Parenting is a tough gig, and from what I can tell, it doesn’t get easier as your kids get older.
You have to let them find out what consequences feel like while they still have a soft place to land.
This mom has a daughter who is forgetful.
I have a 16 year old daughter that I will call Kia. Kia is forgetful, sometimes it is on purpose, other times she actually forgets.
She doesn’t have ADHD or anything like that.
One example of her purposely being forgetful was when the school was allowing students to go out for food trucks.
I gave her enough money to get food a few times at the food trucks.
Kia ran out of money and decided to keep forgetting her lunch and texting me to Venmo her cash so she doesn’t starve.
She believes that, most of the time, it’s on purpose.
I just brought her lunch and she gave up. I wasn’t giving her money eat at the food trucks ever single day.
Another time she “forgot” to grab the gift for her nephew. I put it on her phone, luckily we noticed before we got on a the highway.
So in short she does this often and I can’t get her to stop. If she does forget something on accident I can never tell.
It’s like the boy called wolf situation.
So recently when her daughter “forgot” the shoes she needed for class, she refused to bring them.
She is in a college chemistry class, they go to the campus for labs. You have to have the proper clothes in order to do the lab.
Also if you miss it without a real reason you don’t get a make up day for the lab.
If you don’t come in with the correct clothes they will not let you in the lab.
One of the rules is closed shoes. I had her tennis shoes right next to her backpack.
I know she saw them and she knows the rules.
She didn’t wear them, instead she went to school with sandals. The teacher stopped her and she called me.
She asks me to bring her shoes, I was at work and told her no.
Her daughter thinks she’s a jerk for making her earn a zero in class.
She couldn’t do the lab and she isn’t allowed to make it up.
She came home and we got in a huge argument, my side was everything above and I am done with her forgetting things so she can do what she wants.
She admits he wanted to wear the sandals but told me her grade is going to take a big hit with a zero in lab.
She thinks I am a huge jerk
Reddit is going to have encouraging thoughts here, I bet!
The top comment reminds her it’s ok to not be her daughter’s friend.
She had to figure it out somehow.
Maybe it’s time they work on this issue together.
Sometimes that’s the. best way to learn.
These solutions aren’t tough ones.
Mom absolutely did the right thing.
It’s time to show her what it’s like to not have someone to bail you out.
If you liked that post, check out this one about an employee that got revenge on HR when they refused to reimburse his travel.