Category: Family

Feminist Friday: Everyone should have a Plan B

Being a mother of girls I have been told this Plan B thing should worry me. …but it doesn’t. I mean why should I be worried that my girls will be given an option. Period. Yep, that’s how I feel about it, it’s a choice just like eating McDonald’s is a choice. As a parent I feel it is my job to help my girls make wise choices for their health and well being. Not just physically but mentally prepare them to make the best choices for them. That means a myriad of things. How to dress to keep warm on a December Sunday at Cleveland Browns game, how to not fill their bodies with just junk food and eat a balanced diet, that caring for others is almost as important as caring for themselves , how to deal with puberty and how to practice safe sex.

Now as a woman I understand that sometimes things happen. Sometimes you’re caught off guard by a freak snow storm, or you just really really need large greasy fries and a pound of M&M’s, sometimes you can’t care for people that don’t want to be cared for, and sometimes with sex, accidents happen. Bad things happen. But that doesn’t mean your world has to come crashing down around you. That means that you are in charge of you’re own health and body. And the CHOICE is yours and yours alone.

Maybe I am crazy. Maybe this is a poor way of looking at this hot button issue but here is the thing, I am the parent. I get to choose what values I instill in my children, and my girls should get to choose how they handle situations in their own life. I hope to educate them enough so that if ever faced with a tough decision they are informed enough to know all of the options available to them. I hope to teach my girls to read labels and know exactly what they are and aren’t putting into their bodies whether that is medication or foods. I want them to value the full weight of human life, while at the same time valuing their own minds and bodies.

With everything girls have to worry about I want mine to know that I am with them every step of the way. They can ask me anything and come to me with any questions or problems they may have. In that I also want them to have every option available to them. Just because I wouldn’t doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be able to. Every choice should be an educated one. Does that make me a bad mother? I don’t think so. Wanting options and choices for our kids is what every parent wants.

“Maybe I’m Not Cut Out for This Gig” and Other Thoughts After Having a Fight with My Kid

My son is 6. I like it because he can tell me when things are wrong with him or what he wants to eat or about his favorite Avengers. I don’t like it because he can also tell fibs and ignore me and also sometimes act like a giant dick. And it’s times like those when I think, “I’m really bad at this. Like…BAD.” I’m not, say, Dina Lohan bad. But I know that he’ll be in therapy one day talking about how that one morning before school, Mom lost her shit and threw his bookbag across the room. Or dropped the f-bomb 34 times in a tirade about him not listening. Or. Or. Or. Continue reading

The Autism Chronicles: Self-Injury Hurts Everyone

At the beginning of the school year, Charlie had some big issues. We got regular reports that he was biting and hitting his teacher and aides. This isn’t an uncommon behavior with non-verbal children, but we only saw it at home when he was extremely frustrated, angry or in pain. It wasn’t a regular occurrence, so the fact that he was doing it at school was troubling. New town, new home, new school – new acting out. I, of course, felt super guilty for bringing them down here and his obvious dislike of the situation. We worried they were going to kick him out of school, that he was going to seriously injure someone, that maybe something bad was happening at school to trigger this behavior. Check out news stories of abuse in schools against autistic students – it’s absolutely horrifying how frequent and severe it is.

Luckily, this behavior settled down after a couple of weeks. A combination of Charlie getting used to the teachers, teachers getting used to Charlie, and vast quantities of pepperoni to get him to do as asked. He began getting more and more positive reports, he came home with crafts projects and started using utensils when he ate. There was an outburst every once in a while, but quickly diffused without injury to anyone. We were feeling pretty good, this experiment was working, we were a functional, happy family.

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An Incomplete List of Things I Can’t Listen to in the Car Anymore Because My Child Asks Too Many Questions

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– Wu Tang Clan, Enter the Wu Tang (too much N-word and 6-year-olds don’t grasp the concept of why it’s not okay if WE say it)

– L7, Smell the Magic (Fast & Frightening is one of my favorite songs, but the line “Got so much clit, she don’t need no balls” is a line I don’t have the patience to explain)

– Jay-Z, The Black Album (Again, with the n-word, but also kids are bad at understanding the drug trade) Continue reading

Two is hard, don’t let anyone tell you differently

I know the grammar in the title is incorrect, but that’s what you get when you’re running on four hours of sleep and a beer (don’t judge me…both kids are down for a nap).

