Dave is out of town this week for a few days so I'm kind of on my own with the kids. So tonight, his mom picked them up from camp and when I got home she had let both of them go play across the street with Jared (Sam's buddy) and Zoe (Rebecca's buddy). I hadn't planned anything special for dinner so I just let them stay out as they usually come home when they get hungry.
At 7:00, Sam called to ask if he could stay at Jared's to watch a movie. I said that was fine, but asked what Becca was doing. "She's at Grant's" he tell me. Grant is another friend of Becca's who lives about 7 houses away or so. We have had this conversation with her before. She knows that she is not allowed to just run around to any friends house in the neighborhood without telling us first where she is going to be. So I sent Sam over there to tell her to come home and when she got here, I told her she was grounded for the rest of the night and that she could find something to do in her room until bedtime. So upstairs she goes and about 60 seconds later the waterworks and drama start. So I go up there and tell her that she has two choices, she can stop crying and find something to do in her room until bedtime or she can go to bed now. That quiets her and I go back down stairs wondering if I'm being too mean. So I call Dave to run it by him. He validates me and offers to talk to her, but she has calmed down by then so I pass and tell him I have handled it.
It's strange. When these kids first came into my life, they were someone else's kids. I spent all my time with them trying to be nice and have fun. I never had or needed to discipline them. But now they live with me and I'm basically raising them (don't even get me started about their actual mother). So now I find myself having to actually parent them and I'm trying to find the balance between evil stepmom and just mom. I so want to do right by them. Can somebody please assure me that I'm not going to make any mistakes!?
3 comments:
Pull up a chair, & grab your coffee...
From what I just read, I can tell that you are disciplining them because you love them. Mel, if she disappears down the street and something happens, how the hell are you supposed to know where she went if she doesn't tell you. If you didn't love her, you wouldn't give a crap. Case in point... look at her mother.
Sometimes you have to do these things because you are PROTECTING them. It's not because you feel like being a total biatch, you worry about their welfare. I don't know about you, but as I kid, I NEVER understood that... until I became a parent. It was suddenly very clear. Crystal Clear.
I would walk through fire for my children. It is my obigation to make sure they become accountable, respectable people. The same goes for you. I hate how you use the term Stepmom. You have become MUCH MORE than that to them. You have their health and well being at heart, as if they are your own. You have become a mom.
You did the right thing by sending her to her room. Had you not done that, and told her that NO MEANS NO, you would essentially become a doormat.
Kudos to you, and stop second guessing yourself. You did it because Becca needs to know that it is imperative that her parents know where she is at all times. Apparently she didn't understand that before, so maybe now she will.
Kids are vanishing Mel. There are freaks everywhere. Maybe even on your same street.
From a Mom to a Mom... You did the right thing. I promise.
Thanks. And by the way, I adore coffee so much that I think I'm going to blog about it.
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