The 90s Crack Baby Myth: What Prenatal Exposure Actually Means
When my cousin adopted a beautiful little girl from the grow system, the unsolicited opinions rolled in like a bitter Chicago winter storm. A neighborhood aunty whispered over cold chai that the child would be permanently broken because of her...
Surviving the Hell Baby Phase When You Are Running on Empty
The microwave clock says three in the morning, the only light in your kitchen is the green digital glow, and you're bouncing on a yoga ball so hard your knees ache while holding a rigid infant who sounds like a...
Why the Kayla Vesia Baby News Broke My Brain as a New Dad
It was 3:17 AM. My 11-month-old was finally asleep, doing that weird starfish pose that aggressively takes up eighty percent of the crib real estate. The room smelled faintly of diaper cream and exhausted desperation. I was sitting on the...
Dear Past Me: The Truth About Parenting Lifelines and Sanity
Dear Sarah from exactly six months ago. Youβre sitting on the sticky linoleum floor in the kitchen right next to the dog's water bowl. You're wearing Daveβs oversized gray hoodie that smells faintly of old garlic and you're mainlining your...
The Honest Parent Guide to the Baby Guinness Shot
It was nine at night on a Tuesday and my toddler was treating our living room like a hostile takeover. Rohan had three molars breaking through his gums simultaneously and I was doing the classic parent sway in the kitchen,...
Pacing the Kitchen Floor After That Tragic Baby Emmanuel News
The kitchen tiles are brutally cold at 3:14 am, especially when you're wearing only mismatched socks and a t-shirt heavily compromised by regurgitated milk. Florence, the twin who treats sleep as a personal insult, had been screaming for forty-five minutes...
The Kentucky Cheerleader Case and My Postpartum Wake-Up Call
I was sitting cross-legged on the linoleum floor of my laundry room at 3:14 AM, aggressively folding a pile of those impossibly tiny baby socks that somehow always lose their mates, when the headline popped up on my phone screen....
The Megan Walerius Baby Drama and What I Wish I Knew Months Ago
Hey man. Youβre currently sitting on the bathroom tiles at 3:14 AM, scrolling Twitter while the shower steam theoretically clears up your five-month-old's congestion. I know this because I'm you, six months in the future. The kid is eleven months...
The Conflicting Advice About Having A NICU Baby That Broke Me
I was standing by the ridiculously deep metal scrub sink at 3:14 AM when I realized I was completely, utterly paralyzed by other people's opinions. My mother-in-law had just texted me: Let her rest, touch overstimulates them right now. The...