Creating and Enforcing Boundaries

I'm sure everyone has at one point in their life, had to handle someone who didn't know when they had crossed the line. Maybe they showed up at your house all too often. Without calling. Or just dropped their kids off, and left mid-adult visit. Or something else that irritated you beyond belief. I don’t normally feel this way, or even vent publicly, so if you know me personally, don’t worry, the next post won’t likely be about you! ;) 

Recently, new neighbors moved in down the street.  At the time of this post, it's only four and a half months or so into the relationship between our two families. In the beginning I was excited, and probably cheered out loud, "AWESOME!" They have a boy and two girls close to the same age of my daughters' ages. Their mom is really nice, and the girls are polite as can be. In front of me anyway. It was a dream come true. Obviously, I was ecstatic. The kids could hang out, and no driving all over to pick up and drop kids off at each others houses. There aren’t a lot of kids in the neighborhood that are close in age, so this was FANTASTIC! [I could get more in detail here of all the positives, but I am really anxious for feedback, so I will make this as short as possible.]

The downside to this relationship and how quickly it grew, was that it was too much, too fast. I saw the signs, but each little thing individual of all the rest, weren't really a huge deal. I couldn't justify saying anything. Even though I was left feeling sometimes more than agitated, I thought that maybe I was overreacting. 

Being a homeschooling family, our schedule changes all the time. We have the flexibility to do that. But when we have something scheduled, I find it important to do those things, and keep the previous plans. It's how I get it all done and work a full time job. Our lessons are our top priority.

My neighbors are not so understanding to that fact. They think that whenever they text me, they can show up at my door five minutes later. Most of the time, I don't even get THAT courtesy. They just show up. Even during the school day. She has one kid homeschooling right now too, but she says she doesn’t have time for it.  To get a clearer picture, we’re not next door, but more like a five minute walk. When they show up, about 75-80% of the time, they are looking to drop their kids off for us to watch. It’s worded as “Can the kids play? I can’t stay because I have x, y, or z to do...” (Which has been known to be as simple as fold laundry, clean the house, or even as complex as a trip 70+ miles away to another state to visit another one of their children, who does not live in their home.)

Usually when a lot of this happens, I am at work. The girls are working with their father to finish up their lessons, and either the neighbors mom or dad will show up at my house, and say the kids want to hang out, but the parent has an errand to run and can they leave the kids to play. Does anyone else see this as emergency babysitting? Play dates in my eyes are planned ahead (even if just a few hours before), agreed upon by both sets of parents, and reciprocated. I’ve been known to say that I have errands to run myself, and their response? “Oh that’s ok, I don’t mind if you take them anywhere.” Really? You have errands to run, and can’t take your kids, but it’s ok for them to go with me? >>Insert eye rolling here.<<

I have asked that they contact either the DH or I ahead of time (preferably myself, so I could make sure the girls didn't leave any school work behind, and if they did have some, I plan things accordingly with the hubby, being that I’m the primary teacher.)

Here’s what I don’t understand. Why, if I have asked for the simple respect of planning ahead, does my husband get text messages like “...well, your wife said no, but since she’s at work, it’s YOUR choice.” That’s not a respectful person, never mind not being a friend, especially when challenging a relationship between spouses. 

I’m going to stop there, because I’m simply sick of dwelling on such negativity. I’ve been told it’s a toxic friendship doomed for failure. However, I still have hopes that this friendship can be saved. The kids play well for the most part, and it would be unrealistic to expect anyone to get along 100% of the time, including adults.