Welcome to speed Round Sunday on the Parenting Roundabout podcast, where we share a
mini episode from our past for your weekend listening pleasure. We'll be back tomorrow
with a brand new episode. How much of a martyr are we or are
you as a parent of? For example, like last week, Catherine,
didn't you have to go see the Emoji movie? I did? You can
and beyond baby, you can hear all about it on our round here from
this week, I went and saw the Emoji movie. I mean, like,
I feel like the martyrdom happens all the time, though, and it's
usually small. I mean it's things like, well, I was going to
go take a walk right now, but you need me to drive you to
your friend's house right this second. Or you know, I was about to
take a shower, but somebody needs me to take them here or there or
whatever. Or when you're you know, there's one more piece of pizza left,
and you would really like that piece of pizza. But do you either
so all right? Or maybe maybe you guys are stronger and tougher than I
am. My mom used to call it broken cookie syndrome, that mom always
got the broken cookies and clean those up and so that everybody else could have
a nice, pretty cookie. And I've now come to realize that means Mom
gets more cookies. Yeah, they taste sounds like and you can, you
know, sort of accidentally drop the box before you open. Oh no,
broke. So there's two sides. So what you're saying is we need to
we can also take advantage of this Marken syndrome that we have. So okay,
well, I'll drive you to your friends right now, but you need
to do the dishes for me when you get home. Well that's okay.
You guys go out and have fun. All just stay home and read and
watch TV and do all sorts of things. I don't want you to know
I do. God's okay, that's sort of my martyrdom. Mom's always homeworking
you guys. Just go and then you know, I watch I play games.
Nobody will catch me. Would I do that? No, certainly I
would not. No. I think there's a high level of martyrdom. My
husband's martyring himself right now by driving the kid in the right so he's got
his martyrdom points for today. I was thinking of tying into our opening discussion
being the one who takes the dog to the vet for the last visit.
I did that. That was my martyrdom with one dog. But then my
husband went and did it with the second dog, so we're even. We
did it together. Yeah did you No, first first dog. Nobody would
go with me. Everybody was too everybody was too sad. The kids didn't
go, but we Well I made my daughter go with the second one,
and that was probably a mistake. Well, but I don't know. I
mean maybe sometimes they need to see that, right or I guess yeah,
it's like a closure thing. Yeah that was my thought, but it's like,
I'm not going to do it again? Are you going to do it?
But yeah, I mean certainly going to see the movie you don't want
to see is a big martyrdom thing, or watching the TV show you don't
want to watch, or in my case, quite often, reading the book
that the child has to read that you really don't want to read. Oh
you like the Oh I got an emergency alert coming on my phone. Now
that's what that buzzing is a flash funding Anyway, the entire middle school agony
cannon of you know, books that are supposed to be speaking, no,
like, what's the speak I think is that one the girl she can't talk,
oh like speaking meaningfully to the early adolescent experience and the hell whole of
school bullying and misunderstanding parents. And Okay, that may be meaningful to those
kids, but it is agony for parents to read this because we understand what's
going on before the kids understand it, and the parents are always completely clueless
and part of the problem. I never want to read any of those books
at all, much less slowly so that understand them and then explain to them.
Do you understand what happened to her? Honey? Let me explain to
you that was right. That was a major yeah, because I mean there's
no way she could have read through it herself or understood it. I will
say, there's one martyr thing that I will not do is play a board
game that I can't stand, like the Game of Land in your house no
ca, I mean they're too old for Candyland, but like sometimes the other
day my son was like, I said, let's play a game. Okay,
he said, how about Game of Life. No, Nope, that's
not a list. I hate that game. Yeah, And it took us
a while. We finally landed on battleship, and I was willing to play
battleship. Yeah, but then my husband told him how he used to cheat
by stacking up all of his ships into one pile, so you never get
a hit because there's only like four spots on the board. Ye, so
now you make your husband play. Yeah. My son likes playing Runo and
he has his own rules that are expansive and ever changing. So I would
always play with him his way because nobody else wanted to play with him his
way. And finally I started making up excuses not to play. So now
he stopped asking me, and I feel really bad and I'll say, come
on, can I play on with you? No? No, it's okay.
He plays with himself, so just endless games play. So he's the
martyr. Yes, he's served my my my martyr role, and I'm actually
kind of grateful, but still, right, do you feel you're a mother?
