The trouble with trying to raise conscientious kids is that I am absolutely not perfect. As a matter of fact, on some days, in some moments, I am absolutely the worst. And my kids would not hesitate to call me out on it. In fact, I believe they cannot wait to catch me with my foot in my mouth. When that happens, I feel guilty and feel like a fraud. Being exposed as a fraud and a hypocrite, to me, is a worse feeling than being caught doing something bad.
And yet I cannot seem to change. Yes, they do keep me on my toes, but I slip up, probably more often than I care to admit to myself.
Number One Son (NOS) told me about his friend’s birthday party, “Oh, and he said that in addition to bringing a gift, we should also bring something for the food pantry.”
“Wow. That is very nice.”
But of course the Miss Manners inside me could not keep her mouth shut.
“But it would’ve been even better if he had said instead of a gift, we should just bring a donation for the food pantry.”
“And what? You know everybody is going to bring a donation AND a gift anyway… You have all these weird subtle rules that you don’t want to tell people but you expect them to just know. Like your passive aggressiveness, silent treatment, death stare, your ways of being polite without bringing attention to it. But if people don’t follow these rules, you judge them on it. You are so judgmental mom!”
I admit: I am the Queen of Passive Aggressiveness. Oftentimes it comes out because I have been taught to never ask for things or for help. Someone else has to offer it to you on their own. But when someone really does offer you something, you have to refuse it at first. It looks bad if you accept the offer right away.
I pointed out to my kids how their cousins in Taiwan always respond with “No, thank you” when they are in someone else’s house and the hostess asks whether they’d like drink or food.
“They are being polite by saying no at first in case the person that did the asking had only done it out of politeness in the first place.”
“WHAT?!” The boys looked at me like I was insane.
I know. After putting these unwritten rules into actual words, it sounded insane to me too. And stupid. But somehow we grew up and we learned without ever having the rules spelled out, and after so many years, it’s still like a pre-programmed automatic switch inside me.
Anyway, after NOS so succinctly summed up the essences of me, there was nothing else for me to do but to mull over this. “Hey, can you tell me the things you said about me just now? I need to go blog about it.” “Ha ha ha. Good one, mom.” But he gave me the laundry list again anyway, not without the nervous side glances to make sure I was not secretly boiling inside. I vowed to watch out for my passive aggressive behavior. I want to be a better parent. At least a parent that does not drive my children to years worth of therapies.
Five minutes later, NOS asked me to do something for him (one of those 100+ random things that your kids ask you to do by yelling, “MOM—–“)
I yelled back upstairs, “I AM NOT TALKING TO YOU. I AM PASSIVE AGGRESSIVE REMEMBER?!”
DOH!
From one of my favorite sites, PassiveAggressiveNotes.com
Totally internalized the same rules. Remember as though it were yesterday declining birthday cake at a friend’s house (wasn’t a party and we weren’t close; it was maybe cake from a party the day before or something) because 1)it’s rude to say yes on the first, polite offer and 2)it’s rude not to insist after the “no” because 3)everyone says yes the second time so make sure there is one and make sure you say yes.
They shrugged and said, “fine” and I didn’t get any cake. I love cake. I still want that cake. But the horrible part is, I don’t regret the “no.” I’m mad they didn’t say “are you sure” or “oh please” or something to reject my no. I meant yes, but there are rules, dadgumit!
I like how the Jews and Catholics and Chinese tend to raise passive aggressive, martyr kids who become passive aggressive martyr parents. (How’s that for offensive racial identity politics?) Let’s hope we don’t raise passive aggressive martyr kids, eh? 😉
Naptimewriting recently posted…Good point, sir.
OMG!!! There have been many childhood moments stirred up by your story! But because it happened where everybody shared the same rules (unlike the multicultural US) I was sure the moms did not mean it the first time so I knew they were fakers. That kind of destroyed one’s innocence pretty quickly: soon you learn grownups don’t always say what they mean. On the other hand, people are genuinely nice and hospitable to strangers. How’s that for a paradox? LOL @ the gross UN-PC thing you said. 😉 Can’t agree more tho. 🙂
This has got to be one of the hardest parts of parenting–I can’t even imagine. This is one situation where I’m relieved to not have kids.
By the way, that website sounds great!
Kathy
Children survive right?
Get out of here. A food donation IN ADDITION to the gift.
I think the kid is a jerk : )
I always want Kaishon to do something nice for others instead of getting gifts at his birthday and he thinks that is pure craziness!
LOL. Point taken m’lady 😉
I was taught you had to refuse the first two times someone offered you something. If they offered it a third time then it was ok for me to accept.
Who asks three times anymore? I’d NEVER get even the occasional lousy date that I do if I went around refusing right away. I don’t know what my mom was thinking.
I love the signs! HAHAA Brought back memories of working for the state… a coworker with control issues loved putting them up. I got sick of it once and posted one next to it stating the style of bagel cutting should be the choice of the bagel eater. (Seriously, this was his point of contention.)
In our office we have ppl complaining about tea varieties…
But you know – you’re actually right about the party. They really should have said “intead of a gift…”
Still, there are unwritten rules that make no sense at all. Saying no thank you to an offer seems silly to me. I guess it depends on whether the rules are ones everyone knows.
at least that’s what miss manners said every time ppl ask her about wedding etiquette right?
This post hits a little too close to home for my comfort! And now I must go visit that website.
Sorry baby!