Just say THANK YOU ffs

[MadameBee]

I need a rant.

I have two DSDs 15 and 13. I have been around for 10 years (was not OW). Have fairly good relationship with them.

I have two grown up kids who have left home and one about to go to Uni.

DSDs always have to be reminded to say please and thank you, which irritates me.

Worse is that that I put a lot of thought and effort into coking a nice meal (even if I didn’t and I just cooked a frozen pizza this would piss me off).

They refuse today thank you.

Everyone else, at the end of the meal says “thank you” and they sit there looking down in fucking silence, smirking, then DH tells them and it’s just shit and embarrassing and awkward.

WHY?!

@JeepersC
Well that in its way is a thank you isn’t it.

I don’t know why you’re getting all defensive about this. Thanks are nice. Generally accepted things in the world is if you do something someone says thanks. Be use it’s nice. Not because someone beat you into submission

poor bastards are expected to say “thank you” after every bloody meal, geeeeeze. They’re not at someone’s house, they’re in their own home!

It's literally two words, not a recital of Shakespeares sonnets.

@NotADomesticCat
I don’t think anyone wants what you are suggesting. But I would hope if I put a meal in front of anyone and they liked it. They expressed it somehow.

As much as if they didn’t like it, they might say thank you for the effort, but your pumpkin cream cheese spaghetti wasn’t a hit this time! Too much tomato ketchup in it

If you were a chef in a previous incarnation, perhaps you're accustomed to receiving thanks. These children are in their own home and shouldn't need to thank you for providing for their basic needs. Manners is a whole 'nother ball game.

We ALWAYS say thank you. I’ve always thanked my mum. DP thanks me. I thank him. It’s basic manners?!

@JeepersC
Anyway. I think you have missed the point.

If everyone on the table says thank you and they don’t deliberately then there are issues

@ThursdayLastWeek. I would also support DH and express my appreciation when he’s been working really hard but I don’t say thank you every day he comes home.

I honestly think in a normally happy-ish, functional family saying ‘thank you’ for every small service or act of love isn’t necessary. The appreciation is unspoken but not unfelt. The mutual give and take renders formal thanks superfluous.

I feel quite strongly about formal thanks being unnecessary in families. My elderly mum has been unwell for some time and as her next of kin I’ve been responsible for driving her to appointments and being her advocate when various medics have either tried to force her into treatments and interventions she doesn’t want or conversely, not offered treatments she would like. When this started she would send me a formal thank you card through the post after every appointment. Quite apart from the cost of this to a woman on a fixed income, I found the cards distancing - It felt was treating me like an acquaintance who needed a quid pro quo rather than a loved one. I told her this and now she conveys her thanks by a hug or kiss. That’s all I want or need from her or DH or the kids.

My dd was well reared, but she was also reared to feel at home when she is at home. There are no niceties with us. It's my job as her mother to feed her. We just have normal conversation! We'll discuss what we're eating as it's as likely that she'll have 'attempted' to cook as I will have.

You're a stepmother expecting the children to thank you for feeding them. They're teens. They won't. Unless they're drones.

@icecreamdiva

I can’t even see how your scenario and a general thanks mum. Looks lovely mum. Tasted nice mum. Yum etc. Is even comparable

If everyone on the table says thank you and they don’t deliberately then there are issues

Hit the nail on the head. And I doubt it's manners or the quality of the food proffered!

I think it is a hugely positive thing to be grateful - to appreciate a meal someone has cooked for us and served, to appreciate being able to snuggle into a warm bed, to appreciate standing under a hot shower. The more we make an active effort to appreciate what we have, and to thank those who help us and care for us, the more content we are. We need as adults to show children how to be truly content and grateful for what they have.

I always thank anyone who cooks a meal for me.

If you're as rude to them in their own home as you've been on this thread I can see why they don't like you. You don't seem to like them much either. I'd be more concerned by that then whether they do an automatic thank you when passed a plate.

I have always always always had a meal ready for them when they have arrived

Time to shake things up then isn't it?
They're 15 and 13 - old enough to start helping out with cooking/laying the table/washing the dishes and putting them away etc.

Why isn't your DH sorting this?
He has plenty of time during the journey back after picking them up - and when dropping off - to actually have a conversation about basic manners...and also helping out round the house.
They can't have it both ways - expect to be treated like occasional guests when it comes to chores/housework and then claim it's their home so they shouldn't have to say thankyou.

Tell your husband HE can sort out dinner etc when he gets back - either he does it all by himself like you do or he gets his kids to help HIM.
You spend that time on yourself/relaxing.
Then eat and go put your feet up, leave them to take care of everything......just like they do with you.
Watch how quick they all are to express discontent and point out that YOU didn't thank them!

He's raising rude, entitled, lazy gits for kids.
Stop pandering to them all.....it's the only way they'll all learn!

I don’t understand why people think it’s formal to say thanks.
I say thanks many time’s a day. It’s not formal. It’s just nice to do.

And if doesn’t have to be the word thanks. It can be any show of appreciation.

These step kids are not showing any form of kind appreciation. Because clearly they don’t feel it. For one reason or another

Icecream your story about your mother seems to suggest you come from a family that has real trouble simply thanking each other verbally for doing something for them.

Most people would simply have said, “Thanks love”. To send a card to your daughter like that is very unusual.

Ye, I thank the Lord above every time I take a shower.

Such shite.

I’ve always said thank you after ever meal whenever anyone’s cooked for me, even as a child, even if it was my parents 🤷🏼‍♀️😂

I don't actually expect it, but my children thank me anyway. So when you go out for a meal I assume your children don't thank the waiting staff because it's their job!
If they do then they should extend the same basic manners at home. If they don't it's a big problem.
OP I think your stepchildren are either rude ungrateful or both I would get them to cook or at least help sometimes as it should make them more appreciative if what you do

If dd thanked me for cooking dinner I'd check her temperature.

@aroundtheworldyet I think we are at cross purposes here. There is a massive difference between a spontaneous ‘yum yum’ or ‘this is nice’ (both of which I would expect to hear quite regularly ) and a formal, rote ‘thank you’. Even if I didn’t hear those words, a clean plate and maybe asking for a bit more is a thank you if the underlying relationship is sound. Equally, a ‘ thank you’ is meaningless if it’s said without genuine appreciation behind it.

As the PP said, it was drilled into me at home in order that it became a reflex

If it's just a reflex, what's the point? It's completely meaningless.

Yes, I taught my kids always to say thank you when someone gives them something. Because that's what society expects and hey have to fit in. And appreciation and gratitude was always modelled to them within the home, so they absorbed and followed that.

So when they say thank you to me (or did to their dad) after we'd cooked for them, it was spontaneous and could happen at any point during the meal. And they said it because they felt it, and genuinely appreciated it. Just as we said thank you or expressed pleasure and appreciation when they did/do things for us.

My friend's kids' "thank you mum for a lovely* meal please can I leave the table" was SO robotic and so devoid of any real appreciation, that it chilled me a little.

*whether it had been lovely or not

Do they have manners around other people and outside of the home?

Just wondering if it is a lack of general manners or a specific reaction to your rules.

Step children often have complex emotions and I assume they only see their dad EOW as you mention 2.5 hour journey for them.
How is the relationship with their mum? Context could be very relevant here.

Interesting, when I take my lovely warm morning shower I often remember the freezing damp bathrooms I have lived with in the past and feel grateful. Similarly when I’m snuggled up with lovely DH, in our comfy bed, in our nice house, in our quiet street, I often feel thankful and grateful.

You have a totally different mindset Jeepers.

It’s actually very good for your mental health to appreciate things.