My Baby Daddy Is A Bed Bug: A Custody Exchange Survival Guide
Dear Priya from last October. You're currently staring at a navy blue canvas duffel bag in the entryway of your Chicago apartment, wondering if you can legally set it on fire. Your baby daddy just pulled away in his Honda....
Look Outside Rat Baby: When Your Kid's Google Search Gets Real
Last Tuesday, I was standing over my farmhouse sink, aggressively scraping crusty oatmeal off a plastic toddler plate with my thumbnail, when I happened to glance at the family iPad sitting on the counter. The browser was open to a...
What I got wrong about the great baby bassinet debate
I was staring at the ceiling fan at three in the morning, calculating how many consecutive minutes of sleep I had logged since Tuesday. It was twenty-eight. Next to me, my daughter was grunting like a tiny, angry pug in...
Is the Newton Baby Crib Mattress Really Worth Three Hundred Bucks?
My mom told me to put my firstborn on his stomach with a heavy quilt "so he feels secure like he's still in the womb." The lactation consultant at the hospital swore he needed to sleep on my bare chest...
The Ugly Truth About Finding Tiny Silverfish Nymphs in the Nursery
It's two in the morning and I'm staring at the baseboard near the changing table. The lighting is terrible, my eyes are burning from lack of sleep, and my toddler is currently practicing his gymnastics routine on the changing pad....
When Do You Find Out The Gender Of Your Baby
I was untangling IV lines in triage when a patient in her third trimester started crying. Not the quiet hormonal weeping we see a dozen times a shift. Full sobbing. Her mother-in-law had just painted the nursery aggressive pastel pink...
That 3AM Moment We Met a Baby Centipede (And Panicked)
The luminous dial on the baby monitor read 2:14 AM. I was standing in the semi-darkness of the nursery, holding a soiled nappy at armβs length, trying to calculate if I had the energy to take it to the outside...
Why That Viral Froggy Newborn Portrait is Actually a Photoshop Trick
I was scrolling social media at three in the morning during a seemingly endless feeding session when I saw it. A newborn, maybe six days old, propped perfectly upright with their tiny chin resting on their folded hands. The classic...
Dear Past Me: Surviving a Baby Bed Bug Nursery Infestation
Dear Past Jess, It's 3:14 AM. You're standing in the middle of the nursery in your mismatched pajamas, holding your phone flashlight exactly two inches from the crib mattress, trying your absolute hardest not to wake the baby or hyperventilate....