daughter's friend has a lazy parent!
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daughter's friend has a lazy parent!
| Wed, 07-19-2006 - 9:12am |
My oldest daughter's best friend has a lazy parent. She is a single mom around 50 years old, but is very youthful in spirit. She's a wonderful woman, but she won't take her kid anywhere with her friends. She has no problem letting her daughter go anywhere else, she is very reasonable with curfews, and will give gas money to her other friends who come to pick her up. It's great to carpool sometimes, but she doesn't exactly live close to anyone and the parents I've spoken to are getting tired of going to pick her up and drop her off every time. According to the daughter her mother feels that if her friends want to see her so badly they can drive her. Humph! I feel bad for this girl. She's very sweet and an extremely loyal friend to my daughter. What can I do?

You might try inviting this mom and DDd for a little mother trip to the mall or lunch. Get to know her. She might not be 'lazy' - she might be depressed or exhausted. Being a married mom to a teen is rough enough but being a single one is rougher - she's it. She's got it all to do. I know many of you are single moms and I applaud you all - the very thought of that scares me to death. Or maybe this woman has some medical issues that leave her exhausted. I have a very underactive thyroid and even though I take medication I still get real tired. Play a role model for her - show her how to parent. By having some mom and dd time, you might show her what a wonderful child her DD is. Also while you are with her, talk about how valuable car time is to you and your DD - that's truly when the best talks occur.
But then, of course, she may just truly be lazy and there's not much you can do about that. In that case, just befriend the child as much as possible. This girl will need an active role model in her live.
Oh, there could be so many things going on here
Perhaps she is embarassed about her car? I am not the neatest person in the world and my van when the kids were younger tended to be pretty messy. I was twice told by some little darlings how their mother would never tolerate such a mess. I dont blame the kids-they were pretty young-but it disturbed me(not enough to keep the van spotless ;))
She may also feel she doesnt fit in with the adults in this group and prefer to avoid the discomfort. Maybe she's self concious about being single or what Im guessing is an age difference(Im 51; we came to parenthood late so I have been down THAT path as well)
I think :
1-as the other poster suggested, work a little harder to get to know her
2-let it go. Good friends are hard to come by and I think giving gas money says she isnt conciously using anyone
As the parent with a child who lives waaaay out here, an hour+ away from most friends, I do a heck of a lot of driving my DD to her friends houses. Yeah, it would be nice for them to come get her, but so far, no one has offered so I do the driving.
To the other moms' credit, giving gas money is a very generous gesture. At least she is aware of the fact her DD's friends drivers' are going out of the way for her. My DD used to hang around with a group of 4-5 girls and there was one mom who never, ever drove the girls anywhere. If they wanted to see a movie, go the mall, beach, whatever, that mom never offered to drive. Come to think of it though, her DD never initiated anything, she let everyone else make plans for all of them. It could have been because she knew her mother wouldn't be willing to drive her and her friends around. Who knows?
Some parents just don't want to be bothered. My DD also had a friend with a mother like that in grade school. DD would call and ask her over and the mom would flat-out say no, because she didn't want to drive or go out of her way -- all of 20 minutes. I was the one who did the dropping off and picking up.
Anyway, the next time this friend is involved in an activity, do you think you could ask the mom to meet you at a 1/2 point for pick-up and drop-off? You could use a cell phone to call and say you were 15 minutes away from pick-up point, etc. This is actually something I'm thinking about with my own DD and her friends from school.
Hope this helps,
Julie
Edited 7/19/2006 11:34 am ET by hydrangea_blue