I Should Have Nagged! {{{Venting}}
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| Sun, 08-27-2006 - 5:41pm |
DD has known, since about oh, .... June 9, that her summer reading needed to by done and her summer assignments complete by the first day of school -- which is TOMORROW!
What do you suppose she has been pretty much all day, every day for the past five days? Yup, her summer assignments.
I had rather hoped that we could have spent this last day of summer vacation doing something other than this ... which is nothing! Just hanging around not much of anything, because it just seems too cruel to take DS off to the movies or something and leave her behind working. I am soooo frustrated.
I tried so hard not to nag over the summer, and did a pretty good job of NOT. But I did make a few polite suggestions about getting it done. Especially when the I heard' I'm bored' a time or two.
Now, it IS a fact that we ended being out of town a bit more than we expected to be at the start of summer. BUT, it is also a fact that there was PLENTY of time to work on this stuff before now! In fact, we had 5-6 days between trips when I specifically said "You really should spend these next few days concentrating on getting your homework done. It would be a real bummer if you ended up trying to cram it in the last few days!" Looks like that fell on deaf ears.
This morning she could tell I was frustrated. I told her it would have been nice if all this would have been done before now so that we could have done something special and fun to celebrate the end of summer. I can't believe she actually said this, but she did! "So do I, mom!" Like it's my fault?! Just who does she think is responsible for being in this situation? She is trying to make me feel guilty for admitting to being frustrated but it's not going to work.
It's already 2:30, she CLAIMS to be almost finished, but there still isn't going to be time to do anything. She hasn't got her backpack and supplies organized, her new school polos are still in a bag on the stairs (I asked her to hang them up 2 days ago) and miscellaneous things to prepare for tomorrow are still undone. Aarrgh!

As hard as it is today, you did the right thing by NOT nagging. This is your DD's chance to learn about natural consequences. She spent the last five days of her summer vacation cramming, she'll rush around tonight or tomorrow morning organizing her backpack, and the polos are un-hung and maybe crumpled. Ah well.
The hard part for me would be that those consequences would be more negative for me than for my DD - and maybe that's the hard part for you too. I'm lucky that my DD is pretty self-motivated about work (and doubly lucky that her school doesn't assign summer work), but the backpack and clothes would be the same for her and she wouldn't be phased about it all.
I've had to work at NOT caring about the things that she doesn't care about - why should I get stressed about wrinkled un-hung clothes or a disorganized backpack if she doesn't? I try reminding without nagging, and the let her live with the outcome.
Sorry your last day of summer was no fun - I probably would have been mean and taken DS to a movie .
Sue
Well, she pulled it all off. She even managed to get her backpack organized, showered, hair blown dry and her clothes laid out for this morning by a pretty decent hour last night. She was giggling rather conspiratorily when she told me how "'there were e-mails flying back and forth all day today -- no one else is finished yet either". To which I replied, 'so I guess I'm not the only frustrated mom today?'. More giggling, an "I love you" and (gasp!) "well, at least we learned a lesson". Could it really be true??? I do hope so because this school year is probably going to be a tough one and it will be very, very long if we continue in this vein.
As much as I don't like it either, (summer vacation SHOULD be 'vacation' as it was intented) summer reading and assignments seem to be the norm. Every other high school student we ran into over the summer had some sort of reading and/or assignment to do -- not just from the San Diego area or from California, either. I don't know what the drive is to push these kids so hard, but I've felt from the days when my younger DS was in kindergarten, that it is just TOO MUCH. They'll all be burned out from school before they even GET to college. Sigh .... don't know what, if anything, can be done about this, though.
Sometimes you just have to let them suffer the concequences of their actions or lack of, as in your DD's case. I don't think you should have nagged. You remindered her a few times along the way and she chose not to listen. You fulfilled your part. Now it's up to her and her alone She made the choice and she now has to deal with it. IMHO, I would take your DS to the theater. Why should he have to pay for her poor decision?
Mily
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You are absolutely right and I came to the same conclusion myself last night. I plan to apologize to him today when I pick him up and then try do a special something with him this week.