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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

kids ruin your home. FOR LIFE!!

21 replies

bananaandcustard · 15/10/2015 22:01

Ten years ago we decorated our front room, and put in a new fireplace and new carpet. Our 2nd son was about 11 at the time and he decided to start a fire in the new fireplace. Both of us parents were doing other things and had no idea he was starting a nice fire and burning holes in our brand new carpet.
Of course we were glad he didnt get burnt, and after giving him a lecture about starting fires etc etc, we brought a large rug to cover the holes.

Over the years we decided to halt any such ideas of having a nice home while we had four young children but wait until they were older and perhaps wiser.

Our second son is now 22yrs old, and we have put a new flooring on the ground floor of the house and have a new kitchen.
Helpful son decided to help us paint our dinning room. Which is fantastic, and we were so grateful. After all he is 22yrs old and must be perfectly capable.
yesterday I came home from work and found son happily painting the walls, and so in to my new kitchen I went to make a cup of tea. There on the floor, the new wooden floor was an upturned bottle of oven cleaner, (next to the bottle of white spirit) slowly but steadily leaking on the floor.
I have a large white area on my misshapen and now raised wooden flooring.
I had a perfect kitchen floor for about 3 days.

I have been too upset to address him on this issue, but have got insane urges to damage all things precious to him, like cutting the balls of his collection of bobble hats or creaking a wheel of his skateboard.

AIBU to act on this impulse???

OP posts:

KingJoffreyLikesJaffaCakes · 15/10/2015 22:03

DS once knocked a massive hole in the wall with a toy Bob The Builder hammer. Luckily he was wearing a Bob hard hat.

Looking back, it was a stupid thing to give him...

timeforabrewnow · 15/10/2015 22:05

Ouch!

timeforabrewnow · 15/10/2015 22:07

Sorry - the ouch was for the OP - and her 3 days of nice floor.

EatShitDerek · 15/10/2015 22:07

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

MarkRuffaloCrumble · 15/10/2015 22:10

I accidentally got permanent black marker pen all over my parents new cream leather sofa as a teen.

I felt terrible but they were remarkably calm about it!

If it's any consolation, your DS will probably still feel guilty in 30 years too

custardcreamdreams · 15/10/2015 22:17

I think I would cry. Insurance?

A few years back, in my 30s, I spilt an entire glass of wine over ddad's 2 day old laptop and fried it.

ijustwannadance · 15/10/2015 22:19

Why was oven cleaner on floor? Had he knocked out of cupboard or something? He is old enough to pay for damage and replace the bit of flooring.

tootsietoo · 15/10/2015 22:19

OMG. Poor you. That is unbearable. Cut his bobble hats up.

My DD1 is gradually picking holes in the wall plaster around her bed. She decided to do some painting a few months ago on a brand new sitting room carpet without any newspaper underneath - paint on new carpet. She does gym on the sofa in the kitchen and ripped the vinyl by shoving it around. She has weed on her bedroom carpet in several places and it is marked. She has wiped poo on her bed frame. There is nail varnish all over the carpet. Even DD2 who is less stinky has scribbled on her wall and bedside table. They have both sploshed water out of the bath so often that there is a brown damp patch on the hall ceiling.

I just thank god our house is old and scruffy anyway and not nice and new and pristine. I would like a tidy house one day. By the sound of it I will have to never let them back in once they leave.

Goldmandra · 15/10/2015 22:26

Soul destroying but it isn't forever.

Claim on your house insurance and they will replace the floor.

In the meantime make him grovel. A lot.

ShotgunNotDoingThePans · 15/10/2015 22:28

What a camel! I think I'd definitely be examining my insurance policies. Accidental damage during decorating was covered by ours a couple of years ago, when DH was painting with a 'protective' sheet on the floor and the paint soaked through the fabric.

cakedup · 15/10/2015 22:47

When I was about 6, my parents bought brand new white leather sofas (asking for trouble or what!). I decided I didn't like them. So I covered them in talc and then coated them in bleach. My mum went apeshit. Once she'd cleaned all the mess up, I decided I'd pay her back for shouting at me. So I drew all over them in black permanent marker. She then got the sofas covered in fabric.

About 5 years later, same sofas, I was doing a 'magic show' for my little sister which involved juggling with bits of paper. Boring eh. I thought I'd up the stakes a bit and set the bits of paper on fire. Which I then dropped onto the sofa which burnt great big holes in them.

