Happy Mother’s Day to the wondrous women in our lives. To my own mom, who just passed her last test to be a dental assistant and puts all her love into work-of-art birthday cards for my boys. To my step-mom, who takes my kids on adventures of culture and silliness. To my grandma, who catches so many small details of my children. To my mom-in-law, who shows my sons to appreciate dogs, water, and laughter. To my sister, who I’m so lucky to have as a friend and a parenting confidante. And to my wife, who is so much more than this month’s column can say.
For this week’s Family Matters with Tracey Serebin, Tracey asked me about 5 tips dads might like to have before they have a baby. Listen in and hear about planning for paternity leave, managing all those well-meaning friends and family members who want to visit your exhausted household, and avoiding spontaneous expenditures that come from your overjoyed but non-budget-conscious state of mind. Tracey’s interview with me on her Internet radio program runs 30 minutes, following her segment with a mom expert. Log on to the new installment and click “Listen Now” or “Podcast.”
This month is both National Breast Cancer Awareness Month and Domestic Violence Awareness Month. With organizations like Avon sponsoring fundraisers and Major League Baseball commemorating the fight against breast cancer with pink bats (among other efforts), awareness is growing for this major threat against our women. As a forty-something adult, I have known of too many cases in my sphere of friends and family who have suffered from this kind of cancer and I urge the men out their to help their women get regular breast exams because early detection is so important.
On the domestic violence front, this is an area in which men are much more likely to be the aggressors. Our women and children fall victim to what can often be the result of men not getting the help they need to stop the violence. Please take a look at a past article on this issue, called “Being a Man Means Stopping Domestic Violence.” Not that most of us need a special month to be reminded, but this is certainly a period of time to do what we can to show our women respect, love, and support.
Listen to this week’s podcast of Tracey Serebin’s Family Matters and hear me talk about a dad’s role in helping mom recover from childbirth. Actually, I don’t know if anyone actually recovers — perhaps the term should be “reasonably functions.” In any event, Tracey’s interview with me on her Internet radio program runs 30 minutes, following her talk with a postpartum nurse/doula. I’m now a regular guest on Tracey’s show, which is growing rapidly (more news to come on that end). You can log on to the new installment and click “Listen Now” or “Podcast.” Or go directly to the podcast. Let me know what you think.
Tracey Serebin, author of 101 Questions for Expectant Parents, talked with me about how important commujnication is between new moms and dads before and after a baby arrives in the family. Catch the interview on Tracey’s show, “Family Matters,” by visiting www.webtalkradio.net/content/view/598/30/ .
Aside from taking a fairly morbid look at why my wife is essential (http://www.familymanonline.com/columns.php?id=55), I’m attempting to highlight a few less obvious reasons to celebrate my partner in this month of the mommy:
She reads almost as many kid novels as my 10-year-old — at night by herself.
She rarely complains about our sons’ messy rooms because she’s the biggest slob in the house.
She knows how to say, “Sign here, honey,” after she fills out the kid-related paperwork I can’t stand dealing with.
She cleans the cat litter every day in repayment for the eight years I did so while she was in child-bearing mode.
She lets me hide in the bathroom to check my fantasy baseball scores under the pretext that I actually need that long to use the toilet.
She puts up with the fact that her four boys (me included) cry more often than she does.
She allows me to write almost anything I want about her (she nixed a whole lot of graphic details in my childbirth columns).
Happy Mother’s Day to you, honey, and to all the moms out there who do all the big and little things to make our family lives tick. For an extra laugh, check out the following goofy clip: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bhcA4Ry65FU .
It’s only a few hours into Mother’s Day, but already I’ve messed it up. First, I couldn’t get the kids out of our bedroom before they woke my wife just before 7am. Then, I needed tips on making the coffee (I never make coffee). I often make waffles in a waffle iron, but today I tried a different batter that produced bricks of flour that might as well have been used for home construction. I went outside to cut flowers with one of my sons, and discovered that most of our blossoms are dormant, so all I got was a single lily (lovely as it was) which housed a slimey snail. We finally got to the breakfast table, which my boys set with some flair, and Wendy was a total sport. She didn’t care that the waffles sucked or that the flower arrangement was anemic. The kids and I scored with the gifts and my wife smiled radiantly — her patience and ability to see the glimmers of sunshine in everything being two more reasons she’s a wonderful mommy.
Oh my dear wife, thank you for the reminder of why we share a life./You left for just two days/And oh was I amazed/That solo parenting three involves a lot of work and strife!
