Hospitality Boundaries and Limits

My daughter, the gal with the giving heart came to me many weeks ago with a request: 

"Mom, can step sister #2 and baby almost 1 come and stay with us for a while? She is about to be homeless."

Yikes what could I say? We have a little extra room. 

Okay maybe even a lot depending on how you look at it. 

The daughter having moved down stairs, into the living room area, was willing to open all of that up. I figured we could make it work.

I wondered how much time we had to adjust to this idea. Not much or none as it turned out. So here they came. It was an adventure. 

I am not sorry that we did it. I know my daughter has learned lessons. She has also discovered where some of her limits and boundaries are.

I am not sure she will ever want to open our home up to host anyone again. Maybe if we had more space and the person could have their own room instead of sharing with her.

It is not that step sister did anything egregiously wrong. There are just the usual stresses of living with strangers and having a toddling baby scooting around.

Almost at the same time my daughter was pseudo adopting a new neighbors' out door cat. 

This meant having a new cat roaming around and slightly upsetting ours who is anti social and was already reeling from the idea of strangers being on the premises. 

I had to move her water source up stairs. Poor kitty.

I have a heart for single moms. I am just a softy that is where my daughter gets it. 

It is not just that I was 20 with no plan, no driver’s license, a part time job, no partner and, no college education when I became pregnant 16 years ago.

It was in many ways touching to have this new Mamma in our home. We agonized over how best to help her through and during this stage of what she is dealing with. 

We have been in her situation, homeless with little or no funding to help secure lodging for ourselves.

It can be harrowing. Staying with friends and family can be both a blessing and a curse amidst it all.

I asked my daughter to remember more fondly now everyone who ever took us in.  It is not just anyone who has the temperament, paid tenancy or not, to live with a single mother and her child(ren).

She looked at me with a bit of a new look letting that sink in.

From Budgeting to Banking

I got a cute, little, interesting, note recently from the daughter. 

"Mom I was bored so I wrote you" she said.

I had no idea what to expect but I was delighted.

The note contained very interesting information and insight.

She said she missed what we had been trying to do with the money for toiletries and other things she needed each month.

She realized she had blown it and she wants a chance to try again.

"I am even willing to do the running total and receipt thing" she included.

The note just had that tinge of sincerity and realization. It was like after you lose a first job or apartment. 

Especially when you lose them because of your own senseless immature actions. It slowly sinks in where you went wrong and the changes that need to be made in the future.

At least that happens for some people. I know others sort of meander through jobs and living spaces a little more clueless.

This daughter of mine however is a smart cookie. I am proud of her. I have high hopes for her.

It is in this environment that she started talking about getting her first bank account. It easier and a little more complicated than she had imagined.

She started looking at the big well known institutions but I steered her away from them.

"You do not want to pay a monthly fee" I told her.

"Go small, go local, maybe look at credit unions."

She found one she likes and we made a visit to sit with a guy there and get the intricate details she needed.

Now we are just waiting for my summer disbursement. We are in a lean moment. 

Still reeling from the car bought in January. It wiped out my winter budget which messed with spring finances.

She knows all of this. As the child of a single parent she is privy to a lot of information. 

As I mentioned in yesterday's post sometimes I think that this in and of itself teaches lessons. I know it does but still there are things she simply has to experience to fully grasp.

So I am excited for her. I think she has learned her lessons and she is ready to move forward financially. Earlier this year she started seriously pushing me to let her get a job.

I do not know where the intensity came from. Part of it she said was to try and help me. So touching.

Never the less I told her it was a bit early. Indeed she began looking and what she is finding is that she needs to be at least 16.

Fall here we come and look out!

Teen Money Matters

A few months ago the daughter was complaining about needing a new belt. At the same time for the last few years or so she has avoided as best she can running errands with me. 

We have done everything together for years. This was a blow. 

It meant I was at the store alone but I saw some belts on sale. I texted her and sent her photos. I bought one. Got it home and she did not like it.

She did not in a mature way leave it with me and ask for a new one. We could have exchanged it. Instead she left it laying around. This does not always mean disinterest so it took me a while to get to the bottom of her issue.

A few dollars and time wasted. I got a new idea. She is too old for me to buy everything for her. I still have to pay for it but she needs to take some control and ownership. 