Definitely? I dinged myself some mom points with that. I should have
just kept playing with him endless endless games. But it's hard to play came
in right, It's it's a completely different game when you play one on one
with him. He has many, many interesting rules, but and it requires
like having two or three decks to play with it at a time. Oh
mile, yes, wow, Yes, sounds gets fun, impossible to hold
well, yes it does, doesn't it. That is not a wrong,
just part of the reason why I suddenly came too busy, but now feel
bad. But that is a good one. Yes, definitely playing board games
with a child endless, endless, awful, mentally unstimulating board games. Um,
what are some martyrdoms that you've done, Nicole, I bet you've got
some good ones. Well, I don't know if this comes from being a
teacher, but and it sounds so terrible because I know that most parents would
jump at the chance to do this, but I refuse to go on field
trips. Oh far too many bad field trips with my classes. And I
feel so bad because I just couldn't do the ones with my kids. And
I don't know what it was, but you know, the day long trip
to the aquarium and just the thought of supervising a group of kids that were
in mine, and the agony of sitting on the bus, and I mean,
it pales in comparison to what you do, Catherine with your daughter.
But it's just those are when I go on those like eight nine hour bus
rides. There at least a coach bus. They're not a school. Yes,
okay, that's true. That makes a difference. So there were a
lot of field trips I dipped out of. But mind you know, I
volunteered in the classroom and I you know, I was around. I just
I could not bring myself. I was a level of martyrdom you could not
attain. I could not. I just lose my friends. My friends just
thought I was like the worst person in the world. But I was like,
I'm sorry, I can't. I've just had two many bad field trip
experiences. Yeah, field trip PTSD. That's right exactly. So that was
I can see how field trips could be murdered room opportunities, but for me,
they were always part of the control and independence equation. To get back
to our first topic is that I like to have my eye on everything.
So if they will let me go on the bus and be with the school
class for a whole day and I can watch everybody, and I can size
all the kids up, and I can see which teacher loses her patients earlier,
that is gold for me. I will be very happy that you don't
want to go, Nicole, because it can be a spot. This is
more wants to go every time. So at Actually I did other parents a
favor, so absolutely they are all those control freak moms were very very happy
to step into your shoes. Well okay, so no, not feeling so
bad about it. Yes, just you know when you were a teacher,
the moms you didn't want to come along. You have empowered those moms,
so you can feel bad for the teacher. She's coming again. No,
I just yeah, just a just thinking about it. I must have PTSD
from it. Seriously, So do we count as martyrdom having to share a
food stuff that we are fond of? Do we, ever, Oh,
I don't know, hide certain things where we think the children will not find
them, guess, even though they're typically happening on the property. I'm wondering
about those ketchup chips. Do you share the shipments of ketchup chips with the
kids, Nicole, or do they go into a closet? I flat out
don't I hide. Getting here, Nicole is not a lot of martyroom.
I think you are emotionally healthy and refusing. No, no, no,
I martyr in many other areas, Um, I do not give up my
Canadian food though, so that goes into hiding. They may they may get
a little snippet of it, they may get a little you know, feeling
extra generous. They might get a little taste, but no, for the
most part, those catch up chips are mine. No one's going near though,
So yeah, I feel very bad not sharing things. But sometimes it's
like mine, right, I think I think that's legit. Gotta say yeah,
if you like, like, you know, take a bite of something
and then it will be contaminated with your cooties and then nobody else wants it.
That's that works in my house. Would not care, that's true.
Would my daughter would be horrified, but my son would be. It's pre
pre loved. But it's a really martyredn though, when you know you spend
the jillions of hours to all the other things for your kids and you just
take this little piece for yourself. Is that really that leg It depends on
who you ask. I guess. I mean all the hours of sitting in
the vehicle driving back and forth, waiting for them to finish their lessons,
waiting for that, waiting for this. You know, that's true. I'm
gonna take my little bag of ketchup chips and hide them. They're just for
me. This is my reward. It seems only fair. Yeah. I
did a lot of sitting around places waiting for kids, but oftentimes I felt
like that was the only me time I got all day. You know,
my kid is with somebody else and I can read a book or listen to
a podcast, or work or just you know, not beyond for a little
while. So I have trouble thinking of that as margyrdroom, though you could
certainly spin them that way. Right. A lot of time, and like
you, Catherine, I will just go sit at the place for the two
hours. I will sit in my car with my laptop for the two hours
and wait it out rather than drive back and forth. Yeah. Well,
I guess we all have our own various criteria for what martyrdom fails. But
when we want to make our kids feel guilty now or in the future,
we will see we have some examples in the right direction. Yes, we
can go for it.