OK, so my poetic skills need a little work, but I hope the message is clear: Parenting three children is much easier on my nerves and resources when my wife is there with me. This week, my wife left town for a scheduled three-day conference just 150 miles upstate. The first 36 hours were fine. I got the kids to their schools, fed them their meals, put them to bed, got myself to work, and managed to keep my cool with them for the most part. But the next several hours involved losing my middle child for 10 minutes on a busy street (this has happened before: http://www.familymanonline.com/columns.php?id=34) and generally running out of gas last night with two hours and dinner left to get through before I could rest a bit. My wife decided to surprise me by coming home early and I’ve rarely been happier to see her. It was one of those times when I realized how much I rely on her to share the parenting load. My respect for single parents grew even more in the last two days — and so did my respect for my wife.
Babies have a way of testing the best of marriages. Pre-kids, husbands and wives may work well together, being loving and kind and perhaps doing a decent job of managing a house and finances. Once a kid enters the picture, the responsibility level goes through the roof. You have more than just each other to care for and you may well disagree with choices about parenting style, foods to feed the little one, and who can best care for a child when one or both of you are away. There are all of these grandparents and involved friends who have words of advice and ways of invading your personal space. There’s always the subject of money: how to spend it and save it (now you have to plan for preschool, possible private school, and college). Then, there is sex — or the lack thereof. Husbands and wives have plenty to tear at them once they are in the family way. So, how can we keep the relationship healthy, for the sake of ourselves and our children?
Mom-authors Stacie Cockrell, Cathy O’Neill, and Julia Stone deliver Babyproofing Your Marriage (http://www.babyproofingyourmarriage.com) a superbly organized, down-to-earth manual about marital challenges and solutions. The writers have at least two kids each and have had many successes both at home and in the workplace, so they know the issues of modern parents. Providing advice from their personal experiences, their husbands, and other parents, the women tackle the big issues at play in a marriage affected by children. The seven quick-moving chapters (lots of subheads keep the content manageable for parents with little time to read) cover everything from keeping score (how partners tally up how much each person does for the family — I’m definitely guilty of that!) to sex (stressing the unique effects a new baby has on intimacy) to having more kids (chaos reigns, so how do we manage it for the good of the marriage?).
Adding to the overall experience are Larry Martin’s witty illustrations, which enhance the already approachable humor used throughout the book. And particularly helpful is the summary of suggestions on pages 255-263, titled “How to Live Happily Ever After in Four Easy Steps (Ha!).” Although the tips in this section are not meant to be a cure-all, they do synthesize the ideas put forth in the book.
With Valentine’s Day coming up, Babyproofing Your Marrriage is a fine gift for your favorite wife or husband. Read it together or simply use to start discussions and find your own solutions. Remember that taking care of your marriage is one of the best things you can do for your kids.
The August cover of Babytalk magazine (which can be viewed at http://www.parenting.com/parenting/babytalk/channel) shows a close-up of a baby nursing at a breast. There’s no nipple showing and the breast is airbrushed and only partially represented. But the depiction is clear enough, particularly with the headline “Why don’t women nurse longer?”
Let me start by saying that I strongly support breastfeeding. Numerous studies prove the health benefits, attachment advantages, and (dare I say it) cost efficiency of feeding a child breastmilk. So, for those women who are physically capable of breastfeeding, I think it should be tried, at the very least. For the men in these women’s lives, it must be supported, even though it postpones a man’s claim to his wife’s mammary glands for most of the time she breastfeeds (tough it out guys).
My three children were breastfed for more than a year per each kid. My wife nursed our children at home, in bathrooms, at her office, and in the car. She rarely fed our children in public, but when she did so, it was under heavy cover because she felt judged by others — especially when they made comments like “how disgusting” and “I don’t need to see that.”
With this Babytalk cover, the editors and publishers of the magazine take the debate high-profile. This is not the first time a publication has done this, but the impact of this doctor’s office mainstay is significant as is the image on the front. I think it looks beautiful because it depicts a natural, nurturing moment, but others feel it has the effect of ’shoving the issue in people’s faces.’
I believe our American culture needs to get past its issues with breastfeeding, especially in the first two years or so of a child’s life when the health benefits are so clear. We shouldn’t shame women who want to breastfeed as much as we shouldn’t pressure those who do not, for whatever their reason. But I don’t see what’s wrong with promoting breastfeeding’s benefits with pretty pictures or powerful words.