I have two kids. And life, right now, is kind of hard. It’s mostly happy, but it’s hard.

Someone once told me that going from 1-2 kids is way easier that going from 0-1. I call bullshit.

Being a new mother to a brand new baby is always hard. Especially when it’s your first. (And I bet, especially, especially, if you’re a single parent).
However, at least that’s the only other being you have to focus on.

When you have two kids, everything becomes a little fuzzier. You try to focus on the baby, while running, yes, literally, running, after the other one.

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Hopeful we’re not Naive.

Before we started this process we read several books and all of the internet.  There isn’t a lot of [accurate] media and I don’t personally know any lesbians, who have gone through this process, to draw experiences from, so the internet and books were our reference to get things started.  It led to some missteps, as different doctors have different letters after their names that we didn’t know we needed to look for, sometimes we didn’t ask the right questions right away and ended up wasting our time, and laws and practices vary so much employer to employer, state to state. Continue reading

Your Morning Mixtape: High School Edition

Oh hey, guys… Long time, no see. I’ve just been over here doing……… Ok, I’ve been doing nothing, really. I’ve been in a slump-type thing for the past couple of weeks.

BUT! Things are looking up! Tomorrow morning I am going on an adventure. I am leaving the state! Without my husband! Or my child! Or my dignity, because I have tickets to go see FALL OUT BOY. I am as giddy as a middle school girl. My friend and I are going to be roadtripping down to the Dirty(er) South and spending a few days in good old Hotlanta. It’s my first vacation  without my kid. I’m just the tiniest bit excited.

In honor of the fact that tomorrow I will be driving down the road eating all of the snacks and singing at the top of my lungs, I compiled the biggest playlist of the stuff I listened to in High School. Nothing says freedom like blasting 311 and eating Red Vines. America, amirite? This one has everything from Nirvana and Pearl Jam to Luscious Jackson and the good old Butthole Surfers. It literally bleeds 1996, or as I like to call it, “Freshman Year’. Put this bad boy on shuffle and prepare to get nostalgic for the time when people wore flannel unironically, and the internet was something nerds did on Friday nights. You’re welcome.

As usual, you can follow me on Spotify, if you have a weird burning need to know how often I listen to Saves the Day (Spoiler alert, it’s a lot)

I’ll see you guys next week, after I’m done being AWESOME.

The Alternate Universe Game

Have you ever wondered if somewhere, there is another you, existing in a different universe, making different decisions? Sort of an “I wonder what would have happened if” universe? When I was younger, I played this game a lot. I would wonder if somewhere in time, there was an Erin whose mom didn’t die young, who was still around and would offer me advice and hugs and all the normal things that moms do. As I got older, I had really bad insomnia, and I would play this game well into the night, assuming I hadn’t had enough bourbon to knock me out. Continue reading

Happiness Is A Warm Cookie

Cookie Heaven

Cookie Heaven

This week has been…tough. A couple of weeks ago, I went to my boss and did the craziest thing I may have ever done – I offered to do way more work than I’m paid to do. I think I had some sort of breakdown, or an alternate personality surfaced, or controlled by government aliens. I basically said, “You know how I’m completely overwhelmed by my current job responsibilities? I think everything might be easier if I took on some extra work!” See? CRAZYTOWN. So, that all started on Monday and I ended up logging a bunch of overtime (a bunch = any at all).

On top of that, my guy was out of town this weekend. He left on Friday. I’ve been home alone with the boys since they got off the bus. All the stuff in the previous paragraph about work being insanely stressful? I’m REALLY looking forward to getting back to it. I am exhausted in a way I don’t think I’ve ever been before. I don’t want to go to sleep yet because it’s actually quiet and I’m basking in silence.

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Am I the Only One Stoked That My Kid is Getting Older?

Babies. They’re pretty cute. They’re fat and full of rolls and they giggle and they have disproportionately large heads and big anime eyes and they smell like babies! They also can’t talk and shit their pants (generally immediately after you have changed their diaper) and don’t understand how sleeping at night is awesome and their food looks like their poop and they can’t do ANYTHING for themselves. Essentially, they’re nice to look at but the upkeep is RIDICULOUS.

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