If my SO and I were living in a happily post-childrearing state of domesticity and any-other-adult-not-squeezed-from-my-loins was faced with the adult responsibility prospect of having to pay for food and shelter, I might lighten the burden by offering the roommates wanted section of my newspaper but that’s about it. The dynamics of this situation are an extended part of the parent/child relationship. Pretending it is otherwise is artificial and benefits the already-livin’-for-free party more than the paying-for-everything-making-spouse-wear-pants-in-the-living-room-doing-all-the-cooking-and vacuuming party.
But what we’re talking about here is two adults, and both seem to be having difficulties adjusting to their new relationship. “I used to change your diapers!” just doesn’t cut it. Nor would “I didn’t ask to be born!”
It’s all how the question is phrased, and it doesn’t actually have to include the word “please.”
“Could you pass me the remote?” is a lot different then “give me the remote.” In the latter case, you’d get your remote, after I stuck it down my pants and rubbed it around for a bit, then handed it to you with my did-you-get-the-hint look.
My father is one to order, not ask. Even when I was a teen, living at home, it drove me nuts. Would it be so hard to ASK me to get change the channel on the TV, not ORDER me to? That carried on after I became an adult, even into my own home. Finally I had to sit down with him and ask that he stop order me and my SO around.
I also spent a couple of summer, during college, caught in that area between childhood and adulthood. I’d been living on my own during school, only doing what I wanted to, but I was back home over the summers.
My guess is there is more then just this one exchange going on here. kambuckta’s daughter has become used to doing what she wants, when she wants. kambuckta is still thinking of her daughter as a child, and not an adult. In addition, it sounds like she is getting tired of being mother to a child again, and not housemate to an adult.
Talk it out. The 2 of you need to sit down and decide what your relationship is and how to keep from getting on each others nerves. Decide on reasonable rent/chores. House rules. And most of all, how to go about treating each other as adults. That means asking not ordering. It also means no getting snippy back. If you wouldn’t treat a stranger that way, why would do it to your loved ones?
For crissakes, the kid’s paying RENT. Did we all overlook this? It’s not like she’s unwilling to contribute to the household.
Meanwhile, if emptying the dishwasher is not a regular, expected task from her, then Mom has no right to expect darling-daughter to read her mind and empty it. What’s the kid, nostradamus?
Even when I lived with my parents for FREE, my mother always said “please” when requesting something from me. We have a great relationship. This being said, if I wanted her to do something, I always said please. Isn’t this how family members are supposed to interact?
I think that we all agree that politeness is super cool, ASKING for politeness is way gross.
The problem I have with the OP is that it’s assumed that simply because it’s a parent/child relationship, that politeness isn’t required. If you’re willing to treat a total stranger at Starbucks nicely with a please and thankyou, why wouldn’t you grant that to someone you love and care for?
I agree, after returning to my mom’s house after years of being away I went through something similar to some of the other people who were sympathetic to the OP’s daughter.
I paid room and board, yet I lived in the basement suite, ate mainly at work, did my own laundry, and rarely spent time in the shared family areas of the house. It took a few arguments between her and I before we came to an understanding that I was an adult and although we were in the same house just as I was as a child, that the situation was now different.
We went through a few arguments to establish those changes, and eventually came to ground rules that were more akin to roommates, than the mother/daughter power struggle going on right now at the OP’s house.
She’s paying “minimal lodging and board.”
Apparently she is, including not caring for her convalescing cat, for which there is no excuse.
Well, if you’re going to order someone around without so much as a “please” you’ve got no business charging them anything for room and board.
Here’s the thing, I generally have no problem with Q.E.D., unless he pokes at me, which he is prone to doing randomly just for shits and giggles. Then I got a problem with him. There are times when I actually agree with him, partially or wholly. For whatever reason he seems to have decided he has to prevail over me, (Either by anally retentively nitpicking the petty semantics of what I posted, or by just calling me a bitch out of the blue.) which I do find sad. He’s shown a pattern of this, and frankly I was sincere in my wish that he’d just put me on ignore already. But, then a part of me wonders if he doesn’t get joy out of annoying me. :dubious:
The OP said that she asked her. Where do you get ordering about? And what does any of that have to do with room and board. I pay rent. Should it be free if my landlord doesn’t use what you consider proper manners? That’s a bit of an odd concept.
