Category Archives: Tom

So I forgot to mention…Katie’s room got fully cleaned out about a week ago.

We had given her chance after chance (after chance) to get it picked up even a little. No it didn’t have to be perfect…but I couldn’t even make it to her bed without stepping on who knows what so I was just D.O.N.E. done. We finally gave her the final ultimatum on a Friday night. We reminded her multiple times throughout the weekend. Reminded her she was going to lose everything if she didn’t make a dent.

She kept putting it off and putting it off. So Sunday afternoon I gave her one last chance. And when she decided that continuing to lay on the basement couch and do nothing was her best choice…it was time. I grabbed the roll of garbage bags and off I went.

There wasn’t much sorting—everything from the tops of her dressers got swept into a bag. Clothes from the floor? In a bag. Toys? Bag. She made it upstairs about three minutes behind me and I already had about two bags full.

She proceeded to sit on her bed and bawl. Not even making any move to, you know, pick anything up or put anything away.

“WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS TO ME?!” You know why. We’ve asked you to pick up your room for a month now. I reminded you all weekend and you didn’t do anything. We warned you what would happen—and you saw us do this to Owen’s room so you knew we were serious. This is happening because you made bad decisions.

Tom had been napping but all the drama woke him up, so then he started helping. I think it took us about 45 minutes to get it cleaned out. We did sort some stuff like Legos and took out a full bag of garbage. We found a pile of dishes. Innumerable candy wrappers. Clean clothes mixed with dirty clothes. And under everything? Horrible stains on the carpet that she had NO CLUE what it was from.

So this is about what it looked like when we were done. Bed, dressers, desk, chair, mirror, bookshelf with books, and some toys.

I wanted to take out more but I was mentally and physically exhausted. She was not happy that she lost her nightlight and Alexa. I told her if she had been that worried about it, she should have picked it up.

And then, for as upset as she was, after we were done, she was downstairs laughing and having fun with Owen. Like nothing ever happened.

Fast forward to the next day and I don’t remember exactly what triggered it, but I’m sure it was a combination of her sassy I-can’t-believe-she’s-not-a-teenager mouth and more bad behavior… after I spent the entire day trying to get those unknown stains up and failing…but I went up again and removed even more stuff. She lost the makeup mirror, most of her books, more toys, and anything that was on the floor (you thought she’d have learned that lesson, but no).

In the end, I had taken out about the equivalent of 10 garbage bags. Here it all is stacked in the guest room.

And you know what? She really doesn’t give two craps about any of it. She hasn’t asked for any of it back…except for her Alexa.

She knows why she lost it. She knows she has to earn it back.

I have made her do all the laundry we pulled out—but it all goes back in the guest room (she was allowed to pick two pieces per load to keep).

We’ve told her she can earn some other things back but she hasn’t even cared enough to attempt that. This includes Christmas presents she just got!

Of course her job is to keep her room picked up now—which shouldn’t be hard because it’s literally empty, right? Ha. She still manages to have her floor almost covered every day.

So we have no idea what’s going to happen. Do we just really get rid of everything? Make her sort through it? Make her earn stuff back?

Sigh.