Mommy Monday: The Good Girl Prostitute.

"Sometimes it is not enough to do our best, we must do what is required-" 

Winston Churchill

Tonight as I was laying in bed with my daughter she had a revelation that she won't be using my phone for the next week because she and her sister got in trouble for 2 separate things. They get to use my phone to play the uploaded games, lately it's Subway Surfer they play and have been excited to have won a new character.

But as she was sitting there, I said the most annoying thing I think I have ever uttered. "Well why don't you do something really good in the morning and you can get to play on the phone again?"

And a plethora of thoughts started running through my head about parenting as of late. I hate parenting in the years 2000. Really I do. I hate hearing that my kid will moved ahead if they do put effort or don`t in school. That if I scold them to hard I am deemed to psycho mom. If my expectations are too high then I am causing undue pressure.

But as I said why not do something good to get to use the phone again, I felt like I just cheapened my daughters adulthood by tenfold. Now I am horrifically guilty of using the reward system as a bargaining chip to my favor. Do this for candy, do that for a new Lalaloopsy, do this for this and for that. Never did it phase me until the other day I turned to my elder daughters and said to them, we are a family and that means we are a team. If we work together we get more done. So why do I need to be bargaining to have them to do something. At school they get stamps and stickers for good behaviour, they get presents or snacks for doing something I want them to do.

But when is too much, too much? Why am I telling my daughter to do something that she might not have automatically done, it feels like a version of little kid prostitution. "Hi honey, do something mommy wants but you might not want to and I will reward you for doing so." Why reward? Why ask for good behaviour? This feels like a disaster waiting to happen. I am setting up my daughters to think they need to do stuff to get stuff in return. This is not the daughters I want to raise. I don't want them to think that they should do things for their boyfriends, their husbands, their bosses, their friends or anyone else to get stuff they want.

I think the mentality of things are only given to those who complete tasks or wants of other cheapens our society as a whole, it definitely cheapens our children's core value system. They need not be the prostitutes of our generation.

My girls are feisty and bossy. I don't pigeon whole the word. They can be bossy and they know it. I said to them the other day, "you are very good at being bossy, that's great, now it's time to also practice being a good team player." I want them to hold their own and not be wallflowers. I want them to command the room like their mother did, I want them to be independent and smart, I want them to be in control of their decisions and not to fall to peer pressure. I don't see how the reward system will yield the girls I want to raise.

I don't want to prostitute my girls core values and personal self beliefs into you are only as good as the reward you get from your behaviour. They are good people, because it is who they are, it's their value system they are protecting, fostering... they don't need anyone to pander to, they don't need a rich boyfriend to feel self value, they don't need to be constantly rewarded for being a good person. Because people who do will never do good for others that won't be able to reward them back.

So reward system is partially being removed from our house... because I want to raise just plain old Good girls!

~Cheers!

*this to me applies to girls and to boys equally*

SPEECHLESS!

Children are SMART!

At least mine are... so being sick was one thing, and it seems like being sick is exceptionally detrimental to me because this is the second time I have been sick the whole of 2009 and both times getting a simple cold blows out into full on laryngitis.

Chalk it up to the fact that I talk to much, I talk to my kids too much, I complain to my family to much, I speak to much in my political meetings to much, I love to debate too much.... I talk to much and well my vocal chords are annoyed by me and I have been silenced.

Parental silence= Children's fantasy

Do this, eat your food, don't stick your fingers there, don't put that in your mouth, why are you naked, stop hitting your sister, let's change your diaper... commmoooonnnn let's change your diaper, do you want to go to your room, why are you being a bad girl, get off that, get down from there, you are going to hurt yourself... followed by yelling of Menace, Monster....

My children (and even my husband even though he won't admit it) are in bliss; I cannot verbalise anything, a whisper is difficult and well after everything I read about having laryngitis whispering is more strenuous on the larynx than talking. So how do your children repay me for my silence? They take, take and take some more advantage of me.

We have a large flat screen TV in our bedroom... (doesn't fit in the carved wood unit we have in the living room that my father made with his bare hands that I can't muster up the courage to do something with) they watch their very juvenile cartoons in that room because the largeness of the screen keeps them occupied. Today, after many weeks of behaving, understanding that mommy's room is her domain and not to be messed with... with a thought in their mind, being monkeys and jumping on my bed was the only form of entertainment they could enjoy in my room.

If you fret over the jumping you'd be surprised because that is the lightest point of their expedition of my room, see jumping would not suffice my daughters, because to them linens are obstacles, pillows are deterrents... they need to remove every item off the bed before commencing the frolicking of toddlers.

I can hear them as I come up to my room door giggling to their hearts content, laughing like there could be no better moment for them. I open the door, to which they stop instantly because my eldest is aware that linen removal is unacceptable.... frightened they are that Mommy Dearest might start yelling, they realise no such noise will leave my mouth, nothing no yelling, no sound of disappointment... they smirk.

Luckily my eldest to a point understands that such a behaviour would have not been accepted previously, she participates in putting the pillows back onto the bed. Only reason I wasn't highly irritated, by all means it's Sunday... it's time to change the linens anyways!