Me, Overfunctioning: 3 Bad Things It’s Teaching My Kids

So over here, school has started again. I may have subconsciously avoided my boys’ room this morning, which at last sight looked like someone flipped it upside down and shook it. My daughter’s room was pretty similar as she rushed out the door. Hers just smells better.

What I want to do? Overfunction just a little.

Tuck just a few sleeves in drawers, gather the strays around the hamper, whisk away three or four dishes that shouldn’t be there in the first place. It would

a) make me feel like a better mom.

b) prevent future migraines.

c) cause potential guests to think better of me.

d) serve my kids.

e) all of the above.

Forgetting the Long Game

But remember Esau, who traded his inheritance for a killer bowl of chili? I’ve wondered about that–about what Hebrews says was “unholy like Esau.” (Yipe. Unholy over stew.)

This is what I’ve come to: He was short-sighted.

Esau likely didn’t wake up one day and think, Hey, I should chuck something valuable in light of my utter impatience. It was probably a bit of a self-nurtured habit.

Sometimes, I’m short-sighted in my overfunctioning for my kids.

In about .2 seconds, my thought process might go like this.

This is easier than hunting down…

1. four avatars of “not me” (one for each child)

2. the actual perpetrator

3. a time when said perpetrator can clean up his mess (i.e. not while at school) and ideally not strain his eyeball-rolling muscle

4. proof the job is done sufficiently. Otherwise return to step 3 as many times as necessary.

5. If willing attitude and #4 cannot be accomplished to satisfaction, implement discipline.

6. Enforce discipline.

My own identity issues also breed a short-sightedness. I desire to be needed; adored. You’ll probably want to check out When Help Makes Them Helpless: Why Not to Pick Up Your Kids’ Socks.

So in these next paragraphs, I’m going to sound like a school warden out of a Roald Dahl novel. In reality, I’m closer to a marshmallow. (Or a doormat?)

But this is what I’m telling myself when I just want to get someone’s shoes out of the middle of the stairs.

1. Overfunctioning for my kids is the opposite of empowering them.

Last night, I drove my son to Walmart to pick up the trousers he needs for his job at a Fast Food Restaurant that Shall Not Be Named, starting Saturday. He wanted to know why I couldn’t just pick up his pants for him.

After muddling through a few sentences, I at last landed on, “See, the goal is for you to become increasingly independent–on your own, taking responsibility for yourself, rather than me taking on more responsibility for you.”

(As I type this he is outside, but left his dishes out after lunch. They are snapping at the back of my neck. I just try not to look that direction.)

Most of the time when overfunctioning for him, I’m stealing away what he could learn: that he is capable and expected to take responsibility for himself. That in many good things in life, he can and must make them happen.

Then, there’s my teenaged daughter, who struggles with some social anxiety. Rather than making phone calls, approaching a customer service desk, contacting an adult, texting on her behalf? I’ve made the decision to have her do her own dirty work, so to speak.

In college, I won’t be there to take her to her hair appointment. She can do this.

…Even when she throws me under the bus:

Sometimes her lack of initiative means she misses out on opportunities. Those times are tough for me.

I don’t want her missing out–and honestly, sometimes I cave. (Do not do this.) But in those times, she’s missing out on the reward natural consequences could teach her.

You know I like thinking and writing about how we create resilient kids–which I’ve determined is the opposite of snowplow parenting, broadly shoving out of the way all those obstacles that grow our kids.

(Remember learning not to “help” that chick out of the shell or the butterfly out of the cocoon? Same deal.)

Check out Psychology Today’s list of “overfunctioning” symptoms.

2. Overfunctioning breeds entitlement.

So I whisk away my kids’ dishes like they’re cherished princes. And a funny thing happens.

The next time, they don’t pick up their dishes. And they don’t pitch in on other tasks, either.

And in that, I pick away at a bit of that potential strength–to be the kind of kid who serves. Instead, I chalk up one more point to them expecting someone serving them. It doesn’t help them follow Christ, who came to serve rather than be served (Matthew 20:28).

No, we don’t want kids who refuse help from someone. Whose pride gets in the way of them receiving. (Um. Like mine.)

But the rest of culture is by and large instructing our kids that they’re the center of their own universe. That they should demand what they want, rather than do the hard work of change.

Asking them to work for their own happy consequence counters that natural entitlement. Entitlement stems from a lack of gratitude. A natural selfishness stemming from a recurring state of privilege. …And laziness.

That sense of “I deserve” or “I demand”–that may keep a grown kid from being able to get or maintain a job, care for a family, and muscle through what’s hard for the goodness on the other side.

To steal a phrase from Ron Deal, asking our kids to “carry their own backpack”–shoulder the weight of their own responsibility–becomes crucial to repeatedly demonstrating they are capable of managing their lives.

3. Overfunctioning moms can communicate inferior views of women.

Between my husband and I, he is not the one prone to sweep up children’s clothes from behind the bathroom door, or slide someone’s deodorant back in the medicine cabinet.

Author Elizabeth Gilbert, in the excellent Forbes article 7 Signs Of Perfectionistic Overfunctioning – How To Recognize It In Yourself And Change It, believes women are prone to overfunctioning because they constantly wonder if they’re doing enough with their lives. (And, I would add, tend to define themselves by their relationships.)

But in lashing myself into ideals–and thus overfunctioning, I communicate a few myths about women:

• They never stop taking care of people.
• Women never stop, period.
• They will do what you don’t want to do. No worries. Please wait for someone else to plunge the toilet.
• Women and their work are to be taken for granted. Not respected.
• They believe asking for help = weakness. (This is known in some circles as pride.)
• (They are secret martyrs, but please do not mention this.)

It’s one thing to happily, willingly serve my house from diapers to dishes–just as Christ served me.

It’s another thing to train my sons–and my daughter–that my service is their right, and not something they need to also learn to give. 

Just as service is a theme in the Bible, so is gratitude, respect, and humility.

So this is what I’m telling myself as I wait to remind someone to put away the tortilla chips and shredded cheese.  May your patience be longer than mine.