leading strings

[lee-ding]

plural noun

strings for leading and supporting a child learning to walk.
excessively restraining guidance: His parents tried to keep him in leading strings, but he finally married and moved away.

Origin of leading strings

First recorded in 1670–80

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018

Modern man has cut loose from leading-strings; he stands on his own feet.
Another Sheaf
John Galsworthy
You can break from the leading-strings of that malignant Mr. Jennings.
Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII No. 1 January 1848
Various
A high-spirited lad like Alwyn would not be kept in leading-strings.
Doctor Luttrell's First Patient
Rosa Nouchette Carey
For many years he had been kept in leading-strings by Wolsey's and other clerical influences.
Henry VIII.
A. F. Pollard
Has sir Willoughby Worret been lead in leading-strings all this time?
The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor
Samuel James Arnold