I'm glad to say that ds is nowhere near the destructive brat I was.

megletthesecond · 15/10/2015 22:52

cake your magic show!

holeinmyheart · 15/10/2015 22:56

Mine upturned a pit of white enamel paint on my brand new brown tweed carpet.
Cut a hole in the new cover I had just made for the sofa. Broke a beautiful lampshade by throwing a rugby ball around the sitting room.
Cut a hole in a silk scarf to make pants for a Barbie Doll.
Wiped Dog poo on the hall mat innumerable times. Broke one of the toilet seats by standing on it. Broke windows with Footballs. Left an iron face down on a carpet and GHD imprint on wooden table. Been sick in bed as a teenager through drinking too much.
Left the tops off felt tips on top of cushions. Slammed doors so that the paint chipped.
Etc etc etc.
The joys of family life.

gandalf456 · 15/10/2015 22:59

Oh cake! Are you ok now?"

coffeeisnectar · 15/10/2015 23:03

My youngest at the tender age of 18 months scaled the safety gate and put a heavily garnished wooden book in the microwave. And then turned it on. I was folding washing and alerted by the dense smoke filling the flat. My microwave was destroyed, the worktop was melted and the whole place had to be cleared of smoke by the lovely firemen who came to deal with it.

Literally she was out of sight for about four minutes! Bloody child!!

coffeeisnectar · 15/10/2015 23:04

Varnished, not garnished.

coffeeisnectar · 15/10/2015 23:06

Same child smashed my car window, put her hand through a window of the house (minor scratch luckily) and smashed her own bedroom window. She is now banned from owning anything which bounces.

SistersOfPercy · 15/10/2015 23:14

Ds torched his grandparents kitchen when he was two. Mum used to put his socks on the shelf over the fire in the kitchen to dry (gas fire with bars I add). This particular day ds had taken himself to the toilet only decided to be helpful en route. For reasons beyond me he took a few pairs of socks off the shelf and hooked them over the bars of the fire. (Managing to unhook a guard in the process) He then managed to light the gas fire with the ignition and wandered back into the lounge to continue with his episode of tots TV. He was so swift at this that I thought nothing at all of it and he'd been gone no longer than his usual wee time.

When I went in five minutes later the smoke hit me. I threw ds over the fence at the neighbour and managed to put out the fire, I then had to face my mother.....

Tbh I think she was secretly pleased as it forced dad's hand at a little decorating. Ds is now 23. The teasing over the incident is still ongoing.

Goldmandra · 15/10/2015 23:44

Just after my friend paid for a decorator to repaint and paper the whole upstairs of her new four bedroom house, her 4YO DD and DN took a pencil each and drew two long lines at their shoulder height from the top of the stairs along the landing wall, in, around and out of every bedroom and back to the stairs.

She is the calmest, kindest, most understanding person I could ever hope to meet. She was so angry that day that she sent her DN home early. That was it. I have been in awe of her ever since.

And no, they couldn't get the pencil off. They had to pay to have every wall repainted/papered.

cakedup · 15/10/2015 23:44

Yes I'm very well behaved now gandalf456!

megletthesecond I remember inwardly panicking when the sofa was on fire, but not wanting to spoil the show for my sister so keeping up the showmanship facade, even when pouring glasses of water over the sofa to put the fire out, finishing with "ta da!". I just remember my sister watching the whole thing like this but politely clapping when it was all over.

I also nicked my mum's lit cigarette (you know, back in the days when it was perfectly fine to smoke in your house with small children inhaling all the fumes) and took it into my room, pretending to smoke it, whilst having a tea party with my teddies (I was 7). My mum then called me because there was a cartoon on tv, so I tossed the fag into my wardrobe and went off to watch my cartoon. Luckily it only burnt a hole through my wardrobe floor. I also nearly burnt my dad's office down twice. I was a little bit obsessed with fire.

My mum loves telling re-telling these stories to DS (10) who just recoils in horror as he is a very sensible child. I'm so glad he doesn't take after me.

SistersOfPercy · 16/10/2015 00:08

I recall as a kid I had the spare room as a playroom which I shared with a cupboard of dad's tools and the like.
One Sunday afternoon after a lengthy session bouncing on my space hopper I decided that actually orange wasn't really a very space like colour so I raided the tool cupboard, carefully closed the door so as not to ruin the surprise and used the silver car spray paint for a bit of a revamp.

I was high as a kite and almost unconscious when they found me, I was also predominantly silver, as was most everything else I'd touched.
Worth it though, I was the only child with a silver space hopper on all our estate

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