Is it the end of June yet? <sigh>
I guess I should be glad I was able to post something nice on Mother's Day.
If you have read any of my previous blogs, you know that I predicted that SD's good behavior would last about 2 weeks. Well I was close enough for government work. Yes, she has been cleaning (sort of), but it is becoming more and more half-assed. She straightened up the living room on one of her days off, but no dusting or vacuuming. She cleaned up the table after dinner, but left what dishes wouldn't go in the dishwasher in the sink for someone else to clean up. I was busy with school work that night, DH was sick, so the dishes were still there the next morning and STILL there when I got home from work that evening! (DH pissed me off with the dish issue, btw. I had cleaned up that 2 day old mess before I could start dinner, then I cleaned up after dinner. SD and DH had some snacks and I asked him to make sure the dishes were done so I wouldn't find them in the sink this morning. Guess what happened! No, I didn't wash them before I left, so I bet I get to do them tonight. You may have to bail me out after a double assault charge!
So in any case, I am back to square one. She is going to do less and less while I get to do more and more at the busiest time of the year for me. In the next 2 weeks, I will be grading 36 French exams, 49 German exams and 16 German III essays along with writing report cards for each child in those classes and an extra 49 for my computer class. My school doesn't just do grades, either; we write an individual comment for EACH CHILD. Oh, I will also be writing comments for each of the 12 students in my advisor group, speaking to parents at an admissions test, chaperoning prom, attending graduation and working with my colleagues in the Foreign Language Dept for 4 days to "vertical team" our classes. But hey, she will be putting in 30 hour work weeks, so I shouldn't expect her to have time to help me out, right? GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR.
Please oh please, let HUD call and say she will get to move out at the end of June (or sooner!!!)
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I so know
Oh honey, if only we lived closer...I'd take you out for cocktails and we could vent about how to deal with the bullshit as we enter the homestretch. STBX is (also) OUT at the end of June and I could not be happier but it feels like that day is neeeeeeeeeeever going to come. Everyone keeps telling me to keep my cool, it won't be much longer, etc. I know they're right, but it doesn't make the day to day nonsense any easier. All I know is that I get up at 6:30 am and don't get home until 6:30 pm. Then I play with DD and get her dinner, give her a bath, play some more, put her to bed, and I'm finally done by 8:45 pm or so. And instead of sitting down to relax, I have to clean up the whole friggin house. I get NO help from STBX. He leaves after me in the am and so I come home to wet towels balled up on the now wet bed, dirty boxers in the middle of the room, ss's pajamas thrown wherever he decided to get him ready for school, cereal bowls with milk STILL ROTTING in the sink, pieces of food on the floor, trash spilling out of the can in the cabinet under the sink, the garbage he couldn't fit in the overflowing trash on the counter next to it. In 2+ years of marriage, STBX has N E V E R done the dishes or loaded the dishwasher. NOT ONE TIME. He's taken out the garbage a few times at my request, but not until after calling me a nag. Tuesday, he had the kids for a few hours and I came home to a TORNADO of a mess in my living room. Not ONE inch of carpet was visible, I swear. Toys, clothes, games, etc. DD is 2 and she does make a mess, but she will help clean if you ask her, and of course SS, the laziest 5-year-old I've ever met, can't lift a finger. I asked STBX how he could leave that mess for me after I worked all day and he said that he had the kids so he couldn't do it. UMM...yeah, okay. Then he called me a nag again and said that since I want him out so bad that this is now MY house and he has no more responsibility to it.
MAN...I know that the end is near, but it is SO hard to remember that when you come home to a mess and you're ready to blow your top. I like a neat, clean home and I can't relax if it's not semi-orderly. So like an ass, I am cleaning all night while STBX watches tv and just walks around me to get to the kitchen so he can add to the mess and also not clean the new one up.
It's a respect thing, for me. And an entitlement thing...like, since I am in the wife/mother role, I need to be doing the cleaning and housework for STBX, bottom line--the "Oh, she'll do it" attitude. Then when we get mad, it's turned around like we are SO anal. Yet it's not really about the act of having to wash the dishes or do the laundry, it's about the totally unfair expectations and the idea that our "loved ones" just assume that they will be taken care of rather than thinking maybe WE'D like that courtesy once in a while.
AHHHHHHH!!!!!
I know what you mean Krissy
If SD doesn't put his tools or pencils back, he gets upset with her, but my wanting a clean sink (esp after I have already done 2 sets of dishes!!!) is just me being "picky."
Incidentally, most of the dishes were in the dishwasher when I got home, but of course the ones that can't go in there were not washed up. Like you said, that is, apparently, my job.
Oh, and if you are wondering why I am not more upset with DH for not doing the dishes, I honestly prefer if he doesn't. The fibro makes his fine motor control unpredictable, esp if he is tired and he has a tendency to drop things. He does dishes when he can, but she knows about his problems and still leaves stuff to washed!
How old is SD?
Depending on her age I might be impressed that she even does part of those chores w/o being asked. If we didn't remind the SS's to do their chores they would never get done(they're 13 and 9).
DH should be helping you to remind SD to do them!
SD is 21, so don't be impressed
she also has a son. She is living with us until she gets a place of her own. She pays us $40 a month, doesn't have to chip in on utilities and hasn't really cooked a meal in months (she has been here since October). IMHO, she shouldn't have to be reminded to clean up after herself. I know this sounds bitter and angry, so please don't see it directed at you.
You have to find something that motivates her...
The ticket is motivations... finding that key for her to 'earn/gain/learn' etc. I don't mean a carrot here and there, I mean a serious motivator/agreement. Such as something that she just would absolutely love, but can't because these are the consequences, than you have to give her visual cues as to if she's blowing it, or winning it. The bigger the chores and expectation, the bigger the prize. What happens is that yes, they will be very focused on gaining their new prize, so they make all efforts, but they may dwindle off, you have to remind them, but leaving visual clues of the item in question around here and there, and you do have to remind them that they have a goal to work for, yes, work hard for, but in the end- it's worth it.
Once they get it, it clicks for them, and you can proceed with other things, and deals. But again, start out simple at first, than work your way up.
I agree that DH should support, enforce and back you up, but sometimes, we have to get a little creative.
The other thing is leave the house a mess. I know that it drives us crazy, but you know what... others start to get it when they no longer have jeans to wear or dishes to eat from. It sounds selfish, but to be honest, sometimes its the only motivator you have. After I can't take it anymore, I just stop, literally. I am too tired, I have more laundry and dishes to do now and no one else does it either, so I can sympathize, but the importance isn't about if the house is clean, but your family. So, if need be, let it go, literally. They will get the hint. So, I say, if she left the dishes in the sink, leave them there until she does do them. Don't do them, just leave them.
Man has the intelligence to change his life,
Sometimes, he just fails to use it...
StepMom, she is 21 and I don't really care about
motivating her to do anything other than getting out of my house. I have tried just leaving the messes - I end up with a sink full of several days worth of dishes instead of just one or two. I actually told her last night that I expected to find an empty sink this morning and she did wash some of them, but she took the others out of the drainer and put them on the stove instead of putting them away and she still managed to leave glasses (including her son's sippy cup that I put out there before I went to bed) in the sink.
You see, that is the worst part. I am dealing with an adult who only cares about herself. She even had the nerve to tell her dad to put gas in her car when he borrowed it the other day. He told her no (which surprised me!), but can you even comprehend the sheer arrogance of asking him for gas money when she had cost us almost $100/week to run her back and forth to work in addition to getting me to work! Oh, she occasionally filled the tank, but come on!
Sorry I am ranting again, but my life is getting to me right now and I have no where else to get this off my chest.