Friday, April 20, 2007

The psychology of parenting

Stefanie injured her finger again (this is the same little pinkie that she broke 18 months ago on the trampoline) and I'm trying to not let her get away with zoning out of her activities completely and spending all her spare time doing sweet f***-all. Does that sound harsh? I know my daughter very well, you see, and if you let her, she'll milk this for all it's worth.

So I gave her a choice the other day: "Either you come with me Adriana and watch her do her ice-skating lesson, or you go down the tennis courts with Larysa and take care of the dog, while she does her lesson. But you're not going to sit around at home MSN'ing and watching telly all afternoon." Stefanie chose the tennis courts, and what do I find when I get there an hour later? She's been cooped up in the clubhouse the entire time not caring for Jessie at all! I wouldn't have minded, but it was obvious there were a few people put out by her inattention. First, there was the lady who was deathly afraid of dogs, hid behind her husband the entire time; another one hid in the clubhouse she was so frightened of her; Gwen had to poop and scoop after her; and finally Jessie got into the clubhouse (a big no-no!) and Stefanie had apparently done nothing to remove her.

My mortification complete, I tried to spell out her misdemeanors to her, but all I got was a surly apology and the brush-off at the courts. In the car on the way home, I tried again to impress upon Stefanie my disappointment in her irresponsibility, and all I got was deflection. The old "It wasn't me, it was my sister" routine is great to confuse and confound the parents most of the time, but this time I wasn't buying it since Larysa was in her tennis lesson the whole time.

It wasn't until I was on the phone later with Orest, recounting her behavior and the possibility of selling the children (we've since discovered that selling them piece-meal - one organ at a time gets a greater return) that she finally delivered the heart-felt apology and remorse that was required under the circumstances.

I know this is just a regular part of parenting, but boy, nobody told me it would be so exhausting! Shortly after sorting this all out between us, I was (gently) snoring away on the sofa, unable to continue on in my normal evening duties. I'm going to need a resident analyst on-hand, pumping me with some stock phrases, instead of me having to tax my brain to come up with all this myself!

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