It’s not negligent parenting. It’s sanity parenting

NBTB-Sanity Parenting

I.

Meet Stella. She’s six, and, for a few more weeks, an only child.

Stella: Eeeeeeender! You never share! You do not understand what sharing is! Sharing is when I want something, you GIVE IT TO ME!

So I pee myself laughing and text Stella’s mom. She ROLFs. “Is that my fault?” she asks. “Probably,” I tell her, because I’m a bitch.

II.

Stella: Ender wants to build a fort, but I don’t want to build a fort. I want to play Minecraft and Ender wants to watch Good Mythical Morning. We can’t agree on anything!

Jane: You guys are together for four hours today. I think you’ll have more fun if you find something you can agree on.

Stella: I’m not going to agree on anything TODAY!

Jane: Then I guess you’ll have a miserable day.

Stella: I! Will!

So here comes Flora, who can’t bear if anyone is determined to have a miserable day:

Flora: How about if you two…

And here comes the intercept by an un-helicopter mother:

Jane: Baby? This is so not your job or responsibility. You have things to do. If the littles do not want to play together, it is not your job to make them.

Flora: Is it yours?

Jane: Fuck, no. I have things to do too.

(20 minutes later, they’ve figured it out. Yes, there was screaming. But no blood. This time.)

III.

Stella: My mom is way nicer than you.

Jane: I know.

Stella: But you’re a way better cooker.

Ha. By the way, beloved, that’s because I feed them lemon meringue pie for lunch.

IV.

Today’s story does have a moral.

Do you see it?

If not, go meet he who became my new favourite love in the summer of 2014—and then come back, and read this piece again.

xoxo

“Jane”

How un-helicopter mothers parent

A16

Jane: Jeezus, that was a bad fall–he’s been down a while. Do you think he’s conscious?

Marie: I see his hand twitching, he’s fine. Well, unless it’s a seizure.

Jane: Doesn’t really look like a seizure… oh, there, he’s getting up. So what were we talking about?

He was fine. They were all fine. Each of us came home with as many kids, with as many intact limbs, as we left with. It’s all good. How was your weekend?

In-between neglect… I mean, parenting and taking really good care of my children this weekend, I found out fabulous Anka at Keeping It Real made me her Real Deal Mom for the Month of January. How awesome is that? I think it was because of the How I broke my children post. Because it doesn’t get any more real than that… Have a stroll through Anka’s blog, and if you have a mama (or sanity) blogger you love you’d like to nominate for the Real Deal, she’s love to hear from you.

More like this: You know he’s his mother’s son and You know he’s his mother’s son, part deux

The NBTB post everyone was reading on the weekend: The naked truth about working from home, the real post

The NBTB post everyone (ok, three people, maybe) was searching for last week: On existential angst and 9-year-old- boys (aka Love Letter to the Boy Who Will Set the World on Fire)

Mildly appalled by Jane and Marie’s behaviour and wondering how we would have behaved if someone really was hurt? Read my friend Stacey’s post When Children Get Hurt about her processing of just such a scenario.