One of our readers sent me a link this week to a very funny video. Coincidentally, a couple of my Facebook friends had shared the same video. It seems that us mom people have quite a bit in common.
The video featured a mom discussing how she and her kids are not friends. She goes on to, very humorously, explain that she is totally OK with that. She talks a little bit about her distaste with people who consider their children their best friends and, I have to admit, I was totally confused. There are people who want to be their kids’ best friend?
I guess I don’t travel in the same circles as she does, but I can’t imagine one of my friends telling me that one of (or many of) her kids are her best friend. Unless we were drinking and she started with something like, “and she was pulling some teen-queen temper tantrum shite and so I took away her phone (sips wine) because she doesn’t appreciate all I do for her, you know? (sips wine) I mean, how did she get to be such a bit*h? (sips wine) but I still love her so much (chugs wine-gets teary) and she’s my best friend (more wine) remember how cute she was when she was born?? OMG my perfect baby grew up to be a bit*h (full crying jag).
Otherwise, I can’t picture it. I don’t mean to say I’m not friendly with my kids. We have a grand ole time together. We talk about the funny things they do with their friends. We laugh at stupid dog memes. We debate over whether or not hot dogs are a breakfast food. We tease their father about pulling his pants up to his armpits. It’s a hoot.
But when push comes to shove, they are completely aware of the fact that I am not their friend.
When they were little and unwilling to clean up their toys, I would give several warnings. The first one was always the standard request to clean up. The second usually went something like, “I’ve asked you once, please don’t make you ask again,” and from there it escalated, “I am going to yell. The next time I come in here and I still cannot see your floor, I am going to scream and vomit fire.”
If that didn’t work (and most times, it worked), I turned into reverse-Santa. I would go and find the largest garbage bag that I could summon and head to the room that had become a trash heap. Without speaking, without acknowledging the screams, the crying and the pathetic begging, I collected all the crap. Clothes, toys, books, stuffed beasts, nothing was safe. The rule was, if they could keep their room clean for a week (or a month, depending on how extensive the cleanup was), they could have the bag back.
At no point, in all of the years of reverse-Santa, did they even ask for one single item from the bags. So either they blocked out the whole incident, locking it away in the recesses of their minds, or they just didn’t need all of that stuff to begin with. A couple of years ago, Brian and I sent the kids over to my parents’ house and dragged every one of those bags to the curb, not something you would expect of your BFF.
Eventually, they broke me and any chance for friendship. It was October. We were a full-time homeschooling family so there was no “me time,” no time when kids were not in the house, every second of every day, making an ever-loving mess. Wading through a sea of Legos, every day, had left me battle-scarred and war-weary.
I told my children, little kids who were once tiny little cherubs of cuteness and love, that I was canceling Christmas. I looked them in their sparkling little eyes and said, “If you don’t keep your room spotless every day until Christmas, I will tell Santa not to come. I will tell that jolly old man that my kids are wretchedly ungrateful, that my kids can’t take care of their current crap, that he should not bring them anything. Not one single thing.”
It was a bold threat. If they didn’t meet the challenge, it could have been a very, very ugly December 25. I could have been dubbed, “the meanest mother on the face of the earth.” I could have had two puddles of abject misery weeping around the house, for weeks.
But that didn’t happen. Because my kids knew that I was not screwing around. My kids knew that I would follow through, without a second thought. They knew that I wouldn’t even let Santa leave them coal. Nothing. There would be no things, of any kind, under the tree (except for dog biscuits. No need for the dogs to suffer).
And this is the attitude I bring to most of my parenting endeavors. Because, when you go out into the real world, there are consequences for your actions. If you don’t do your job, you get fired. If you treat people badly, they won’t be your friend. If you poke a sleeping bear, it will probably kill you.
My job is to teach my kids to be good, decent, hard-working, kind and compassionate people who don’t behave like jackasses. And also, to stay alive.
I want to send them out into the world with the tools they need to be problem solvers. I want them to learn to do unto others as they would have done unto them. I need them to understand that sometimes, you’re going to screw up. And when you do, you have to apologize and make it right. And I can’t accomplish any of that if I’m worried about how much they like me. Because a lot of those lessons are really going to piss them off.
They can work it all out in therapy. Besides, they should definitely have a bestie who doesn’t use anti-aging eye cream.
Since keeping my kids alive is the first and foremost of my parenting goals, I’m going to pass on this advice from geology.com (http://geology.com/stories/13/bear-attacks/) on how to avoid or protect yourself from a bear attack. I bet none of their BFFs thought of that one!
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Laurie Nigro, is the mother of two biological children and one husband. She also takes care of a menagerie of animals that leave throw-up around for her to step in in the middle of the night. Laurie’s passionate about frugal, natural living, which is a nice way of saying she’s a kombucha-brewing, incense-burning, foodie freak who tries really hard not to spend money on crap made by child laborers. You can hear her rant about her muse (aka husband) and other things that have no bearing on your life, in this space each Sunday.
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