience failure…

Step back.
Take a breath.
And shout it with me:

“I will not raise a house cat!”