Clearly define responsibilities for everyone in the family and there's no need for confusion or fuss.

Motherhood is job training usually learned in the middle of the job. We have no idea what we will be required to do until we are presented with a particular situation. Had I realized early on that motherhood didn't require that I do every little thing, I would have written a clear job description for every member of the family. With a clear understanding of our individual responsibilities, my family could have avoided some of the chaos and confusion that is a part of every family. Our job descriptions might have looked like this:

Mom:
* Responsible for meal planning, meal preparation, and preparation cleanup. Not responsible for dining messes made by individuals capable of cleanup.
* Responsible for cleaning of laundry brought in and presorted in laundry room. Not responsible for locating matches to orphan socks or doing laundry on a hysterical moment's notice.
* Responsible for ferrying children to scheduled events. Other rides will be provided with adequate notice.
* Responsible for scheduling house cleaning responsibilities and setting cleanliness standards.
* Responsible for organization and fairness within family unit.

Dad:
* Responsible for routine car maintenance, yard work, and trash collection.
* Responsible for personal laundry deposit and cleaning of personal space.
* Responsible for computer, television, and video game monitoring and scheduling.
* Responsible for co-parenting with Mom and co-participating in children's activities and issues.
* Responsible for date night with Mom.

Children:
* Responsible for personal laundry deposit and bedroom cleanliness.
* Responsible for maintaining agreed-on grades and school responsibilities.
* Responsible for timely personal input to family calendar.
* Responsible for maintaining weekly assigned chores.

The job descriptions would change as our family changed. Diapering and late-night bottle feedings would be included and discarded when no longer needed. Toy pickups would change to video game pickups. As the children matured and took on new responsibilities, their job descriptions would be individualized for each child.

Our job descriptions would be posted so everyone could all see. Questions and concerns would be discussed and changes could be made to the descriptions. As new circumstances came up, we could add them. Arguments of "who's supposed to do what" would be eliminated by our job descriptions. By understanding our roles in the family, we know what is expected and can meet those expectations.

Motherhood is exhilarating as well as exhausting. We want to do so much for our families that we sometimes wear ourselves out. By simply defining our roles as well as the rest of the family's, we get the help we need and create a cohesive family unit.

About the Author:

Luanne Davidson is the proud mother of three adult children and wonders what might have been if she had done a thing or two differently. She writes her "Coulda, Woudla, Shoulda" column each Thursday.

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