Dear Sangita: My kid is trying to “parent trap” me with her new teacher whom she loves. She found out who her teacher is for school this year, and he’s coached her before at school. She’s insistent that the two of us are meant to be! She’s been bringing him up a lot and seems to be planning ways to get us together. I’ve been single a long time, and I know she’s just doing it out of love, but I also don’t want to get her hopes up — even if I do think he’s kind of cute! — Not for teacher
Dear NFT: Straight up: no. Knowing that he’s going to be her teacher for the year, it’s probably not a good idea to get involved with him. If he’s just another teacher in the school, maybe that’s a different conversation. But in this case, it’s not the right thing for your kid, even though she is excited about it. The only way this will work is if the relationship happens to evolve naturally outside of school: let’s say you run into each other while on a run or something like that. But the idea of meeting each other through school — I just don’t think that’s the right thing. Your daughter comes first; hold back for now. As for your daughter, I think she’s noticed that you’ve been single for a long time and just wants to help. But I think you just have to say, “He’s your teacher, and there’s a boundary, and I have to make sure that boundary is met because this is your education and you have to be taken care of.” If anything gets messy or dirty, you don’t want it to affect her learning experience at all.
Dear Sangita: I’m getting low-key bullied for being a working mom who doesn’t have time for school fundraisers. My kids are at a school where parents are overly involved, all the time. I work full time and almost never contribute to fundraising efforts. Now they’ve started to talk. A parent was sending me details for her kid’s birthday party a few weeks ago and I saw a text come in on her phone that was clearly about me. Do I confront her? — Parental peer pressure
Dear PPP: When we talk about balance in life, nothing is ever actually balanced. In your case, focusing on your career means you can’t also be doing school volunteering right now. At the end of the day, you’re helping your kids by earning money and showing them how to work hard. You should never feel guilty for that; you’re trying to do as much as you can. You don’t ever have to be involved in school activities, and being peer pressured by parents is completely wrong. As long as you’re there for your kids and your kids are happy, there’s nothing anyone can say about it. If your kids were asking you to be a part of school activities, then that might be a different story, and you might adjust priorities a bit to make it happen. But you definitely don’t need to make it happen just because a few parents think you should! I would call up that mom and ask if she wants to chat and go for a coffee, rather than putting it all in a text where people can read into things. You can tell her candidly that you saw that text, and you’ve been hearing what people have been saying, and you just want to understand where they’re coming from. These might be parents who don’t work, and so they’ve decided to devote their time to school volunteering. You both just come from different perspectives. Talking it out might help.
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