Chores

We all have them. Most of us grew up with them. And the majority of us give them to our own children. Chores. More often then not, we learned how to do chores from a parent, a grandparent or in some cases a family friend. I learned from all three. And again, more often then not our styles and ways we go about giving and teaching the art of doing chores to our kids, comes from how we learned and did chores as a child.


My intention when I set out on the journey of becoming a parent was to do chores with my children on weekends. To have them have a simpler, quicker chore such as setting the table or emptying the dishwasher on the busy evenings of family life. Yes, that was my intention. Now consistency, I admit, has never been my strong suite. I am an artist. I can be slightly flighty at times. When I do something I do it with great passion and commitment, but I am not consistent. Building consistent patterns of simply taking my medications three times a day, shots on the same day every week and setting up everything for my monthly infusions took great lengths for me to succeed.


I think, from my experience, I'd say that a large amount of successful parenting depends on being consistent. I arise to the occasion in the areas I need to be consistent in, but I did for years hold on tight to the areas I could be inconsistent in and have each of us still survive! I'd like to think it has taught my two beautiful children about being flexible and they do have an easy going aspect to their personalities.


Although I set out with the intention of consistently teaching my kids about successfully doing chores, I self admittedly failed at some point. Not because of my inconsistency, but because of my rheumatoid arthritis. If you have a chronic illness that gives you chronic pain and extreme exhaustion, you may understand this. If you don't, you may not quite understand. Now this isn't to say my kids aren't helpful or that they don't have chores. They do. And they do the ones they do have with consistency most of the time. They are normal kids, they do gripe once in a while. And if you spring a new chore on them because it's the weekend they don't always jump at the chance.


I recently told a new RA buddy that this disease, most definitely when it is aggressive and active, will affect your life in so many ways. And this is just one of those many ways.


If I was too tired to do chores myself, chances were good I was too tired to make sure my kids did them. And if I my hands were in too much pain to show them how to dust, vacuum, wash windows, clean bathrooms, chances were good I didn't do it. And yes, when I don't feel  well I am even more inconsistent then I was before I got sick. And my kids have learned how to work mom not feeling well to their advantage; they are kids after all!


My daughter and I bought dry erase chore charts last weekend. This is a good start, and not the first attempt! So far so good. Here we are at the weekend, when I decided to surprise them with a few extra chores. Mistake. My daughter, who likes to help, didn't even like that. My son who is hitting pre teen liked it even less. The lesson for me, consistency. The hurdle, feeling well enough to be consistent.


I like the mantra a wise woman I know says, 'when we know better, we do better.'