She had also started ribbing me for loving to pick up toiletries and other items from the $1 store. She wanted expensive razors and so many other things.

I did not grow up with an allowance and I could not afford to give her one. Instead I told her I would give her the cash out of the budget that I would normally spend on her. She would be responsible to shop for these things she wanted so I did not keep getting it wrong.

This was exciting to us both and we tried it. 

I told her I wanted her to keep a running budget on paper. Either start with the beginning amount I gave her or at least keep track of what she was spending where and when so we could go over it and keep tabs on it.

I asked her to gather her receipts and be able to present them to me. None of these things happened.

Fast forward six months or so and well we kind of hit a snag. The good thing was she learned that life is expensive. I thought she knew that. Buying all the items she wanted without price checking really cut into her funds.

Oh so that is why mom loves the dollar store…

The bad thing was she was kind of treating the money like an allowance. Once she had bought the items she needed on her list if there was anything left she would spend it on candy or gifts for friends and family. Not birthday gifts for special occasions. Just random gifts for her baby step nieces etc.

The girl has a good heart but this was not the purpose of the money I was giving her. It would lead to her being out of funds when a need arose. Finally I had to stop the experiment. We were both disappointed. 

All is not lost. Stay tuned…

Her Kitchen Fire Incident

It was a busy Sunday morning. I was headed to a class I had been taking running a tad behind as is my ongoing issue. My daughter was up and preparing to cook those refrigerator cinnamon rolls from a can.

She had the oven turned on and was preparing them on a tray.

She opened the oven to check on it’s heating up process and said 

"Ah mom something is on fire."

I peaked in and sure enough there was an orange flame. Eke!

What in the heck was my thought??? Upon more inspection I saw what looked like an oil spill on the floor of the oven in the back. We have not been using the oven very much at all. I would have remembered if there had been an oil spill. That could not be the substance.

Instead I looked again and realized it was a melted portable plastic cutting surface. This is where the drama began. I said we had not been using the oven. I mean not to cook. Instead it is very often used as over flow storage for clean dishes that need to be put away. 

One of my daughters few chores is just that. I wash and rinse. They drip dry and she is to finish the job. There can be a lag with this…and worse since the oven gets closed well of course it does not always get checked and attended to. This causes a pile up.

That is what caused the almost clear plastic cutting surface to fall behind the racks in the oven. It was probably all but invisible when my daughter cleared out the oven to use it for baking.

Now here we were with it on fire and I was duly upset about it. We have no other cutting surface and again this is due to her neglecting her duties. 

We, well I put out the fire. I turned off the oven and told her it needed to stay that way until I could come home and hopefully scrape the cooked plastic out. So much for her warm baked breakfast treats.

I did not want to miss my class so there was not much time for a full lecture. This was our first official kitchen fire since she started cooking. I was turned to head out the door and then she spoke. 

It was the:

 Mom I know I frustrate you

 I act like I do not need you 

but mommy I am scared voice.

"What will I do if the fire restarts?" 

It touched my heart and made me want to wring her neck even more. I would not have been leaving the house if I did not think with the heat turned off there was only about a 1-5% chance of this. 

"Flour" I told her quickly grabbing it from under the counter to sit right by the stove and be handy.

"You cannot throw water on an electrical or grease fire" I warned.

"Instead you must smother it. Keep the heat off and you should be fine. We will talk later."

I am sure I brought this issue up at least three times after that when her attitude was offensive due to her naïve pride about how the world should run. Over time now we have both let it fade. 

Small moments in the parental vindication zone.

Post Birth Wrap Up

Yes ladies and gentlemen, my daughter was born with her right hand up around her ear. She would hold that pose with both hands balled up but arms raised about her head for weeks. I would laugh and ask her if she thought she might be under arrest for something.

If I put her arms down she would fuss so up they stayed.

They put her right on me when she was clear. I think Gramma cut the umbilical cord if she wanted to. I was not really looking around. I was checking out the new little messy bundle.

She was perfect with 20 digits and a button nose. She had a full shellacking of some what thick black hair that appeared completely straight.

With the almond slant to our eyes and just a hint of my color she looked almost Chinese. She had perfect little dark pink lips and a nice round head.

It was long over due love at first sighting. She nursed right away and I cannot remember when she first cried for me. I am sure she made the necessary noises for the delivery staff.

