Well, I have a friend whom I wrote about a while back (these are the ones who went all anti-peanut-allergy-considerations-psycho on us in OUR home in front of OUR peanut kid...), and it turns out that her family of 7 is moving in about a month. I've known about the move for about 4 weeks now. Is it so terrible of me to say that I felt... relieved by the news? Actually, I felt almost jubilant...

Her husband's been working in Arizona 1 week a month for the past two years anyway. Clearly it's better for her family to move, if just to be together. She has been holding up the process because she is from this area and really had no desire to move away. I think the only reason she agreed to the move was that her husband's boss issued an ultimatum- as in, either move out here, or no more job. Anyway, they are moving on...

So, why would this bring ME happiness? She was my closest friend in the area. She still is my emergency contact on all my kids' school forms... Her family was the family we would do stuff with. But, I can't help but feel that I've been taken advantage of by her when it comes to the childcare department.

We had an arrangement 2 years ago where she would watch Luke for me while I went to volunteer at the twins' school. In turn, I would watch her 2 girls (the youngest was Luke's age) while she ran an after-school program at her kids' school. I knew that the hours wouldn't even out, but I thought at least I could ask her to help me with doctor's visits, etc. I usually went to volunteer for 2 hours a week, and she would watch him maybe 1 or 2 times a month. The other times I'd go in while Luke was at a MDO program or preschool. Her 2 youngest came like clockwork from about 3 pm until 6 every Friday. Sometimes she didn't come to pick them up until 7! And I would ask her what happened- was there an emergency, and she just looked at me-- totally blank! Like, she didn't even know she was very late... She doesn't have any schedule, any bedtime, any dinnertime... It drove me NUTS.

The hours didn't even come CLOSE to being even. Whenever I broached the subject of her maybe watching my kids a little bit more often, the subject was changed... Whenever I asked her to watch Luke while I had a Dr appt or something,within days I got an email asking me to watch her girls (not well-behaved, at all) for about twice as long as I had asked for...

This went on and on. Last year when Josie was born, I basically started saying *no* to every request. And I was very careful to not ask her to babysit at all... I felt like a total hag blocking her requests, but I know my limits and if I'm watching her kids, I just can not do anything with Josie that I need to do. I can't put her to a nap or anything.

I didn't realize what a drain the constant childcare requests were on what was at one time what I considered my closest friendship in the area... until I started saying "no" and didn't even hear from her for months, really... It became clear that I was just some childcare provider, really.

So, I have scheduled a couple of playdates for Luke with her daughter, and I'm babysitting her 2 out of control kids one last time, and that's it. Luke considers this girl to be his *best friend*, but actually even he doesn't put up with her drama and constant requests for snacks and her "I'm bored" comments anymore!