The last thing on your mind the first week you have your newborn home is keeping a tidy house. So when my parents came over to see their new granddaughter, our coffee table was a disaster. Frantically scattered upon it lay every single parenting book we had bought, read, forgot about, and then frantically dug up again in the previous 72 hours when it became clear how woefully over our heads we were. Why the hell did I think I’d learn to swaddle a baby just by reading about it once? And why won’t she sleep? Wait … is she sleeping now? Is she dead? No … she’s definitely asleep. “Wow. Look … [Read more...]
Parenting Fails Can Sometimes Be Wins for You and Your Kids
I’m not that great of a parent. But sometimes my bad parenting actually works out. Some of my parenting fails are actually kind of wins! I made a list of things I do wrong as a parent that actually make my sons happy so who cares … besides me, 10 years from now, when my instant gratification policy has turned them both into monsters. My Nine Best Parenting Fails Co-sleeping – Sometimes it’s by choice, sometimes it’s because I can’t be bothered to bring him back to his room. But my 5-year-old loves it, and assuming that he grows out of it before he’s say, fifteen, I’m not too … [Read more...]
Tough Love Looks Like No Love if You are Not Judicious
"James, you’re not helping him by being tough, you’re being mean." It took a while to let that sink in as I looked at my wife in disbelief. I couldn’t believe that what I thought was showing my oldest son, tough love, was actually looking like and feeling like I had no love for him. My dad was huge on tough love and it helped push me to do things I might have never tried. Now as a dad myself, I also use tough love on my kids. However, this one time I had to agree with my wife. I wasn’t showing my son tough love, I was being a dick. I was killing his pride instead of helping him … [Read more...]
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