Burnt out parent volunteers

[Anonymous]

After covid, I've been *much* more intentional with our time - both activities that I sign the kids up for, and activities that I volunteer for.
I'm tryinf hard to hand onto some of the silver lining from the lockdowns.
That means that I'm volunteering less, but I actually feel really good about the volunteer work I do (I lead my daughter's Girl Scout troop, and I absolutely love it. I no longer do anything with the PTA or another non-profit.)

[Anonymous]

My kids are in 8th, 5th and 2nd grade and I do feel similar to you. I’m a bit burnt out and more so than before the pandemic. That said - I do what I want to do and try to set boundaries. If IDGAF whether we have the event or whatever, I don’t volunteer for it and say no when asked. If someone else wants to have these things - they can volunteer to do it.

I also am clear that I don’t accept complaints LOL. If you don’t like what I’m doing - be my guest and take it off my plate and do it yourself.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I hear you OP. I work and do a handful of volunteer positions and try to finish out whatever I agree to. That said I reluctantly agreed to be a cookie manager for Girl Scouts this year because no one else would and I hate it so much. It is way worse than I expected. I may do one more year because there was so much effort put into figuring out the ridiculous system and my DD troop is great but if I do that I am doing NOTHING else. I would rather write a check if that were possible, the whole system makes you feel like your time is worthless. In the future I will exclusively volunteer for things at the school or that I can really get behind on a value basis because none of this has been fulfilling at all.

I signed up to be the money manager off the bat because I know I didn’t want to do cookies.

[Anonymous]

I decided to be part of the PTA board because our PTA is non existent and if I didn't volunteer we wouldn't have a PTA. I want for my child to be able to go to events at her school and I realized I can't just attend the meetings, I had to put in some work. I am glad I am doing it. I also go to my kid's class parties ( we don't have room parents). But I decided to say no to girl scouts and other volunteer opportunities within the school. I stepped it up a bit at work and run one of our committees. People have been doing it for years so I figured it was my turn.