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[quote=Anonymous]Spouse and I have a disconnect on scheduling for the kids. Spouse insists on maintaining a packed schedule of 1-3 after-school activities per weekday, per child (we have 3 kids). The kids mostly enjoy/choose the activities themselves, so that's a plus. But the problem is in the execution: spouse is controlling and constantly changing the schedule. So, if something gets canceled or moved, spouse wants to move another activity to that now-vacant spot on the schedule. In addition, certain activities do not occur on fixed days, so they are at different times every week (think: something like swim practice that needs to happen at least 3x a week, but doesn't matter which days).

To make matters worse, spouse does not have strong communication or organizational skills so the result is a lot of chaos, where nobody except spouse knows what is happening when on any given day. Spouse frequently forgets that they have moved something to another day or time (or forgets to tell the rest of us about it), and refuses to engage with organizational tools that I've tried to introduce to minimize chaos, like google calendar or old-fashioned fridge calendar to track activities. We both work full time. Spouse also has difficulty managing anger so we are all getting yelled at about this too. I just got yelled at again about a missed math class that nobody told me about, and spouse is considering what "consequences" our son should face for refusing to go to the class 30 minutes late. In addition to being very unpleasant, I don't think the value of the activities outweighs the very real cost of constant chaos and lack of control we all feel over our days. Plus it can't be good for a child's development in executive function to not feel control over what is happening in their day.

Maybe this is just a vent, but does anyone have any advice for how to handle constant scheduling chaos in the family that is mostly caused by one parent's demands?[/quote]

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