My son turns two in August. He’s been exhibiting a lot of behavior that falls squarely into the “terrible twos” category since about 17/18 months. I’ve been told this is normal. I’ve been told it gets better at two, then bad again at three. I’ve been told “just wait until two.” Whatever the answer, I’m hoping it either ends soon or I’m granted about 500 more patience points by the divine.

 Seemingly overnight, my son transformed from a kid we could take anywhere—WOULD take anywhere thanks to his perfect restaurant behavior—into a child that can’t handle sitting in a shopping cart for five minutes while in Target because all he wants to do is squirm and run around and knock things over.

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Recently, I heard a story in the news and was pretty torn. It was story of how a mother in New York ordered her bickering 10 and 12 year old girls out of the car and drove away. Here’s the story in case you missed it. Apparently, Madlyn Primoff left her girls on the side of the road, returned some time later and reported them missing when they weren’t where she left them. A Good Samaritan had seen the girls on the side of the road and brought them to the police station.

Madlyn has been charged with a crime and isn’t able to see her daughters anymore.

I’m torn because this case definitely isn’t black and white for me. I mean, who didn’t hear the threat of “If you don’t stop fighting, I’ll pull this car over and…” But, c’mon–we all knew it was an empty threat. But, who hasn’t gotten so annoyed and worn down by their kid that they’re tempted to leave them on the side of the road and drive away. Of course, there’s no way I could actually DO it, but I’d sure as hell be tempted. And the kids aren’t little–they’re 10 and 12. Definitely old enough to understand punishment and consequence.

I think this just brings to light a larger issue that parenting is HARD. It’s frustrating and thankless and will make you question nearly every decision. But, thankfully, for me, is 100% worth it.

But I’m interested in what everyone else thinks. What’s your opinion on this situation?

As though this topic han’t been run into the ground enough, let’s talk Octomom. (Dead horse, I beat thee.) I’ve watched with mild fascination all of her interviews and read most of the articles on her life. And, honestly, like most people, the more I hear about her, the more skeevy and bizarre she seems. I’m not going to get into all of the overdiscussed topics of her cracked out doctor shooting a litter of embryos into her body, her seeming addiction to having children and her codependent relationship with her parents.

Nope, I’m not.

What I want to mention is this: last week, I found myself feeling one emotion toward Nadya Suleman that I never thought I’d feel. And that emotion is Envy.

Not Envy for her kids, fame or plastic surgery. But Envy for her shoes. See, I was reading an article in the uber-klassy US Weekly and they had a picture of her running errands or something. I was starting to flip the page when I caught sight of her shoes. She was wearing a pair of Tory Burch flats. The same shoes I’ve been drooling over for more than a year. The same shoes that I haven’t bought because I just can’t justify a pair of flats that are $150+ right now with all of the nanny expenses, diapers, clothes and other things that go along with having children.

Mind you, I only have one kid. Not fourteen.

So, there was this strange moment where I was staring at these really cute flats, wishing I could buy them, while skimming an article on how Nadya was accepting public donations on her website.

I guess I only have one thing to say to Nadya: Can I borrow your shoes?

While I usually exploit my dunce-y motherhood moments in public blog posts, today I’m going to talk about something that’s bigger than me. Something a lot more worthy of attention than mishaps at Chuck E Cheese.

It’s easy for writers to remain in their own little cocoons, forgetting that there’s other people out there, forgetting that our words do reach people, forgetting that we have a public platform, albeit somewhat small.

Earlier this month, I received an email from a reader, Victoria, asking for my help. She has a sixteen-month-old daughter, Gwendolyn, who has been diagnosed with Spinal Muscular Atrophy (SMA). SMA is the #1 genetic killer of infants, and 1 in 40 people unknowingly carry the gene. The life expectancy is two years old.
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Since my son turned eighteen months old, I’ve discovered a disturbing trend among friends and family–the questions about “second child” turning from merely inquisitive to downright hostile. When my son turned a year, it apparently was a magical number in which people deemed it socially acceptable to inquire about the timing of “the next one.” I mainly just shrugged my shoulders and made a big production of pouring myself a nice fat glass of Cab. I mean, my kid didn’t sleep through the night until six months, people. I think I’m still recovering.

But now that he’s a year-and-a-half, the shrug and wine-drinking no longer quiets them. I get bombarded with, “Don’t you want your son to have a close sibling?” and “Do you want to change diapers until you’re sixty?” As if I would stop, put the wine glass down and skip off to the bedroom with my husband to avoid diaper changes in middle-age.

And for the record, yeah it would be great for my kid to have a close sibling and no, I don’t really want to be changing my diapers and my kid’s at the same time. But there’s this thing called “sanity.” And I’ve barely recovered it due to the aforementioned non-sleeping and three months of colic and constant zombie-state and being pregnant in the middle of August and swelling up to the size of the Stay Puff Marshmallow Man.

So.

Where does this leave me?

I’m not sure. But I think I’m going to pour myself a nice glass of Cab.