How cruel.

I suspected I was pregnant with my fourth child even before the little ritual with peeing on the stick for two reasons. Reason 1: It is not normal to fall asleep in the (parked) car in the carpool line. Reason 2: It is not normal to think that dipping chocolate covered pretzels in hot sriracha sauce would constitute a tasty snack. Well, okay, both of those reasons are “normal” behavior–normal behavior for a woman who is pregnant, that is.

Food is a touchstone of pregnancy. It’s not only because a pregnant woman has to think of the developing child in her womb as she chooses what to eat, but also because those “pregnancy cravings” are very real. Trader Joe’s trips, normally a comparatively inexpensive supermarket trip to stock up on fresh vegetables, have become a veritable minefield of lethal snacks. There is definitely someone pregnant working in product development for that store (chocolate covered peanut butter filled pretzels, exhibit A), and they prey on my dramatic pregnant appetites. Read more →

All the Jewish celebrity parent gossip you (n)ever wanted to know.

- Congrats to Big Bang Theory star Simon Helberg and his wife Joceyln Towne, who just welcomed their first baby, a daughter named Adeline, on May 8th. If he ever needs parenting tips on set, I think he knows where to go. (Celebrity Baby Scoop)

- Here he is, making his debut: Astala Dylan Willow Geldof-Cohen. If you need a refresher course on who exactly that is, see here. (Celebrity Baby Scoop)

- Mother-of-two Amanda Peet has come out in support of vaccinations, sharing the story of her daughter Molly’s whooping cough when she was an infant. (People)

- In case the elaborateness of her kiddie birthday parties didn’t stress you out enough, Tori Spelling is now debuting a craft collection for the Home Shopping Network. Start making your uber-stylish scrapbooks and holiday cards today! (People)

I yelled at my daughter this morning. She’s not even 2, and I yelled at her. More than once. Even as I was doing it, I knew that I shouldn’t be raising my voice, that I didn’t want to be responding to her that way. I knew that my yelling was not only ineffective, but it was hurtful, and not the way I want to parent my daughters.

And yet, I couldn’t help myself.

I have all sorts of excuses, reasons, whatever you want to call them.  My husband is traveling for work this week, and I’m stressed out by solo parenting and my own work demands. I’m getting over a cold. It’s raining. I was up three times in the middle of the night with her sister, before being awakened at 5 am for the morning. My new diet is stressing me out. I hadn’t had my coffee. She wasn’t behaving well, and I did ask nicely several times. Blah blah blah. Read more →

Looking back, I am quite sure that my great-Uncle Sid was a sexual predator.

In those days no one seems to have known what that was, and certainly no one talked about it. But even when we were very young, we knew he was not the guy you wanted to be with, especially if you were alone. When I was little, he bent down to kiss me and my sister and would stroke our non-existent breasts. When we got older, my father would hold us away from him, but he was still allowed to kiss us. What were people thinking?!

My dad was a good, involved father and yet it would not have occurred to him to confront the situation. He just protected us from inappropriate touching. And that was considered enough. Read more →

What I wouldn't give for a washer/dryer set...

As a nice Jewish girl, I’ve encountered this bit of wisdom from Pirkei Avot (popular Jewish text known as “Ethics of our Fathers”) time and time again: Aizehu Ashir Hasameach B’Chelko. Translated: Who is rich? He who is happy with his lot. I understood the words, but the deeper meaning never really sunk in. Then a few weeks ago I had an epiphany, with the help of a kitchen renovation and Shel Silverstein.

Now I’d been feeling a little down lately, thinking about the things that we can’t afford yet, and eating my heart out about updates on Facebook: this one got a new car, that one a new house, etc. “Why are we the only ones not living the dream?” I wondered with no small amount of angst and marital haranguing. Read more →

Ticker tape parade? Not enough.

It was Mother’s Day Sunday, as you may have heard.

I’ll readily admit that I’m insanely hormonal as of late. I’m entering my fifth month of my fourth pregnancy. And I know that Mother’s Day is the day that we’re supposed to think about how blessed we are, how lucky we are to be mothers, how being a mother is the most wonderful thing in the world. And that if I don’t appreciate all that–especially on Mother’s Day–I’m an ungrateful little toad.

All that is true. But as I read my Facebook friends’ updates about being feted in bed by children bearing homemade chocolate-covered strawberries–as I prepared to host 15-odd family members for brunch–I thought, you know something? What *would* constitute a “good enough” celebration of this Day of Days, or as my husband (incorrectly) called it, this “Hallmark holiday”? Read more →

I’ve always felt a special kind of connection to the time of year between Passover and Shavuot, a Jewish period known as the Omer. (For Mayim Bialik’s Omer explanation, click here.) Here’s why. On Passover, the Jewish people go from being slaves to being free. Now, imagine that freedom. Your whole life, all you’ve ever known is following someone else’s arbitrary rules. And suddenly–no rules. No nothing, for that matter. The freedom must have been intense…and frightening.

But then, 49 days later, after wandering the desert, God gives the Jewish people the Torah, and with it, rules. In some way, those rules must have been a huge sigh of relief. No more crazy anarchy (golden calf, anyone?), no more feeling confused about how to build a society–God gave us everything we needed in the Torah. It’s nice to have a sense of structure to your life. Read more →

I didn’t sell any books last week. This may not seem like such a big deal. Except for the fact that I’ve pretty much bet the house and staked my reputation as a writer on the brand new, as yet untested notion that readers are ready for enhanced ebooks, i.e. my previously published novels “pimped out” with video, audio, and other multimedia features. Guess not.

In addition, a magazine pitch of mine was rejected as being too much like something they’d just assigned to someone else, while a completed piece was more or less re-written prior to publication.

I can’t wait to tell my kids about it. Read more →

This week’s Jewish parenting news you probably didn’t have time to read.

- Can you call a 9-year-old a pyschopath? Psychologists now believe you can identify psychopathic tendencies as early as kindergarten. (NYT)

- Guess who’s getting a much-needed makeover? The power suit. (WSJ)

- There’s no shortage of responses to the Time Magazine’s recent cover, but this one, which takes a look at weaning practices in chimpanzees, attempts to answer the question: did cave-babies have attachment parents? (Slate)

- New studies show that Israeli families’ IVF success has doubled in the last decade, resulting in 25% in vitro pregnancies, and 20% of attempts resulting in live births. (Jewish Press)

When I was almost 27 weeks pregnant with my firstborn, I went into my OB’s office for a routine visit. My doctor was watching me closely due to cervical scarring that I’d incurred from some preventative procedures I’d had earlier in life.

Within two seconds of the exam, he backed away and told me to move to the ultrasound room. We waited nervously as the doctor pulled up the ultrasound machine and declared that I had next to no cervix left, was completely softened and dilated to 1 cm. He scheduled us the next morning for an emergency cerclage (a suture used to close the opening of the cervix) but when we arrived at the hospital the procedure was cancelled because the monitor showed my contractions were three minutes apart. Read more →