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Thursday, June 21, 2012

Hoarding Parents

I am not a parent, but I did grow up with two parents and I nanny for a living at the moment.  I understand there is no such thing as a perfect parent, however, sometimes the parents I work for can be self destructive.


I grew up with a physically and verbally abusive mother and an emotionally absent father.  To go even further my mother is a hoarder and the only reason why she hasn't been featured on TLC for a clean up is because my two sisters and me kept throwing things out.


Right now I'm nanny for 3 children and they live in a very messy house.  The mom came from a hoarder family and the father grew up very poor because his family immigrated from South Korea.  Now they have very well paying techie jobs and emotional trauma from each of their childhoods.


Sadly, I think the mom is just overwhelmed with 3 children, her demanding job and a constantly messy house.  However, her attitude doesn't help with solving the obvious physical problems with her house.  Honestly I think the parents need professional help to deal with their emotional issues.


One example of the hoarding tendencies is how the mom insists on keeping all the baby wipe dispensers.  I recycled two and she found them, of course, and told me to check with her before I recycle anything else.


Great idea, but we don't need 7
This one incident alone makes me feel like I'm back in my mother's house.  I felt like she didn't really want to solve her problem, but just look like she is, just enough to keep people from confronting her.  I'm going to try and talk to her about it, by asking if she wants the kids to take a more active part in cleaning and have me oversee.


Another issue I've noticed is her anger towards her children.  The second day I was there she tells her children after a stressed out rant about the state of the house and how the kids do not help,  I'm bored when I go to the park, I rather be with my friends at the mall shopping.  Do you think the mall is fun for you?  


I felt the kids being emotionally manipulated by mom over her mess; she let it go, she keeps things in the house, she is now overwhelmed and blames the kids.   It makes me a little angry and I think I need to sit down and speak to her about more structure for her and the kids sake.


I'm sorry but a freedom parenting style does not work for parents emotionally disturbed or for a house already falling apart.


What do you think?

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