Parenting

Two weeks ago, Parker went home with a fever and a droopy eye, stumbling a bit. Two days later, his parents the truth: It was terminal cancer.

2. I have a really cute friend I can set you up with. I am single by choice. No thanks!

Today I’m talking masturbation in particular, because this stuff is the stuff happening before your teenager is getting busy in the back of your SUV (it’s happening, sorry). We are laying groundwork for healthy, happy sexual behavior. In the next two installments, we’ll talk porn and then finish it off with actual partner sex stuff.

Recently, I’ve noticed that my children have inherited a sarcasm detector that would make mad scientist Professor Frink from The Simpsons quite impressed. They notice whenever I make a snarky comment, and sometimes will even make their own sarcastic jokes that’d have Ricky Gervais rolling in laughter. Sometimes they target us in their jokes, while other times they say them to each other. And as horrible as it may sound, raising sarcastic kids might not be such a bad thing, either.

I'm calmer, more level-headed, and more responsive (not reactive). I'm able to make it through the day without every comment, incident or event causing me to spiral out of control. Oh, and I'm not crying, at least not every minute of everyday, because antidepressants allow me think clearer, feel better, and be better. Antidepressants make me a better mom.

I didn’t trumpet these views to my mommy groups, of course. I wasn’t crass. But when a girl let her daughter cry it out, I decided the tot seemed a tad withdrawn. When a mom told me all her sons were cut, I nodded politely while thinking, she is so deluded. She made up a medical excuse for a pass on child mutilation. When I saw mothers in the grocery store, carseats in tow, I paraded by, baby in wrap, nose in the air. At least those moms could see another option.

Several months ago I read a piece from a mother who was so over people comparing raising kids to taking care of their “furbabies.” The annoyance and eye rolls practically leapt off the page.

Help.