Momservation: Promise me you will not let the teenage years be the marker for how well you’ve raised your kids.
☺ ☺ ☺
I’ve decided this summer will be the Summer of Independence. I’m going to resist the temptation to make lunches that hit every major food group, pick up wet towels off the floor, and remind people to brush their teeth.
And in “people” I mean my teenage children who should really be further along on this independence thing.
I blame myself though. I’m a helicopter mom who worries that if I don’t feed my children they will starve or if I don’t hover over them with sunscreen they will sustain third degree burns.
This summer I’ve decided to save them from me and a life of never knowing that clean clothes don’t just magically appear on your bed folded and ready to put away.
Just to let you know—it’s not going well. At least by my standards. The kids think they’re ready to move out. I’m ready to abort the mission or flee this hazmat site.
I didn’t think I was asking too much on this first test launch of independence. But obviously, putting a new roll of toilet paper on the toilet paper dispenser is setting the bar too high.
Let’s look at the checklist of things that would define a successful Summer of Independence:
□ Get up at a reasonable hour and feed yourself breakfast
(If by reasonable Mom meant after noon and by food she meant Chex Mix for lunch)
□ Brush your teeth and brush your hair
(Jumped in pool and chewed some gum)
□ Get dressed in something besides what you wore yesterday (and the day before)
(Throw favorite outfit in dryer and spray with Axe or Taylor Swift perfume)
□ Make sure you put on sunscreen and to reapply
(Try to look like a Coppertone model, complain about burned/blotchy skin, not learn lesson and repeat next day)
□ Make sure you eat something for lunch
(Skip lunch then come in with friends like a swarm of locusts and eat everything except what would constitute a healthy lunch)
□ Make sure to pick up after yourself
(Turn the house into a garbage heap)
□ Pick up the dog poop in the backyard before your friends come over
(Laugh at your friends who step in poop then get mad when you have to clean poop out from between toes and bottoms of shoes)
□ Have you and your friends use same pool towel all day
(Grab a dry towel every time then leave wet towels all over the yard, house, and in every chair so there are no dry seats to sit in)
□ Have your friends help you clean up before they leave
(Say you’ll do it yourself later and then never do)
□ Do regular chores like setting and clearing table, unloading dishwasher, and making your bed without being asked
(Must not have to do them because Mom’s not nagging me!)
□ If your clothes you want to wear or need are dirty wash them
(Complain about no underwear and nothing to wear. Continue to be mystified by two square, metal, machines in laundry room)
□ Help make dinner
(Get invited to a friend’s house for dinner or be conspicuously absent and unreachable until food hits table)
□ Go to bed at a reasonable hour
(If by reasonable hour Mom meant falling to sleep after midnight with my phone in my hand, headphones on, and nothing interesting on Instagram, Twitter, or SnapChat)
#Backtothedrawingboard