I am wiped out.
See my face?
I am going to hell.
It has been very very very hard having my dad here.
I dont want to sound like an ungrateful bitch about the man who was half of the effort in bringing me into this world, but it has been brutal.
24 hours a day for a week is brutal. (okay, minus the four hours of sleep I have been getting on the couch)
There is NO privacy.
He’s high maintenance. He is ancy and impatient.
I can’t hear him when he speaks. He mumbles.
He tries to discipline my kids.
He tries to discipline me.
And he gets annoyed with the girls when they do a typical “Do I have to eat ALL my eggs before I have chocolate cake?” whine. (yes, we had eggs for dinner and chocolate cake for dessert).
He looks at me and flickers his eyes as if he can’t believe I would let them whine about their food.
What kid doesn’t?
And then he starts, “You know, if I WERE YOU….”
OH MY GOD. Is he serious?
Yesterday was Easter.
My kids got up on the very very bad side of early (um, 4:30) looking for the damn Easter Bunny. I sent them back to bed and they were back by 6am, opening their baskets on the living room floor, just a few steps away from my temporary bed on the couch this week. (yes, I give my dad my bedroom).
First, the previous 60 degree day did not last. It was about 35 and high winds. The Easter Egg hunt was very quick and very cold.
Look at how cold the girls were.
My mother cooked, I made a chocolate dessert and since she is on a diet and my dad won’t eat wheat, the kids and I ate them.
And since my mother is a vegetarian and dad doesn’t eat wheat, well, that was cause for an interesting meal. A very interesting meal. I won’t ruin your appetite by mentioning what my mother came up with.
Oh yes, my parents have been divorced since 1991 and fortunately it was amicable and they get along and hang out and stuff. It gets kind of annoying too, because they gang up on me. Double bad.
Yet, when I told my mom today that next time Dad comes to visit, I will be putting him up in the inn down the street because I can’t handle a week of him in my little house, she agreed with me that was the right thing to do. But of course, if I happen to be in a house the next time he comes, maybe there would be more room for him to stay with us.
My reply was, “yeah, if I win the lottery, buy a mansion and can give him an entire WING.”
I have this overwhelming feeling of needing to clean the house and put on J’s boxers and socks and sweatshirt and even his work boots, for some comfort.
Hang in there, having parents underfoot is very tough!
Oh to the vey. I’m just happy I get along with my parents so well, and this makes me extra glad!
Wow girl.
Hey, the good news is that you can come here and vent. We’re here for ya!
Hugs and hope J’s clothing warms things up a bit.
I would have let them eat the cake before the eggs. As long as they eat it, I don’t care which comes first.
Next time get a blow up air bed, those are comfy.
Ouch! Sounds excruciating! And you know you’ve just got to share the Easter menu now that you brought it up.
And damn the old man for mumbling – he should know better. But he may have his own hearing issues that he’s not willing to deal with yet which is why he mumbles.
Glad you made it through to the other side.
The Easter menu is scaring me and I can’t even begin to imagine it.
I hope the rest of the week goes very fast for you.
Having just spent the weekend with my parents I feel your pain. I LOVE when they tell me what to do when it comes to my kids.
I seriously would have cracked by now. Bear has broken his parents of the whole “you need to do x when it comes to the kids.” I am eternally grateful for this.
Kudos for surviving what you put up with this weekend.
The Easter Bunny hid the eggs inside our house this year. I asked him to knowing how cold & windy it was going to be.
Parents will always be parents, no matter how old you get. I get the guilt trip from mine and she’s not even Jewish…
I have been in your shoes. My in-laws used to drive me absolutely bonkers when they came to visit. Mostly because they’d drink, then the FIL would start calling my MIL names and accuse her of all kinds of things (as it turns out, HE was the transgressor there…).
Now that they live in our town, we can send them home when we are tired of them. It doesn’t sound like it would work, but it does.
Ugh. I’m sorry. I always think a weekend is just perfect for family visits. They’re long enough to connect, but not so long that you don’t need a months’ worth of therapy afterward.
Up the street is always better – no matter how big your house is. It isn’t the size of the house that exhausted you.
my mother stays with me for a week at christmas, it’s a tough go but my kids are older now and things have changed, she’s more active with them, it’s actually become a week we’re grown to really like.
parents aren’t easy, especially the man kind. 😉
Oh, I am SO with you on this! After the disaster that was my parents’ most recent visit in February, I’ve decided that they just HAVE to stay in a hotel the next time they visit. Having them with me 24-7 for a full week is just WAY too much. I love them, but I don’t love fighting with them, which is what happened in February. I felt like I’d regressed 10 years to what our relationship was like when I was in college.