I've Developed NPS through my Obsession

{Julie at Youngbloods4ever is starting a new Friday special or section of her blog. It's called Neglectful Parent Syndrome Anonymous where she confesses about her obsessions that keeps her away from her parental duties. I just love this girl you know, she's got so much things in common with me and after following her blog for a little while, I've concluded that she and I are like two peas in a pod. She has the same weakness or obsessions I have, isn't that cool? So I've decided I'm going to come out of hiding and jump on her bandwagon and confess my NPSA..lol. If you want to join in on her weekly meetings, you can read her first post about this topic, just click {here}, it'll take you right there.}

Ok...hello!! Is this on? Hummmmp, hi...my name is Anjeny and I have NPS (Neglectful Parent Syndrome). I know I'm soooo ashamed of myself...lol.

I have a really bad problem with obsessions or passionate hobbies that I find myself buried so deep in them that I often neglected my children. I have a few of those obsessions but today I'm going to talk about one of them and that is my LOVE for reading. I read all kinds of books but what I love reading most are those fiction entertaining books, romance novels of any kind. The last book series I read is the Twilight series. I found out about the series a lot later than most of the Twilight fan populace but once I started reading the first book, I fell completely hopelessly in obsessed with it. It was so bad that I had to use doing laundry as an excuse to hide away from my family so I can read the books. I read all four books in about a week, maybe a total of probably eight hours of sleep for that week. Now if this is not a problem, I don't know what is.

See, I love reading, have always loved reading since I was a little girl. My love for books stemmed from my parents. We were poor so we couldn't afford a TV for entertainment so our family spent our evenings listening to stories my parents would tell us from the books they read. My mom's stories are usually from the Bible, she'd read a story that day and told us that night as a bedtime story. Then my dad would tell us a fairy tale story. They told it soooo well that I just couldn't wait to start reading so I can read those stories for myself. When I was old enough to read, they handed over their books to me to read. Once I've worn those books out from reading it over and over, cover to cover, I would raid my friends' houses to see if they have any other books to read. When I've exhausted their book source, I moved on to the school library. Of course the reading books we were assigned from school were not enough, my teachers sometimes got frustrated with me because I was constantly demanding that we moved on to the next book because I could never stick with their guideline to read a chapter or two in the book...I would just keep going til I read the whole book before everyone else did. Pretty soon my friends had caught on to my obsession so they started checking out books for me too from the library. Since a student is only allowed two books to check out at one time, those were not enough so my friends started helping me out with that. That's how badly I liked reading.

Well, when I became a mom, I wanted more than anything that my kids would develop this love of books like I did. When I got pregnant with my first child, I started reading to her in the womb. I was reading all the time, from romance novels, to magazines, to self-help books to the scriptures. But most of my readings are entertainment books like novels. My sweet mother-in-law and grand mom-in-law found out about this too so they too started supporting me on this hobby and whenever they read a book they like or come across a bookstore, I would be a getting a package in the mail with the books they found for me. So that was good because of course, there is really nothing wrong with reading.

The problem I have with this hobby is that I get so caught up that I ignored everything else in my life. My housework is forgotten, the dishes were filed up in the sink, the laundry file gets higher and higher, the kids are neglected, no food was made and they started fending for themselves. See, once I picked up a book to read and I get into it, I couldn't put it down. A normal person would maybe read a chapter or two, bookmarked their spot in the book and go on and attend to their responsibilities.

Me? I picked up a book and my response to the kids when they said, "mom, I'm hungry", "gimme a few more minutes or go in the fridge dear, see what you can find in there." Hubby comes home from work and asked, "honey? what's for dinner?" Me, nose still in the book, "hmm, oh dinner, sorry haven't thought about that yet, gimme a few minutes will ya?" An hour later, still no dinner. I would literally stay up til morning if I have to to finish the book before I would get up and started taking care of my other responsibilities. Talk about frustrations for my hubby....he would literally threatened to take the book I was reading at the moment to burn it...{Blasphemy!!}.

Remember how I said I want my kids to love reading too? Kids copy everything their parents do so I figured if I read in front of them, they would follow suit and start picking up a book on their own to read. I know they can read because I've read with them and have them read aloud for me. A couple of my kids are fast readers and had started reading really good while they were still in preschool. A couple of the other kids have difficulty reading but are getting better. But the twisted kind of fate for me, my kids couldn't care less about reading. Oh they will read if it pertained to their school or our family daily reading but other than, they would not pick up a book to read for fun unless I bribe them or threaten their lives.

So me being this bad with my obsessions, I was always looking for ways to justify my reading. I figured if my kids are reading and actually love reading, I would be able to read too and I did set aside time just for that. But they were not interested in that whatsoever. I got so desperate that I bribed them....I offered money for every book they pick up to read and even would do their chores for them. You think that work? Noooo, they actually said that they would rather do their chores than read and the money they don't really need....traitors!!

Like I said earlier, the last time I read a book was the Twilight series that was almost six months ago and I think I read Stephanie Meyers last book she wrote, "The Host" and then that was it. I am itching to get my hands on Heidi's book, Miss Delacourt Speaks her Mind. I think right now my hubby is a little contented because my nose hasn't been buried in a book lately but what he doesn't know is that this reading obsession of mine is still strong.

What am I obsessively reading, you are wondering? Well.......I am blogging, aren't I? That would conclude that I am reading blogs now...no? I am reading blogs. No only am I reading posts of bloggers on my blog roll but I am also reading the posts from their blog rolls. Some days, if a post from a blogger that drew my attention that day, I started reading all the other posts on that blog. I get up in the morning, get my kids ready for school, either I drop them off at school or have hubby drop them, feed my two year old, then turn on her favorite show and then I sit my behind down in front my PC and read blogs the whole morning. You see how bad I get with my obsession and that I have a problem?

Ahem....so there you have it folks....thank you for listening, I mean reading.

Have a great Aloha Friday.