parenting

When David was about 12, he told me that he wanted to take the train to school alone. My gut reaction was, “No way in hell!” I mean, we live in a safe neighborhood and all, but David has ADHD and was easily distracted. What if he missed his stop? What if someone messed with him?

Growing up, I'd been taught to never think, breathe, or even utter this F-word.

Despite our relative insulation from homophobia, my wife and I are not unaware of the situation. There are plenty of people in this country who don’t believe that we have the right to exist, to be married, or to raise a child together.

My goal isn’t just to raise a son who can avoid the trappings of eating disorders. It’s to help him actively embrace who he is, on all levels.

We have been together for 15 years and parents for two. We've had sex at all times of the day and night. Every day of the week. Indoors and outdoors. We've played out our fantasies. And indulged our fetishes. And now it feels like it's the end of the road. I'd heard about parenthood being the death of sex, but I never subscribed to that notion. Surely that happened to the non-adventurous missionary-position-believers. Ha! But two years into this parenting thing and I would much rather sleep with my toddler than my husband.

“It will be long,” they told me. “It will likely be days after your due date,” they advised. “Everything will begin slowly with breaks between contractions,” they said. They lied.

My husband never, ever drives thru a fast food restaurant because it’s easier, and instead makes it back to the house and gives our daughter something that WILL grow mold if left out too long, unlike the McDonald’s hamburger I would have let her have.

I always have a small piece of my brain on mom mode, no matter what else is happening. I have no problem with this, since that is how humanity has survived.