What is Wrong With Her?

She is impossible to get up in the morning. No matter what we say to her, she stubbornly insists that she can't get out of her warm bed and start her day. She makes us late almost daily, and nothing I threaten her with convinces her that getting up early will make her day go better.

She won't eat her vegetables. It's very difficult to make sure she eats a balanced diet: she would carbo-load till the cows come home if she could. She knows -- or says she knows -- that vegetables are good for her. She even claims to like them. But not when they have been prepared for a meal; just in the abstract, I guess.

She procrastinates like mad. When she's got something to do, like an assignment or a chore, she waits until the very last minute, and then gets all stressed out and whiney about having to do it. Why can't she figure out that doing a little bit each day is far preferable to cramming everything into one evening and making the entire family miserable -- especially herself -- with the mad dash to finish line?

Getting her out of the bath is a pain in the neck. First of all, she doesn't bath often enough -- always has something better to do -- and then when she finally gets in, she won't get out. I try and try to be nice and encouraging, but she just loves to play in that water, and resists the inevitable cold dash into a towel. Can't talk to her about saving water: she's just stubborn, stubborn, stubborn.

She claims to love it when her room is clean, when things are neat and orderly, but try getting her to keep it that way. Resistance in the extreme. In no time flat, her clean room is rendered chaotic and unbearable. It's a total bummer.

And there are thousand other ways in which I wonder, breathlessly, wearily, WILL SHE EVER GROW UP?

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Oh how I wish I were talking about one of my daughters. They have an excuse. They are 2, 4, and 6. No, this incorrigible female is me.

But the question remains. Will she ever grow up? Will she someday embrace the things she knows are good for her, will make her happy, will make her peaceful? Or will she continue to give in to being tired, overwhelmed, uninspired, or just plain lazy? Will she live forever with the same bad habits, or will she finally, as the sticky note her co-worker gave her says: "Put on her big girl panties and get over it?"

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