Is it somehow your idea that she was advertising rooms to let and her daughter just happened to apply? Or is it more likely that the daughter wants to have a carefree lifestyle when it is convenient, as long as good old Mom is there as a backup?
But if the problem would be solved by that, or at least mitigated, why don’t you take the action that is within your power?
Hell, why am I dancing around it? Why don’t you put HIM on Ignore?
Fair question. Because, as I said I normally have no problem with him, indeed I often agree with him, in whole, or in part. The personal dislike is on his end, I don’t like his actions, and so I tell him off. Get it?
Well, that’s pretty much every post he makes. Some people have a shtick. That shtick isn’t going to change.
Well, if the kid is a rent-paying adult, maybe all the kid needs is enough logic to figure out that if the dishwasher is finished running, then it needs to be emptied. And if it needs to be emptied, then she should do it without being asked/told/ordered/whatever. Rent-paying adults do what needs to be done in their own homes, without anyone saying pretty please with sugar on top.
Look up. See that thread title? Here: S’cuse me? PLEASE?? Um, just do it! That sounds like an order to me, and worse, politeness not required.
This isn’t a typical landlord-tenant situation, and you know that.
What is somehow my idea is that the OP is letting her adult daughter stay with her, there’s no contract in place and the OP feels because her “boarder” is also her daughter she can chuck politeness out the window.
What needs to happen is that adult thing we call “communication.”
I think everyone would pretty much agree daughter needs to do more, but emptying the dishwasher is a no-go with me. I’m in my early 40’s now and I’ve lived with my fair share of people and I can tell you everyone fucks up where the dishes go, everyone fucks up what’s recycling and what’s not, everyone fucks up what’s compostable and what’s not, etc. I’d say, “could you load the dishwasher please? If you do the washing, I’ll put stuff away.” That would save me time not having to hunt around the kitchen trying to find where things got stashed.
Also, from the OP:
Sounds to me like daughter is willing to do what she can, but needs mom to rationally communicate to her - like an adult - what she needs.
The “S’cuse me?” comes after the reported “Say please.”
Mom: Empty the dishwasher.
Daughter: Say please.
Mom: Excuse me? Please? Just do it.
You can’t take the title as the original request. It’s the reaction to the daughter’s reaction.
Also, it appears the mom didn’t have to say “hang the laundry” or “clean your room.” The daughter knew what was expected.
I’m guessing the kid has a pretty good idea of where stuff goes in the kitchen. I’m also guessing that this wasn’t the first time that kambuckta has asked the kid to empty the dishwasher. If you are arguing that the kid couldn’t figure out that she should do it, because normally kambuckta likes to do it herself, I’m pretty sure that’s not what’s going on here.
Oh my god. Take it easy. A convalescing cat? Are there any other kind? I think we’re overblowing the situation. The cat is probably sitting on a pillow all day and requires a dose of medicine every once in a while, it’s not like he’s hooked up to a EEG and a respirator.
Well, that’s basically why I’m in this thread. “Empty the dishwasher” is a command, and I can’t imagine my mother ever speaking to me that way unless she’d already asked and I was being lazy.
Sarahfeena, you’re probably right daughter knows where stuff goes assuming mom and “The Bloke (not her bio-dad)” isn’t a recent rearrangement of the household.
You’ve never had to deal with keeping a post-surgery cat quiet! Believe you me, it isn’t as easy as it sounds. One of our cats recently had hip surgery to remove the shattered joint on his back right hip. (He’s better now, a false joint has formed. That’s the phrase the vet used to describe it. The one time he got managed to sneak outside un-noticed he got hit by a car.) Locking him in one room was not enough. At first, not only did we have to keep him in a roomy pet carrier, but we also had to put a cone on him. Then, after a little bit, we put him on a short leash within reach of food, water, and the litterbox. Had we not put him on the short leash, he’d have jumped and slowed down his healing process. She said “convalescence after a major accident” in her description of the cat, which implies it is a lot like what we went through.
We had to:
Make sure he wasn’t getting tangled in the leash.
Check his wound to be sure he wasn’t somehow pulling out the stitches or catching them on something, and make sure it wasn’t infecting.
Make sure he was eating, drinking, and pooing, as well as getting him his heavy duty pain drugs and anti-biotics on schedule.
Also, of course, petting him and consoling him as needed since it was an ordeal for him.
In short, this required checking on him about hourly for almost a month to be sure the false joint formed fully and he didn’t re-injure himself.