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Nov 30, 2021Liked by Cindy DiTiberio

I am just starting my school adventure with children and am so grateful to have these voices in my head urging me to ask these questions before I sign up or sign on. Thanks for asking and for these reflections you are sharing!

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It’s so true. I am working on finding the balance between what my kids want/need and what I want/need- something I have ignored for a long time in favour of my children/family.

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This is a really interesting discussion. The past three years I have been extremely involved in the pta. Involved to the point I wasn’t able to do many other things besides taking care of my family and household. There just wasn’t enough time. At the time, I did find it frustrating sometimes that it was frequently the same small group of parents helping over and over again. I did wish for some more bodies to step in and take some small jobs to alleviate some of the work. Share the load.

This year, I have said “no” a lot. I’ve started my own business and simply don’t have time to do both. I struggle with that sometimes too because I don’t want my kids to miss out, especially after the last year. Even while in my period of saying “no” this year, I ended up coaching my middle school son’s cross country team 3x per week because they were going to cancel the season. It was step

Up or my kid didn’t get to run. (A whole other issue I could go on for hours about- why in the world was each child charged charged $350 to run XC with volunteer coaches that I organized?! I don’t need to be paid but where is that money?!)

I’m blathering on, basically to say that I see two sides to this issue. Stay at home/flexible scheduled parents are definitely exploited, doing free labour. On the flip side, straight up refusing to do any of it means my kids miss out.

This year I am trying to help

Out with things that are important to me- cross country, both of my son’s promotions. Things that aren’t on the top of my list get a “no” this year, which may mean those things don’t happen. Oh well. 🤷‍♀️

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