Gramma snapped pictures of her raising holy hell while being bathed, cleaned and fussed with. She was completely pale in one of them and totally beet red in another. LOL

That should have been a warning to me ~wink~

She was born around 7pm. I do not completely understand what took three hours but it was 10pm before we were nestled in our bed back in the rooming areas.

I remember because mom had gone home. Baby was asleep. Things were quiet and I was awake. I tuned my radio to listen to the two hour airing of the Dr. Demento show but only got through half.

I spent the next day in a blur although I was passing my nurses inspections if you are familiar with what they come to check on. I must have made phone calls because friends showed up that my mother would not have had numbers to call.

I called home and the roommate spread the word to our friends on the BBS. They reported "You would have thought he had something to do with it all they way he carried on".

Men can be so cute at times.

Two of my friends showed up at once. I spent most of the day sleeping but I would awaken to see them play fighting over the baby and taking turns holding her.

I only held her to nurse. I did change a diaper or two. I put her in an out fit we had brought for the photo opt that was scheduled.

I remember she was throwing a fit having been handled for all of that.

I was worried it would be a picture of her wrinkled face with a shot of her tonsils at the rate she had worked herself into. Instead the photographer got her with her eyes closed looking so peaceful you would think she was smiling in her sleep.

We were on our way home right away with no complications. 

Drink some water and eat some roughage ladies. That is my final warning. The only thing worse than giving birth is...getting your exit systems all back to normal afterwards if you do not.

I was anti drinking water until dehydration headaches kicked in due to on demand constant nursing. She was a healthy size and on her way to being pleasantly plump with no bottles or filler substances at all. 

Things went steady onward from her birth weight of about 7 pounds and around 22 inches.

Our Birth Story

My best friend had been pregnant all year with me. Her due date had come two weeks prior. All year she had made fun of my desire to just be as fully medicated as possible as quickly as possible when labor pains hit.

"Women have been giving birth since the dawning of time." She would sneer at me.

I would snap back "Millions of them cannot be all wrong. They say it HURTS."

I called her when she was in labor but she was never able to talk...

I think I knew all about what had happened with her by the time it was my term not so long after.

When I arrived at the hospital with serious contractions going on they determined that my cervix was still not really opening. They did not want me to lay in bed (yet) they wanted me to walk around. They sent me into the hall ways were I just slid along the walls.

I think misery can completely describe the next 7 hours it took to get to 4 centimeters dilated. At or around this time my attending Dr. came in and popped the sack to release my water.

A young trainy of some sort came in and introduced himself. His job was to...prevent excess tearing for the future baby exit. He sat for what seemed like a long time massaging and ringing the area gently stretching and rubbing.

I was almost too miserable to catch the hilarity of the whole situation.

With my body progressing they were finally willing to medicate me.

My new problem was my anesthesiologist had an attitude. I could have too when they told me I needed to sit up, bend to expose my spine and keep absolutely still. Did they realize I was in labor which meant I was not in control?

I tried to comply but right as he walked in a contraction hit and I fell over to one side. He started to curse at the nurse who had been holding me. The contraction passed and we resumed our position. He did what he needed to do and was putting his tools together to leave the room.

Suddenly his mood was better and I was the best patient ever. Dr Jeckle Mr Hyde much???

On we went to pushing. This is probably where things went most wrong. Maybe they should have had me walking then or just down on all fours to try and help gravity.

Back prone is just such non sense. What did I know I was 20. I had to trust those who had come and gone before me. I still have a little...damage from all that excess stress on my sensitive tissues.

Never the less as she began to crown I asked to have a mirror in place. I would not have wanted anyone video taping it but I wanted to watch if possible. With my epidural working I could feel pressure and various things but it was 2-4 on the pain scale not 8-12 anymore.

Sadly the mirror got moved as her head emerged and people got in their places to finish the job we had been working at all day. It was after dinner and staff had changed hands actually.

Out came her head and that was announced. I pushed again and I heard "Hand". 

I knew a lot was going on that maybe I was not totally aware of but "head and shoulders knees and toes" don't shoulders and elbows come before hands??? 

What the heck???

As I mentioned the mirror was just out of sight so I had no idea what was going on.

Another push and her shoulders cleared. Another push or few and we had baby never mind my questions.

Tune in tomorrow for the clean up and 1st days...