Message ID: 30c0f5F2pg44jU1@uni-berlin.de
There's a married couple my husband and I have been friends with for years. They recently had twin girls after a long struggle with fertility medications. Although I am generally happy for them because they have wanted children for a while, they have turned into jerks.
And what is sadder is that after 18 months, their girls are also LITTLE jerks. It is not that I don't know about children; I have seven nieces and nephews, two I practically raised until they were school-aged. When this couple was spending the weekend at our house (they live several hours away), I was yelled at by the girls' father because I flushed the toilet while the girls were sleeping and the noise would wake them up. He also told me that I shouldn't make any noise, like walking up the stairs or snoring, because the babies would wake up and scream. And scream they do, and they chew on EVERYTHING and cry for hours if you take it away.
Does this make the girls jerks or the parents jerks? I loved my friends before the girls, but now, neither my husband nor I can stand having to deal with those kids, so we don't deal with the parents either. So who is the jerk here? Us? Them? The girls?
-- Jen
Dear Jen:
Prudie has never thought of babies as jerks before. Perhaps a more apt term for them would be spawn of permissive, if not nutty, parents. To be a guest in someone's home and instruct him or her not to flush the toilet or to snore (!) is unacceptable.
Clearly, parenthood has thrown these two for a loop, and most likely the friendship you had enjoyed will not resurface -- if ever -- until the twins are way past the crying and chewing stages. It is too bad your friends don't know that kids who are exposed to the sounds of everyday life get used to them and do really well.
-- Prudie, regretfully
Dear Prudence
by Margo Howard
November 13-14, 2004
http://www.creators.com/lifestyle_show.cfm?next=2&ColumnsName=pru
There really is not much that ChildFree Abby can add to the sage advice of Prudence, except to reaffirm that the friendship you knew with these people is now a thing of the past.
Prudence is far more optimistic than I, because I believe that once these twins get out of the crying and chewing stages things will be worse - far worse, in fact, than you can imagine. Even at this tender age they have figured out that they run the show, there is no reason to believe that this situation will not escalate as they get worse. The one word these children will likely never hear is "no". Their parents will be deaf and blind to the antics of their children, and take great umbrage if "the village" suggests that their parenting skills are, to say the least, ineffective.
Jen, distance yourself from these boors. Both they and their children will not improve with age. The friendship you knew and enjoyed is over, with no hope of resurrection.
Childfree Abby
The ChildFree Abby Archives - http://www.dismal-light.net/childfreeabby/