It Never Ends...

DaisyFace

Love me...Love me not
Hello everyone--

I have been so overwhelmed and so stressed out with everything that's been happening this summer....and now this.

Long story short--our gas grill wasn't working because the burners had rusted out. We couldn't afford a whole new grill...so we waited until we had a little extra cash and finally bought replacement parts just a few weeks ago. Yay! We could cook brugers on the grill! Finally!

Today, difficult child saw ants on the grill....

So, she took concentrated ant spray and doused the entire inside of the newly-repaired grill.

:mad:

We are furious on many levels. Number one, she should never have been in the garage to GET the ant spray. And number two--she has completely contaminated the grill.

According to poison control, in order to avoid dying from our next grilled meal....we need to completely dismantle the entire thing and scrub out every nook and cranny to remove all traces of poison.

And difficult child...? She doesn't get what the big deal is, since, well, she killed the ants, so what's the problem?

AAARRRGGGHHHH!!!!

I don't think I can take any more stress this summer. And difficult child's attitude about everything is really putting me over the top. Why? Why? WHY would she CONTINUE to go into the garage and go through husband's stuff? What makes that OK with her? And now the grill is useless AGAIN....and frankly, even if we do take it apart and wash it--I'm not sure that we will have confidence that we really did get every nook and cranny thoroughly scrubbed.

It never ends...

--DaisyF
 

TerryJ2

Well-Known Member
OOhhhhhhhhhhhhh, I'm so sorry, DaisyFace. That would make me crazy. How frustrating.
So, what about having HER help you clean off the grill? She can apologize until the cows come home, but unless she actually takes part in the cleaning process, she won't understand how much work it is.
Sigh.
 

TerryJ2

Well-Known Member
P.S. I don't suppose it occurred to her to pull the grill outside and turn it on for a cpl min b4 grilling burgers, and the heat would either kill the ants or scare them away ...
naw, too easy ...
 

susiestar

Roll With It
I would be furious too. Have you taken her to price grills so that she can see how much money she has to earn to replace the one she destroyed? Even if you don't go that route, at the very least she needs to do some hard physical labor as a consequence. The hard physical labor will help drive the idea that what she did was wrong into her mind. At least that was the only thing that got through to Wiz.

It stinks that the entire family will be punished by her actions. Have you tried FreeCycle for a new grill? Or Craigslist?
 

maril

New Member
Oh, wow. :disgusted: I am sorry you have to go through this. I agree with having her help dismantle and clean the grill (if you think there will be a chance of salvaging it that way). My difficult child has done things in the past that leave us scratching our heads, too.

I was thinking pressure wash (http://www.pressurewashersdirect.com/product_reviews_info.php?reviews_id=493) but don't know if that is realistic.

How about locking the garage? We keep our garage locked, due to the antics of difficult child and his friends. It gives us some peace of mind.
 

AnnieO

Shooting from the Hip
Just make her scrub it. Not help - SHE needs to do it. You can help taking apart and putting back together.

Also - wouldn't turning it on high for 15 minutes kill all the neurotoxins in the ant spray? I don't know. Just a thought.
 

timer lady

Queen of Hearts
I'm sorry for your frustration, but I'm kind of giggling here. She had no clue & was trying to help. Yup, have difficult child help dismantle & scrub the grill down.
 

CrazyinVA

Well-Known Member
Staff member
Actually, I don't think this is a difficult child thing.. it's typical teen. It's that undeveloped frontal lobe issue.... impulsive decisions without forethought. Ants = bug spray, I'm sure it was pretty simple to her! It reminds me of an anecdote in the book I've mentioned here before.. "Yes your Teen is Crazy" .. about a teen who thought it'd be a great idea to use a powerwasher to wash the car.. yikees!

I agree in letting her clean the grill, but with your supervision (otherwise you wouldn't know if she truly scrubbed it).
 

DaisyFace

Love me...Love me not
Thanks, everyone--

According to Poison Control, the only way to really remove the toxins is by scrubbing with soap and water...and Yes, we are going to have her clean the grill, under supervision to make sure it really gets scrubbed out.

Our policy on the garage is that it stays closed all the time. The kids may only go in to get something with permission and even then, all of husband's stuff is OFF LIMITS. I don't care if they need a band-aid from the first-aid kit, they are NOT to touch husband's things without permission (can you tell it's been an issue in the past?)

So yesterday, the difficult child wanted to get her bike out of the garage. OK by me. That's when they saw ants on the grill. I specifically said "Just leave the grill alone...Dad will take care of it"....

So, naturally, that gets interpreted to mean "Go through the garage until you find insecticide, help yourself, spray it all over the darn place....and then go about your business as though nothing happened."

:mad:

And we only found out about it because DS mentioned it later. We are lucky that the two of them didn't accidentally poison themselves, since nobody took any precautions and difficult child just sprayed all over-including where her brother was playing basketball. (He thinks he might have gotten it on his shoes.)

Thank God the dogs weren't anywhere near it!! That stuff is highly toxic to pets, too.



--DaisyF
 

JJJ

Active Member
I agree this is more typical teen but with a little difficult child-lack of remorse. I remember doing stuff like that as a teen -- I solved the first problem, didn't see the 2nd one coming. (Heck, husband still does that occassionally LOL).

Can you get locked cabinets for the garage? We finally had to lock up everything and then work on teaching (mostly Eeyore) that he couldn't touch anything without permission. By having everything locked up he had to get in the habit of asking for permission so we would unlock it. We seem to be making progress.
 

DaisyFace

Love me...Love me not
Can you get locked cabinets for the garage? We finally had to lock up everything and then work on teaching (mostly Eeyore) that he couldn't touch anything without permission. By having everything locked up he had to get in the habit of asking for permission so we would unlock it. We seem to be making progress.

Yes--that looks like the next step. I am carrying around enough keys to things in my house as it is...but looks like I need a few more.

:(

--DaisyF
 
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