The Barnacle, my sweet, sweet boy, is nine months old tomorrow. He assaults anyone who will hold him by throwing his brick of a forehead against their face. He has just figured out that, in addition to throwing his head forward and back, he can grip the sides of his bassinet and rock side to…
Dad’s toast points and WTF pumping
I’ve been back at work for two months. This is what people say: IT GETS EASIER. This is what really happens: IT GETS HARDER. In February, we started daycare. I LOVE MY DAYCARE PROVIDER AND SO DOES MY SON. NONE OF MY NEUROSES IN ANY WAY REFLECT HER EXPERTISE OR LOVING CARE. And now I…
Roasted veggies and sausage and Dave comes to visit
In the middle of January, my dad came to stay with us for two weeks. Our daycare, aka Our Second Mortgage That Comes Without a House, didn’t start until February. And during a Skype conversation last fall, when it appeared both my parents had had too much to drink, my mother gaily volunteered to send…
LIVE: Jenny True advice column at Romper.com! NOT A JOKE
That’s right: A terrible mistake has been made! Starting today, every two weeks Jenny True will answer all your pregnancy and parenting questions at fabulous millennial moms’ site Romper.com! Email your questions to advice@romper.com. The first column is LIVE: “I’m Pregnant and Not in Love (with My OB).” Our resident advice-giver-outer Jenny True provides shouty,…
Steamed mussels and WTF back to work
I started off Sunday morning cupping my hand so my son could vomit into it. A few minutes later, back in fine spirits, he gazed at his father in the kitchen whisking batter for crepes. “It’s a high-whisk activity,” SJ confided to him. “I like whisk-y business.” Two weeks ago, a couple days before I…
New Year’s Eve Special: Peppermint ice cream and fuck your rating moms’ attractiveness
I was having a perfectly good day, chasing down some bitch who stole my husband’s debit card information and depleted our joint account buying Chinese food, Hawaiian food, and pizza and making a payment to MetroPCS, until a friend forwarded me an article from some Canadian website called Mothering.com: “Study: the More Children You Have,…
Beef stew and careening into the holidays
These are the last days of my maternity leave. The weather has turned cold, so in the predawn we turn on the heat, which makes a satisfying boom and then slowly seeps up through the floor vents and smells like a different toxin in each room. The baby has his first cold, coughing as if he’s…
Roasted fennel and cherry tomatoes with black olives and it’s all fun and games until somebody shits in the tub
Since I had a baby, I’ve started a lot of lists. I LIKE LISTS. But I don’t finish many because baby. These are three from the past few months: Things My Newborn Has Taught Me: 1. MY SLIPPERS ARE TOO LOUD. Top Two Things I Say to My Son: 1. I LOVE YOU. 2. WHY…
Ginger fruit bowl and fuck your baby advice
SOMETHING MY HUSBAND SAID RECENTLY THAT MAYBE HE SHOULDN’T HAVE: “I feel great! I got twelve hours of sleep last night!” The Barnacle, my sweet, sweet boy, is three months old, and already he’s lived through earthquakes and some of the worst wildfires California has ever seen. His new trick is shoving both of his…
Jenny and Baby Visit Rose and Dave: Special Bonus Edition
Even though my parents were just in San Francisco to meet the baby/Barnacle, I recently took the baby/Barnacle to Evanston, Illinois, to stay with them for 10 days. While we were still in San Francisco, Mom specifically said YES YOU DID MOM YES YOU DID that the ban on writing about her — or, more…
Chicken pot pie and WTF breastfeeding
It’s been quite the transition to motherhood or, as I like to call it, Mom Eats Last. Some days it feels like SJ and I are killing it: We get enough sleep, we eat, we shower, the house gets cleaned, the bills get paid, and we leave the house and return to it, all without…
Breakfast in bed and keeping the baby alive
I’ve settled on a word for how having a baby makes me feel: peeled. If I’m not lurching from one room to another in underpants I haven’t changed in three days and a maternity bra wide open on both sides like some kind of fetish gone wrong, my post-pregnancy belly hanging out like a plastic…
