Learning to say no (to fellow parents)
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Anonymous
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So I’m a people pleaser by nature, and one of my biggest challenges as a parent is learning to say no to requests for help from other parents. Don’t get me wrong, im happy to help when I can but have my hands full as a SAHM of 3 young children. How to you say no to the requests for help — without feeling guilty and without leaving the door open for the other person to push you t say yes? Requests I’m talking about are along the lines of:
Can you watch my kid for the morning? Can we carpool? Can you handle my snack duty at the preschool? And (not directly parenting related but coming from fellow moms) - can I talk to you about my MLM business? Every time I get one of these texts with these types of requests my heart sinks and I agonize over how to respond. It’s often easier to just say yes even though I don’t want to do it. And these requests come from many people - it’s not like it’s from one particular family. Am I alone here? How do you handle this type of thing? |
Anonymous
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Can you handle my snack duty at preschool? Sorry, can't help out. Up to my eyes these days.
Do you want to come to my (MLM party)? Thanks for the invite, can't make it. Are you interested in (my MLM marketing business)? No, thanks for thinking of me. Can we carpool? Sorry, no space in in my mom mobile! Each of my own kids takes up one seat. No room for carpooling. (This only works if you don't have a minivan. If you made that mistake, just say you guys are unreliable carpool partners so you keep to yourselves. |
Anonymous
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So sorry I can’t XXXXX things have been nuts lately!
Seriously OP that’s it. I know it’s hard if you’re a people pleaser but it’s really ok to just say no. |
Anonymous
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Actually, OP its easier to say yes to one or two things and then you won't feel guilty when you say no.
I always say yes to -- snack bringing, I never say yes to carpooling. |
Anonymous
Op, I think this is good advice. I also have a hard time saying no. Try to pick one thing you can say yes to. I think bringing snack is the easiest option out of all of them. What if you said “I can bring snack once or twice a month.”? I think if you say yes to one thing, or will help you feel less guilty about saying no. |
Anonymous
| I just ... don't feel guilty. I say "Sorry, I can't" and then don't give it another thought. |
Anonymous
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OP - also, its good to do a few things that you can do and are easy - but as a mom of 3 kids, you are bound to need help and sometimes it's nice to build a little good will - not that it's going to be tit-for-tat, but its nice to have a few families that you help that feel comfortable asking for help as well.
That said, I don't carpool unless I need the carpool for full season things - maybe a one off, but I don't like long term carpool commitments. But I do other things that seem easier. |
Anonymous
Genuine question but why do folks NOT want to car pool? It gives you a break too, right? |
Anonymous
| I’m a sahm of three and carpool, host play dates, do pickups. I finally started saying no when I also needed a pick up or slight watch by a nanny when my other kids were sick and I had to pay. Not trying to be a jerk, but my time is also worth something. |
Anonymous
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NO EXPLANATION NEEDED
No is no You know that's the case. You wish to teach it to your children, that they are not required to give an explanation for their, "no", in all kinds of instances. How about you learn to do it yourself. |
Anonymous
I hate carpooling. Because I am an extreme introvert and I don’t like other people’s kids and sometimes they aren’t good friends with my kid. And etc etc etc |
Anonymous
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I'm one of the PPs that hates carpooling. I have found some of them to be so so much work. I have had many carpools over the years with kids in different activities and various things that have come up include
one or more parent is always late (which my kids do not like) one or more parent tries to cancel or change the driver at the last minute - leading to a million last minute texts while I'm at work. someone will need to stop on the way home for something etc etc. I have had some successful carpools but only when I know the parents and we understand the ground rules. Also some carpools are not worth it to me- I once said no to a carpool that involved me sometimes picking up a kid 20 minutes the wrong direction - that's 40 minutes extra-- I'd rather take my own kid myself -- the other parent was furious that I said no. |
Anonymous
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OP I'll come at this from another angle. Are you asking those other parents for favors too? If you're doing favors for them, it should be because you can, and because they are part of your "village" and you can call on them to return the favor when you need something. Whatever that something is.
If you're not cultivating your village, it's just unpaid work. |
Anonymous
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Agree 100% with PP.
To all you selfish people, get over yourselves! And to all of you who hate carpools and always say no, good luck when you get a flat tire, your car is in the shop, you have the flu and your kid needs to be at some activity, you have older kids who do different activities in different parts of the county at the same time and you cannot get them both (or all 3 or 4) where they need to be when they need to be there, etc. We all need to help each other out when we can and not be assholes. |
Anonymous
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Recovering People Pleaser here, and honestly, after the first couple “no’s”, it stops feeling like you’re doing something wrong and switches to feeling liberated! I love saying no (well, you know what I mean), the users respect me more (or have shown their true colors and dropped me) and the asking has stopped.
My go to: “I wish I could, but that won’t work. I’m sorry.” |