Monday, July 7, 2008

The Nanny Diaries...

Well the vacation is over and I'm back home. It was an interesting weekend. My friend brought her 8 year-old daughter along because the child's father, my friend's ex, lives in Florida. My friend spent half the day in my hotel room working on the book and the other half in the room she was sharing with daddy and daughter.

Don't get me wrong, I think it's great for a divorced couple to be friends. I am friends with my ex. It works for Demi Moore and Bruce Willis. But my ex didn't steal my credit card on my last visit to see him. I don't pay the mortgage on a house for my ex to live in, a house we nearly lost in foreclosure because he was gambling our income away. The problem with being friends with an ex like that is there is always an elephant in the room that everyone is trying to ignore. And no one sees elephants better than kids.

At one point the child threw a HUGE temper tantrum because she wanted to go shopping with mommy and me. Eventually this tantrum landed in my room..... with me....alone. This seemed an odd time to leave her with me, I thought. I wondered if mommy and daddy were spending quality time together.

I hugged her and comforted her and told her that mommy loved her and we wouldn't be gone long. I remembered my training from sales school....get them to say three yes's and you've got them sold. Maybe it would work on kids too.
"Who bought you a sewing machine today?" I asked.
"Mommy did" she said.
"And who got to pick Mongo's for us to go eat the best lunch ever?" I asked.
"I did" she said.
"And who played with you in the ocean today?" I asked.
She had caught on....."Not Mommy!!!!" she wailed.
"Yes, Mommy did" I said. And I could see her resolve to stay mad melting away.

Eventually she calmed down and I went to take a shower and change. She sat in the room watching tv and when I came out she was entertaining herself by pouring the $4 bottles of hotel room water out the balcony window. Probably on somebody's head.

Moments later mommy showed up at my door, furious! What was taking me so long?? I was scathingly criticized for comforting her daughter during her tantrum. I was accused of letting an 8-year-old take advantage of me. Didn't I know when I was being played by a child?

Um....she's a child. She's 8. She has by default permission to "play me". It's my responsibility to figure out what it is she really needs and then meet that need so that she will no longer find it necessary to "play me" and she can learn to ask for what she needs in an honest, respectful and healthy way instead of manipulating. Call me old-fashioned.

"What did you say to her?" my friend asked.
How was I supposed to answer that? I tried to make you look good you b-word?
"I appealed to her sense of logic" I answered.
Impossible for my friend to understand because her sense of logic only appears for short bursts of time, 2 to 3 minutes max.

"Do you ever doubt yourself?" my friend had asked earlier in a totally unrelated conversation.
At this point I am seriously doubting my taste in friends.

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