Dear Eric: My wife and I have a beautiful home on a lake. We keep our home very neat and tidy.
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Our adult son, wife and their young children live in another state, and when we visit them, their home is a complete mess, dirty and sticky with spilled food and drinks. We stay at an Airbnb when we visit.
They just stayed with us for a week, and we all had a wonderful, fun time, but they treat our house like they treat their house.
Should we set some written house rules for their next visit (and possibly alienate them) like pick up wet towels and bathing suits, only eat at the dining table, clean up the kitchen after using, etc. Or do we just bite the bullet and resign ourselves to what it is.
– Cleaning House
Dear House: You and your wife have created a home for adults – chic, clean, just to your taste. Your son and his wife have a home for a family with kids. As you no doubt remember, when there are little fingers about, little fingerprints show up all over everything. It’s not a given, but it’s likely.
You probably won’t get this family to treat your house like a pristine adult house. But you should set age-appropriate guidelines for being a good guest.
Think about making different requests of the kids and the adults. Ask your son and daughter-in-law to make sure that the kitchen is cleaned up, or no food leaves the dining room, for instance.
Don’t do this in writing, though. Feels aggressive. A phone call beforehand enlisting their help in setting their kids up to be good stewards of your house will make it a communal effort rather than something they got wrong.
Before you call, though, really ask yourself what you need to feel comfortable. The kids are young, the parents are on vacation; you’re all having fun. Sometimes a towel is going to sit on the floor for a minute.
Dear Eric: I’m a 52-year-old mother and grandmother. My daughter and granddaughter live with me due to some bad life choices my daughter has made.
It’s very clear to me that being a mother is not high on her priority list nor does she have the energy or motivation to step up.
I have basically become a mother again as I tend to my granddaughter’s needs all the time. I’m her main caregiver and I’m her “person.” She prefers me over her mother in every and any situation.
While my granddaughter is my pride and joy, I can’t help but be angry most of the time because (1) my life is no longer my own and is certainly not what I envisioned at this age; (2) I pay for everything because my daughter can’t land a meaningful job and, if she does, it’s not for long; and (3) I’d rather be doing anything else but playing with a toddler and watching toddler shows as I find it extremely boring.
I would rather do this on my own with my granddaughter and have mom just go live her life because I’m giving my daughter the best of both worlds – she’s here with her daughter, but I’m doing all the heavy lifting.
How do I overcome my resentment for my daughter? And please don’t suggest I sit her down and tell her how I feel. Been there, done that. No amount of talking or motivation gets through to my daughter. She is who she is, and she will never change.
– Grandmother Turned Mother
Dear Grandmother: I’m sorry to say that if she’s not going to change, then you have to be the one to shift.
Your resentment is rooted in an expectation that she’ll step up and take responsibility. That’s not an unrealistic expectation in the grand scheme, but with respect to your daughter, it is.
That resentment may never fully go away because this burden isn’t fair to you. But it’ll decrease if you remind yourself “this is who she is and I love all of who she is, even the parts I don’t like.”
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You’re still parenting your daughter. If she were flying solo, you could let her make her own mistakes and learn the hard way. But those mistakes would also hurt your granddaughter. So, this is the hard reality.
The choices are either (1) set a hard boundary for your daughter and refuse to budge or (2) frame everything about this situation as an active choice you’re making out of love for your granddaughter and your daughter.
Even if you opt for the latter, please find small ways to take some of your time back. Keep pushing her, even if she fails. Your granddaughter deserves a parent, and you deserve to live, too.
Send questions to R. Eric Thomas at eric@askingeric.com or P.O. Box 22474, Philadelphia, PA 19110. Follow him on Instagram @oureric and sign up for his weekly newsletter at rericthomas.com.
