Outsource This

First let me just say this before anyone gets any misconceptions.  I love my children….a lot.  I love them more than just about anything or anyone else in this world.  Well, except for my husband.  That is the right thing to say, right?  But seriously, I love them equally (infinity & beyond), but of course differently.

And I would do just about anything for my children.  I would give them just about anything.  Except for my retirement fund!  As annoying as Suze Orman is, and she can be a tad bit annoying…..just a tad, she is definitely right about not investing in your children’s education before your own retirement.

I see people in their 60’s working their fingers to the bones because they deferred their retirement for their children’s education.  Look, if I’m doing that, they better be able to retire me in a year or two after they have completed their studies.  Just saying.

But back to my children!

I enjoy hanging with them.  I enjoy playing sports with them, sans the fighting, of course.  I enjoy singing, dancing and exercising with them even though I am constantly laughed at due to my lyrical skills, graceful moves and precise coordination.   

I enjoy travelling and experiencing new things with them.  I enjoy our conversations because it’s amazing how much I learn from them.  It’s amazing how much my perspectives have changed because of them.

I enjoy reading their books so we can discuss them; and I enjoy when they are reading and pause to share a joke or factoid with me.  

I enjoy watching TV with them, especially politics because so far, they are on their way to becoming lovely little liberals.

I enjoy teaching them.  I enjoy explaining life to them, although the last time I was ready for a major lecture, my eldest coined the moniker Martin Luther Queen.

I enjoy helping them with their homework.  Well if it’s Math or Grammar.  Please do not come to me with Phonics.  I don’t know if it’s a long a or a short a.  Again, I’m Antiguan.  All of our a’s are long and hard.  Heck even our o’s sound like long and hard a’s.

I even enjoy cleaning with them because not only does it make things lighter for me, but we make it fun.  And I’m hoping that they will never see cleaning as a burden.  I enjoy cooking with them (well, when they are not trying to burn the house down). 

I enjoy doing so many things with them.  I think they are funniest kids in the world; and they are the coolest and wittiest I ever met.  The only other child funnier is my Mini Me Niece.

However, as much as I love and cherish these kids, I’m ready to call it quits.  Not ready to stop being their parent.  Ready to stop parenting them.

Listen clearly, well read carefully.

I’m tired of parenting them.  I’m tired of being a referee for their fights.  I’m tired of trying to please all three of them at the same time.  I'm tired of cooking or making sure that they eat every day. I’m tired of constantly cleaning up after them.

I’m tired of being Captain Obvious.  Seriously, do I have to remind anyone to hang up a damp towel, wring out a wet washcloth, lotion ashy bodies, brush teeth, pack schoolbags, clean toothpaste from the sink, tidy rooms, put dirty clothes in the hamper and not on the floor next to the hamper, throw away empty containers,  put items away or handle DAILY chores?

I’m just tired of saying the same thing every single time.

When they were babies, it was all new, fresh and exciting.  Now, sometimes it can be the most stressful part of my life.  I used to look at grown people who still live with their parents and think, “Wow, they are really strong to be living at home still.”  Now I say, “Damn, those are some strong parents to have those annoying kids still living with them.”

As annoying as it is telling an 11 year old what to do, can you imagine what a nuisance it has to be parenting a 24 year old or God forbid a 35 year old?  Just shoot me now.  I would not be able to do it.

So I say, since we are outsourcing everything, why not outsource parenting.  And no, I don’t mean hiring an illegal immigrant, sorry, undocumented immigrant, to babysit when you work.  I don’t mean sending the child overseas to the grandmother because of bad behavior or scheduling issues. 

I don’t know how as yet.  I just know that we are a country that exports the tedious jobs, the monotonous jobs, the mechanical jobs, the rudimentary jobs.

So perspectively speaking, there has to be a way to outsource this.