Holding the bag

My kids each carry a bag to church. The bags hold paper, pencils, scriptures, and occasionally the stowaway toy. These bags are very helpful in keeping the kids focused during the meetings. But after church is over, I find that 3/4 of the kids shove their bags into my hands before they dash for home. Individually the bags do not weigh all that much, but combined they are quite the load. And so I am left literally holding all the bags.

Church bags are not the only things I end up holding for my kids. I am the general repository for unwanted items such as coats, backpacks, books, blankets, even trash. When the kids are done with something, they hand it to me. I know this is the way it needs to be for young children who are not really capable of keeping track of belongings. But my children are not that young anymore. They are perfectly capable of taking a few extra steps to the trash can instead of handing the banana peel to me. And yet they hand me the peel, and I throw it away. Most of the time I throw it away without even thinking about it. I haul the bags home. I pick up the scattered shoes and socks. I clear the table. I do all these things and a hundred more without even noticing that I’ve done them, because that is the pattern we all fell into when the kids were little.

But every so often I have a day when I notice. When I resent being left holding the bag. When I wonder why everyone, including me, assumes that the unpleasant/boring jobs belong to me. When I wonder why I am always the one to share give away her last cracker or to be late to events because I’m scolding dawdlers into getting read. On these days it feels like I am the only one who cares about the state of the house, about the fact that we’re late again, about making sure that healthy food gets on the table.

The problem is that I’m so good at what I do, that no one else has to care. They can leave it to me and know that the work will get done. They trust me to do these things for them. On non-resentful days I treasure that trust and I express my love for them by doing all these little things. But the kids are growing. One day they will be adults. They will go out into the world to have roommates and spouses who will curse me unless I can teach them to clean up after themselves rather than always doing it for them. I do try, but somehow I always end up holding the bag, or the coat, or the trash, and wondering how I got there again.

I think some of the reason for the pattern pure habit. It is easier to follow the flow of a habit than to struggle to change it. Just accepting the trash feels easier than arguing with the child about proper trash receptacles. This is particularly true if you’ve already had that argument with two other children several times during the course of the day. I only have so much energy to make them do stuff. Usually I use it all up making them get up, eat breakfast, go to school, practice piano, do chores, eat dinner, and do homework. The last thing I want to do is turn into the bad guy by hauling kids away from their games to make them pick up their scattered shoes and backpacks. I know I should, but I just get too tired to fight over it. But the clutter is unpleasant, so I pick it up. I’m much better about this than I used to be. I’m making them clean up more often. I also hold out hope because I almost never have to clean up after Kiki anymore. She has grown into a responsible and willing helper.

I know I need to work on this. I need to train them to pick up after themselves so that there are fewer days where I’m left resentfully holding the bag.