Friday, November 9, 2012

Bye bye now

I am a terrible, terrible person. Paul and Madison can leave now. I'm done with them. I'm not alone. Alex came into the bathroom while I was showering and told me that sharing a hotel room in Vegas with Dani was cool because they had each other to talk to about all the new and scary stuff going on. Then coming home and finally having a way she wasn't too young to help was nice so she was happy to share her room again. But now she's finished.

It turns out that even though Al was devastated about Danielle moving out, she adjusted to having her own bedroom for the first time, pretty quickly. Now she is sharing with both Dani and Madison. Yesterday I woke up to find Alex sleeping next to me. For reasons I can't explain, my first instinct after finding her in bed was to peer over the edge to see if Josh was on the floor. He wasn't (duh). I found him sleeping on the couch. When I asked what happened Josh said Alex woke him up in the middle of the night to ask if she could sleep with us. Notice she asked him because she knew my answer would be no.

Madison and Paul's house is good enough to live in now. Even with the snowstorm. Since their parents are home, I kind of think they're just staying because it's more fun to live here than with parents. 

Maybe this is a little how Aunt Elaine felt.

4 comments:

Nina said...

Understandable, and if their home is now liveable, they need to be living there.

Sounds like it's time for a kind but firm talk with your house guests.

Kizz said...

Woof. That's such a sticky thing. I hope they see that it's time for them to move on and be grateful. You'd think that Josh sleeping on the couch would be a good hint!

You're a super awesome person for thinking about how Aunt Elaine might have felt. You may be right. But wanting peers to leave and treating young people who have lost their only parent is way different. You can probably tell which one I think it justifiable and which is not.

OTRgirl said...

I can so relate to this post. Even now in our big house with a dedicated guest room and not having to share a bathroom, after 10 days, I'm DONE. I don't care how great the guest is.

Oops...baby is now awake. Just want you to know that I admire you for trying to put yourself in Elaine's shoes. As someone else said, having family that needs to move in with you is different. You need to adjust your whole life, change your patterns and become a new version of family. That's what 'adoption' or 'caregiving' looks like. The fact that she treated you as interlopers for years is a shame on her.

Houseguests should be temporary and it's ok to want your old routine back. If they had to move in permanently, you'd all sit down and figure out how to make it work. With a guest, it's not worth the effort, but they also need to know to LEAVE!

Anonymous said...

I stayed at a friends house during hurricane sandy due to loss of power and heat at my home. I and my pet were invited by this friend to stay at their home. Well, lets just say it turned out that I was not truly welcomed and ended up leaving and staying at my FREEZING cold home at night.

Every situation is different but please also remember a guest is just temporary and they WILL go home. I've hosted guests in the past and have stayed at many other people's homes. There will always be a disruption in our routine (in our homes) as well as the person's home ( in their routines) you are staying in. Especially in a crises those feelings should be put aside by everyone, lol.

Now that the power and other order has been more or less restored in NYC, have a talk with your guests as to when they will be returning home. If you don't feel comfortable with asking, have Josh have the talk with them.