Magazine

Tired mom in a dark nursery swaying an infant next to a sound machine

The 3 AM Survival Guide Inspired By Justin Bieber Baby Lyrics

It's 3:14 AM and I'm staring at the frozen slush on the Chicago streets below our apartment window, shifting my weight from my left hip to my right hip in a hypnotic, desperate rhythm. My daughter is screaming with the...

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A dad holding his 11-month-old baby while looking at a Minecraft village on a computer screen.

The Real Truth About How To Make Baby Villagers Grow Faster

Last Tuesday at 3:14 AM, the ambient temperature in my living room was exactly 68.4 degrees, I was running on four hours of deeply fragmented sleep, and I was aggressively throwing virtual carrots at a digital infant. I was desperately...

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Tired mom holding a crying newborn in a dark nursery at 3 AM.

The Real Cost of Saying Hello Baby: Surviving the First Weeks

I was standing in my kitchen at 3:17 AM wearing a stained nursing bra and my husband's old high school track shorts, violently bouncing my screaming oldest child while crying into a cold cup of chamomile tea. The dog was...

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Dad holding a sleeping baby while reading pop culture news on his phone in a dimly lit nursery.

The Reality of Sparkle Megan's Baby Reveal (From a Tired Dad)

Dear Marcus of six months ago. It's currently 3:14 AM, the rain is aggressively battering the Portland windows, and you're sitting in the glider chair trying to figure out if breathing too loudly will wake up the tiny human currently...

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A tired mom holding a coffee mug next to a toddler bed

The 3 AM Panic Over an Imaginary Baby Wolf and Real Spiders

It’s 3:14 AM and I’m standing in the hallway wearing my husband’s stained college sweatpants, entirely unable to process what's happening. The baby monitor is just blinking this angry little green light at me, and through the static, I can...

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Frustrated mom holding a baby while looking at old nursery gear

The Baby Grand Era: When Grandma’s Advice Makes You Want to Scream

I'm staring at a drop-side crib that looks like it survived the Oregon Trail, and my mother-in-law is patting the literal patchwork quilt she just laid inside it. She's telling me how my husband slept in this exact death trap...

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Tired dad holding an eleven month old baby while looking confused at a laptop screen showing sleep data

How to Actually Troubleshoot Your Way to an Fantastic Baby

It was 2:14 AM on a Tuesday, the Portland rain was actively mocking my sanity against the bedroom window, and my 11-month-old was throwing a massive runtime error. I had tried the bouncing walk, the aggressive shushing, the weird yoga-ball-hip-sway...

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A bewildered dad staring at a sleeping newborn baby

A Baby Born In Portland: My Complete First-Time Dad Meltdown

The thermostat in Room 314 of the maternity ward was locked at exactly 68 degrees, but I was sweating through my gray hoodie like I was pushing a critical database update to production at 2 AM with no backup. My...

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Tired British dad holding a teething G Baby and a silicone sloth teether in a London flat at 3am

The Night My G Baby Discovered Her Gums (and Destroyed My Sanity)

It was 3:14 in the morning on a Tuesday, and I was sitting on the edge of the bath in our London flat, entirely motionless, letting my daughter chew aggressively on my left clavicle. We had recently started calling her...

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