As the title suggests, this is a very lame rant about the selfishness of children. My friend’s mum is about to go overseas for 4 weeks, and she’s getting in housesitters for that time, and wanted her home to look nice before they come. Over coffee one day a couple of weeks ago she asked if I might be able to give her a hand to spruce the place up, as my friend lives some 500 kms away. Mum’s son also lives a fair way away (or so I thought). Always happy to help I said yes. Fuck - that was a huge undertaking.
My husband and our son gave up 2 consecutive Saturdays to wash windows inside and out, scrub out cupboards, clean light fittings, polish, dust, take rubbish to the tip, clean bathrooms, clean the oven, wash curtains etc etc. By the time we’d finished by 4.00pm yesterday, the place was sparkling and my friend’s mum was almost teary with gratitude. We were pleased with her response.
As we were leaving yesterday, I noticed a $20 note stuck to the pinboard in the kitchen. I reminded her it was there in case it was for a bill to be paid. No, says mum, it’s petrol money for Graeme (her son). I said ‘I thought he’d moved away’ and she said that he’s been back in town (and unemployed) for some 6 months and that he was driving her to the airport tomorrow and it was for his petrol money. When I asked why he hadn’t been in to help her, she said (mumble mumble mumble) ‘he’s far too busy to help me, and he doesn’t do housework, and besides he’d miss the footy’. Seriously, I could have been fishing, camping, or cleaning my own fucking oven, but no, I helped out a friend. Her son is getting a mouthful from me when next our paths cross. :mad:
That is bizarre beyond words and part of it is your fault. Who cares what the house-sitters think of the condition of the house as long as it is livable? Why couldn’t she pay them to do some cleaning while they are there. It sounds like you just conned into arranging a spring cleaning of her house under false pretenses. This is your friend’s mum? I hope the relation is closer than it sounds. Don’t volunteer for that stuff without fair compensation. It doesn’t help anyone. There are tons of people that will work others into the ground for their own benefit.
Once I went to help my friend clean her basement so she could move and her teenage son spent the whole time playing computer upstairs and she didn’t even ask him to help. I didn’t say anything because she was close to having a nervous breakdown from a surprise divorce, I was pissed though.
I can see her doing the exact same thing as in the OP.
I dunno - I can see both sides here. On the one hand, yeah, it would have been better for her son to get off his unemployed ass and help his mom, but on the other hand, you volunteered to help, and that was a nice thing for you to do. The relationship between this guy and his mom really isn’t your business; if you didn’t want to help, you shouldn’t have helped. You did want to help, and you did, so isn’t that enough? Although it was kind of under false pretenses, since you thought all her kids were too far away to help…okay, I give you permission to be pissed for half a day. And ask more questions before you help someone that much again.
My mother is 95 years old and living in an assisted care facility. My sister and I don’t think that it will be too long before she needs to go to a nursing home.
Meanwhile, my sister’s son is unemployed and living with her. My sister is infirm. Her husband is elderly although alert.
My sister is nearing 70. My mother depends on her to take her to the doctor, the bank, and to take care of situations as they arise. She also wants my sister to wash and iron her clothing because she doesn’t like the way the assisted care does it.
My sister should be taking better care of herself and she knows it and complains to me. I tell her to “just say no” to mother. But she makes herself sick doing too much. She even washes and irons clothes that mother is going to give away. She has osteoarthritis, rheumatoid arthritis and fibromyalgia and can barely stand up.
I am about 2 and a half hours away. My own doctor doesn’t want me to go there because the situation is so emotionally toxic (and always has been). I go once a year and keep in touch by phone regularly.
My 95 year old mother pays for my sister to have a housekeeper to come in. My sister’s son sits on his butt by all accounts. He doesn’t do housework. The kicker is that he is a grandfather himself. I can’t roll my eyes far enough back in my head. He’s not even fifty yet and the only healthy one in the crowd.
Fair call. I was feeling outraged because of the son’s moddycoddling too. I don’t mind doing housework, in fact if I wasn’t in my current employment, I’d do it full time - I like to make order out of chaos. Anyway, this morning, got up at 7.00am (on a Sunday no less) and cleaned my own oven. And have decided, - the next time the bloody thing needs a clean, I’ll just buy a new one.
Always difficult to to know the origin of parent child relationships. they always seem so sweet as little old ladies. Anyone who wishes to judge me by what I will and won’t do for my mother without knowing what things were like 40 years ago can kiss my furry round ass.
I have a very dear friend with many health issues, which have resulted in severe financial problems. She’s now on disability. Several times over the past decade she has needed to move to a new location. Every single time, she and I, her cousin, and another friend, have done the work, including things like cleaning out and repainting the place she was moving into. I have bad knees, spinal arthritis and bouts of sciatica. The other friend is very overweight and also has bad knees. The youngest of us is in her 50s. Every single time, I wondered how come her completely able-bodied thirtyish son was not helping, as three semi-abled old ladies lugged furniture, rugs and appliances up and down flights of stairs. He was “too busy” elsewhere.
To make it worse, I know my friend’s son regularly asks her for money. WTF? It makes me want to grab the young man by the shoulders and shake some sense into him. GRRRRR. :mad:
And, not knowing the situation with the son—if he hates doing that kind of work, and isn’t very good at it, and helps his mother out in other ways (does he?), I’m not inclined to blame him at all. That you decided to help your friend out with something she wanted, but didn’t need, to be done is your own decision.
And when I say “didn’t need,” I’m speaking from the perspective of someone who doesn’t personally find the results of that kind of extensive housecleaning worth the effort. This may be a little like the kind of conflict between people sharing a house (spouses, roommates, whatever) where one of them values tidiness, and the work that it requires, a lot more than the other, and resents the other for not living up to their own standards.
Her son has nothing to do with this, the level of labor you put into this was entirely your choice. Chastising him for a duty you eagerly took up would be pointless.
There is a single mom in our neighborhood I regularly help out moving stuff around even though she has two strong, able bodied sons (20 & 24) who live at home. She will not ask these kids to help and instead this 120 lb woman and myself have to wrestle objects out of trailers and cars into her house.
I asked her once about why they didn’t help during these exercises and got "they don’t know how (to what, pick stuff up and it down again?), they’re never here, they’re always sleeping, etc., etc.
Of course it was absurd. She chose not to ask them because the hassle of getting them moving was less than calling me. I didn’t resent her sons for this. It was the reality she had created.
WTF? It makes me want to grab the young man by the shoulders and shake some sense into him. GRRRRR. :mad: