My little sister is sick and my dad’s busy helping her, so he asks me to fetch the paracetamol from the fridge. I’m no older than ten, so I have not been allowed to open the box it’s in before. However, I have seen the outside of the box many times and it advertises in large bold letters that it is SUGAR-FREE.

I pass the bottle that was in the box and one of those double-sided medicine spoons to my dad, and I look at the inside of the box in confusion. Throughout this conversation, I’m almost oblivious to the fact that my dad is a little preoccupied with a less-than-happy toddler.

Me: “Where’s the sugar?”

Dad: “Why?”

Me: “I can’t find it.”

Dad: “It’s where you won’t be able to eat it.”

Me: “But I wanna.”

Dad: “Not now, [My Name].”

Me: “But I wanted to eat the free sugar.”

Dad: “Free? What?”

Me: “The free sugar. It says it right here, see? But it’s not in the box.”

Dad: “That’s not… Look, I’ll explain later. Put this away, please?”

Me: “Can I have some?”

Dad: “I said no sugar.”

Me: “I know. Can I have some of the parry-seat-moll?”

Dad: “Are you sick?”

Me: “No.”

Dad: “Then no. Just put it away.”

To my dad’s credit, he did explain later that “sugar-free” didn’t mean it came with free sugar. I was very disappointed.

This was the time before smartphones. My dad had a really bad habit of getting up at the last minute to leave for work. You know the type: sets the alarm for a certain time just so they can hit the snooze button over and over, only to be running out the door with a Poptart in hand? That was my dad.

This was often a frustrating conversation my mother would have with him to fix. On top of the ridiculous amount of times she had to hear that alarm from four to five in the morning, a new baby (me!), and having to make breakfast and clean the mess, she would ask for his help on certain small house tasks that he was otherwise “too tired” to do once he came home.

Unfortunately, with his horrible morning routine, his excuse every morning would be, “Sorry, honey, I’m in a rush so I need to get to work.” It was so bad he’d sometimes have to skip breakfast altogether, so she’d barely even get to talk to him before he left.

My mother, having grown up as the oldest of six other boys, had developed a very petty, mean streak when it came to getting exactly what she wanted.

One particular morning, my dad woke up to find that he had slept in a little too late, and the military can be pretty unforgiving to those who miss formation, thus beginning his usual routine of scrambling to shower, get his uniform on, and rush out the door. Upon telling me this story, he did tell me that he found it odd that my mom wasn’t nagging him for once. She didn’t stop him to talk or complain or yell; she just sat at the table with a cup of coffee and watched him trip over himself to rush to work.

My dad got into his car, turned it on… and noticed the time on his car’s clock was about an hour and a half before he had to leave. He looked at his wristwatch; yep, that said he was late! He looked at his car’s clock and then looked at his watch again. Then, he looked out the window and realized… it was WAY too dark for it to have been the time he was supposed to leave.

And then it hit him. My mother, in all her glory, had changed all the clocks in the house — the oven time, the microwave, his alarm clock, and somehow even his wristwatch — while he was asleep!

Mind you, my mother is severely visually impaired. If text isn’t gigantic and/or outlined with a light or opposing color and her nose isn’t basically touching what she needs to read, she can’t see it. To this day, he doesn’t know how the heck she managed to pull off changing the time on his digital watch without waking him.

Resigned to her little game, he shut off his car and slunk his way into the house. And there was my mother, gleefully sipping her cup of coffee with a huge grin.

“Great!” she said. “Looks like you’ve got time to help me now.

Suffice to say, he stopped hitting the snooze button.

This story is part of our Best Of October 2021 roundup!

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I got all the bad genes in my family, including a chronic pain disorder. I do what I can to alleviate the symptoms, but it’s not getting any better as I’m reaching middle-age, and I find that there are things I used to be able to do in my youth that I just can’t manage anymore.

My sister is two years younger than me and lucked out in the health department. She’s the kind of person who runs marathons for fun, while I’m at the point where I need physical therapy to handle my daily life. We’ve always been very close and share a lot of interests, including hiking and other outdoor activities. Unfortunately, she has some trouble adjusting to my physical limitations.

I’m just starting my summer vacation and I have two weeks off for shenanigans. My sister calls me to invite me for a hike in a nearby national park.

Sister: “It’s been so long since we did something like this together and it would be so much fun!”

Me: “Sure, that sounds great. We could do a day trip, maybe?”

Sister: “Oh, I thought we’d hike the whole trail; it’ll be like three days at most. We can bring a tent and camping gear. You have two weeks off, right?”

Me: “Sorry, but I won’t be able to do that. I don’t think I could handle sleeping on the ground for one night at this point, even less two. But if we take the short trail on Saturday, we’ll be back by evening and I’ll get to sleep in my own bed and won’t have to be in too much pain for the rest of my vacation.”

Sister: “Come on! You can handle three days, can’t you? We used to do this all the time!”

Me: “We used to do it all the time when I was twenty. If I do it now, I’m going to have to spend the rest of my vacation recovering, and I have other plans, as well.”

Sister: “Seriously? You’ve turned into such a granny!”

Me: *Upset* Sorry my disability is such an inconvenience to you.”

Sister: *Even more upset* “Laziness is not a disability!”

We hung up. She invited one of her friends, instead, and spent the entire three days making passive-aggressive posts on social media about how wonderful her hike was and how much she pitied people who didn’t appreciate the outdoors. 

I spent my vacation taking it easy and going on various day trips with friends and other family, and returned to work rested and content, in no more pain than before.

The irony in all this? My sister is a nurse who specialises in my condition.

I just had my first baby about a week ago, and I’m completely exhausted and miserable as my baby is the unbelievably needy type that starts screaming the moment I take my breast out of her mouth and doesn’t stop for an hour. No, literally. She usually even sleeps in my lap, and if I put her on the bed, she wakes up after five minutes at the latest.

My mother-in-law, sister-in-law, and father-in-law make a surprise visit. They offer to make food, and I’m happy since we haven’t had time or energy to make proper delicious food for a while. I’m actually so happy and tired I’m almost crying, telling everyone I’m so hungry. 

When the food is done and served on our terrace table, my baby wakes up and wants to breastfeed (yet again).

Me: “Start without me. I’ll be back after I take care of [Baby].”

After twenty minutes, I manage to get her to sleep, and, hoping that she sleeps for more than five minutes, I make my way to the table and find out that my in-laws and my husband have eaten everything. There’s literally nothing edible on the table anymore. I just sit there feeling stupid, while my husband is smiling.

Mother-In-Law: “Don’t worry about the dishes! We’ll load them into the dishwasher later.”

After they leave, I talk to my husband.

Me: “I haven’t had anything to eat for the last twelve hours. I’m sad I didn’t get any of the food earlier.”

Husband: “It was just food.”

Yeah, tell that to a new mother that has had two hours of sleep every night for a week and hasn’t eaten regularly since then because of breastfeeding for roughly sixteen hours a day and holding a baby for twenty-three hours a day.

Now, years later, I can confirm that my needy baby has grown into an equally needy child. And no, I still haven’t completely forgiven anyone involved (excluding the baby).

My dad is a Boomer, born in 1946, but is a very progressive, open-minded person — probably because Nana would’ve smacked the stupid out of him, otherwise. His only Boomer-mentality sticking point is the “Just get a better job!” argument. My older sister and I have tried to explain that it’s just not as easy now as it was when he was our age, with little success.

Not too long ago, we were having a discussion about the topic, and my patience finally wore out as I was trying to explain how different his time versus ours is after hearing for the umpteenth time that he put himself through college making pizzas.

Dad: “All I’m saying is, back in my day—”

Me: *Exploding in frustration* “Back in your day, cough syrup was literally whiskey with opium, and soda had cocaine in it, you dinosaur!”

Dad: *Blinking in surprise* “I’ve got no response to that.”

Me: “Well, good!” *Turns and leaves*

Fortunately, though not necessarily as a result of this discussion, Dad’s finally come around to understand our point of view!