An Open Letter to Moms of Tweens

Dear Mom of Tweens,

I see you, and what’s more, I hear you. You keep muttering frightening things to me.  “Just wait,” you say, clearly unimpressed with my complaints about yet another night without sleep. “Enjoy them now,” you beseech me at the grocery store while your dulcet darling glances up from tik-tok to scowl at you. Over and over you imply that the light at the end of the tunnel of toddlerhood is actually the headlights of a Mack truck heading at me at full speed. And Moms, I hear you. And I believe you. I believe I’m in for it. But I need you to hear me too, so listen close because I have something important to say about those insufferable tweens of yours.

I will take them. Please, for the love of God give them to me. I know she hasn’t looked up from her phone in a week. I know he talks exclusively in grunts. I know and I. Do. Not. Care,  because mama, I’m desperate over here. I understand that they are surly and sullen and sometimes smelly, but my kids think they are amazing. And even though I’ve seen the dagger eyes they throw at you, they seem reasonably enamored with my kids (and actually that little ball of hormones is pretty polite to me).

The thing is mama, I haven’t showered in a week and I legit lost the five year old the other day. On a good day, I’ve only fed two out of three lunch, and on a bad day, I just pretend not to notice when they eat chips for breakfast. We just got a puppy (I KNOW you told me not to and I KNOW I should have listened) and it’s literally breaking me, so I don’t even actually care if they’re a good babysitter or not. I just need another human in this house once in a while who can wipe their own butt and point out if something is on fire.

And here’s the kicker, not only will I take your tween, but I will PAY to take your tween. Not to keep playing the “who has it worse” game, but I guarantee nobody’s going to pay to me to take my kids. I mean, I’m totally going to pay less than minimum wage, because the college-aged babysitter is robbing me blind, but I’ll feed them (I hear they eat a LOT)! Don’t want that irresponsible middle schooler to have money in their pocket? No problem, we won’t tell them it’s a paid gig and I’ll just take you out for a drink. Think about that! I’ll take your kid away AND buy you a round. We’ll leave the husbands with the toddlers and tweens and swap war stories about potty training and first dates. We’ll both be secretly believing we definitely have it worse, but who cares – the kids will be somewhere else.

So what do you say, mama? Is it a deal? Three hours, twice a week?

And I promise, in eight years, when I have tweens of my own, I’ll send them over to shovel your driveway