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    Tuesday, October 17, 2006

    What Have We Learned?

    Some very good friends came over yesterday and helped me tell the girls to clean their room 80-odd times in 4 hours (strange that there room is still no cleaner than it was before, and it's only 20 minutes from finished anyway!) amongst other things. I cooked and we had dinner together with all of the families after the men got home from work. It was great *grin*

    Every parenting book, Every homeschooling advice column, everywhere I look I see experts in home management telling their readers what to do.

    Put down the broom and teach the kids.

    Don't worry about dusting, spend quality time with the children.

    These are the most important times in your children's lives, the dishes can wait.

    Nobody cares if you dust, the little ones need nurturing.

    Love the babies, leave the laundry.

    All the time, people advocating being a great parent instead of keeping an immaculate house.

    But social services? Nah.
    *
    They want every speck of laundry off of the floor, even if there are plenty of clean clothes available.
    * They want the kids' rooms to be perfect with no toys lying around, even if they were just playing with them a second ago.
    * They want you to hover over your children at all times and not even let them play in their rooms alone (there are dangerous things in there, like wall plugs, you see).
    * No cobwebs, no dust, no mess on the counter in the kitchen (even if you are cooking or just got back from grocery shopping), no clutter on the desks or tables, no nothing. Heavens forbid you are in the middle of a craft project in the living room floor when one of these people drops in.

    The government wants you to be a little automaton. No life, only children and home. No life for the children, only cleaning, school and home. Not only do I have to f'n Marry Poppins, Now I have to constantly live in house beautiful too.

    So what have we learned?

    Nothing is ever good enough, nobody will never be fast enough, organized enough, smart enough, perfect enough, that some governmental harpie won't find something to call you a horrible parent for.

    You will never be good enough.

    5 comments:

    TheyDHD said...

    Now that's one heck of a solution! Unfortunately (or would that be fortunately?) very few of those who call and report actually have children. People who have kids know kids play, get dirty, etc.

    Maybe though, if no person could be anon and false reports were prosecuted like perjury was, that would make a difference. *sigh*

    We can dream, eh?

    Anonymous said...

    Oh K, you are a great Mom! You spend time with your kids and love them and teach them in word as well as in example. You are teaching them to speak up for what they believe wherever they are. That is a wonderful thing!
    Don't give up!! You are going to make it thru this.
    I know you have been working hard to get the house in shape and your hard work has to show a big difference.
    Tomorrow will come and go and hopefully just be another day in your very full life with nothing horrible happening.
    {{{{{Kryistina}}}}}}
    Is there anything I can do to help?

    Anonymous said...

    DHS ignores anon reports that is they do not follow up on them. However, they do record them and may check later if they have another legitimate reason to be in your space.

    Todd said...

    I agree that the anonymous caller should be 'checked-out' before whoever they called about is bothered. I also think that false DFS reports should be prosecuted just like the filing of false police reports are.

    TheyDHD said...

    Anon, your information is flawed. The child protection services people have to follow up on every single call they get, no matter if it is filed anon or not.

    I called to verify.