NYC Moms

Strut your stuff

There are many days that I wonder whether it’s worth it to work. Generally, they are the days where my email is silent as my three year old is in school and my son naps, only to start beeping like crazy as I get email after email from editors demanding instant changes – once my son is awake and only wants to be held and my daughter is begging me to play chase, of course. They are the days when it is beautiful out, and my part-time babysitter gets to take my kids to the park while I sit up in my home office trying to finish an article. And then there’s tax time, when a year’s worth of untaxed paychecks come back to haunt me. Some days, it really doesn’t seem worth it.

But then, an opportunity comes along that I wouldn’t get if I didn’t work. Last month, it was a chance to sit down and chat with Katie Couric. Last Sunday, I had the chance to participate in a mother-child fashion show at Macy's at Herald Square, presented by RoleMommy in honor of women who pursue their passions while raising children.

Parenting my shy child

Growing up, I thought that being excluded, embarrassed, or teased was the worst thing in the world. But as a parent, I know that watching as your own child stands off to the side while other kids play is much, much worse.

My daughter is only three and a half, so navigating social situations is a new skill she’s working on. She’s a bright, articulate, and funny child – when she’s comfortable. But take her out of her element – the first visit to a schoolmate’s house, for example – and she clams up while trying to wedge her tiny body between my legs. At a recent birthday party, she just watched as all the other kids ran around laughing and jumping on the bouncy castle. When the mother announced that the kids were going to play musical chairs, I knew that it was my timid child who would be pushed to the side first.

My first reaction was to ask the mother not to take any chairs away, so that no kid would ever be “out.” After all, they are only three. But then I wondered whether that was really the right response. By not competing she may not lose, but she’ll never win, either. At some point I know that I’ll need to step back and let my daughter learn how to fight her own battles. I just don’t know when – or how – to let that happen.

Surviving sick days

Sick days are the bane of any work-at-home mom’s existence. I’m currently on day five of house arrest and there’s no end in sight: Last night I thought I only needed to make it through one or two more recovery day before my three-year old daughter feels better, but of course my seven-month old son woke up in the middle of the night with a raging fever himself.

I throw myself good-naturedly into sick days at first. I dig deep into my mom bag of tricks and come up with an endless number of art projects, guessing games, pretend play and baking for us to do. Plaster of Paris face masks? Check. Macaroni mosaics? Check. Banana bread, finger painting, scrapbooking? Check check check.

But no matter how many projects or games I think up, time passes very slowly in sick land, especially when you have a kid who stopped napping years ago. We go through everything I have planned for the day and it isn’t even noon yet. I even offer to relax my strict TV-watching rules, but my daughter prefers to play with her favorite toy – me.

By day two, I’m bitterly jealous of my husband who gets to escape to his office every day, showered and dressed in spit-up free clothes. If I can steal a few minutes for myself during the day, I have ridiculous split-second decisions to make: Brush teeth or check email? Email always seems to win out, perhaps because it’s a link to an outside world where no one gets hysterical because I poured milk into the wrong cup. Or maybe it’s because if my breath is stinky enough, the kids will climb off me long enough for me to pee in peace. (That never works, by the way).

Kudos to Katie

When I excitedly told a neighbor about our upcoming meeting with Katie Couric, I was shocked by her reply: “What’s a blog?” she asked.

What’s a blog? Who doesn’t know what a blog is these days?

Well, a lot of people apparently. Although blogs are gaining in both popularity and influence, there are still a lot of people who don’t quite “get” it. And when we first sat down with Katie Couric for an intimate chat in her office, she admitted that she was one of them.

Her first couple of questions made sense: How do we, as busy moms, have time for blogging? And secondly, why do we want to read what a bunch of strangers write?

As we all jumped in with our own thoughts, a few clear answers emerged.

Dealing with Death

My husband and I thought we had this interfaith marriage thing tackled. After all, it’s not so much that we are interfaith – more like faith and no-faith. After nearly a decade together, we’ve weathered only minor bumps. My atheist husband not only knew that raising my children in an active Jewish household was important to me, but he actually enjoyed adding some spiritual traditions to his life. When our first child was born, he decided to convert to Judaism.

I always knew that his attraction to the Jewish faith has always been a little a la carte. He believes in celebrating the Sabbath as a welcomed relief from the weekly grind. He puts up with our twice yearly trip to Synagogue without complaining. We may have differing opinions on the existence of God, but have found common ground in the idea that neither of us can begin to comprehend how the universe works. But believing in an afterlife? We never really went there.

Battling Bullies

Bullying is clearly a big problem. Recently, there was the highly publicized My Space suicide, which shockingly involved grown-ups as well as their kids, plus an article in the New York Times about a poor child that was repeatedly tortured for seemingly no reason. So I wasn’t too shocked to see that a recent lecture by author and “Bully Coach” Joel Haber, PhD, in Katonah, NY was packed to the point where a good number of people were standing.

As a mom to a three year old and six month old, I was by far one of the youngest women in the room (And sadly, it was mostly women who attended the lecture). But according to Haber, my presence wasn’t premature: For girls, forming cliques and ostracizing others can start as early as three.

I’ve thought a lot about bullying since my daughter, Boo, started preschool this year. Right now, the world is still a magical place where the discovery of a mere tree stump to jump on can transform a regular afternoon walk into an adventure. While I welcomed preschool as the beginning of Boo’s independence, I also worried about how, for better or worse, the social interactions she will have at school will shape her character. I know that she’ll soon refuse to jump on that tree stump because someone from her school might see.

Over the past three years, I’ve watched all the babies that I met when they were only weeks old develop into happy, excitable toddlers. So how do all these amazing kids wind up turning into the popular but mean Queen Bees, hapless victims, or ordinary and scared bystanders that I remember from my school days?

Why can't these men keep it in their pants?

I'm a political cynic - who isn't these days? It's practically impossible to be an idealist in the post-Monica era, where you can't trust the words flying out of politicians' mouths, no matter how hard they wag their fingers.

But every now and then someone comes along who ignites a spark of hope. For many people, that's Barack Obama. But for me, that person was Elliot Spitzer.

With his unflinching drive to root out Wall Street corruption, Spitzer proved that you could be a successful politician without catering to the big donors and special interest groups. He was the good guy, taking down all the giant bad guys in his path. Add his Harvard education and ice cold blue eyes to the picture and he seemed like a moral compass in a depressing world of politics.

Is it cruel to let your child cry?

If you asked me that question three years ago, the answer would have been easy: Yes. When we interviewed pediatricians before my daughter was born, I quizzed them all on their sleep-solutions since I wanted a doctor who would understand and support my decision to never let my child cry. But if you read my article in this month’s American Baby magazine, you know that my husband and I wound up Ferberizing our daughter half-heartedly at 4 months and 8 months, and then again for real at 15 months. And if you read my recent blog post you’ll know that my daughter, who is now three, happily puts herself to bed but still crawls into our bed most nights and that I was recently going through sleep-training hell again, this time with my infant son. Judging from the reaction I received from both the article and the blog, most people think that yes, it’s horribly inhumane to let a child cry. Here are some of the comments:

HOW ATROCIOUS!! This article makes me sick to my stomach. You'd have to be an animal...wait...even animals take care of their babies! The CIO method is out and out CHILD ABUSE.

The New Mommy Wars

It’s no longer politically correct to make women feel bad about their post-baby work choices.  Whether you work out of the house or in, or not at all, there’s an acronym, a blog, and a mommy group for you. As a woman who vacillates between being a WAHM and SAHM, it’s refreshing to no longer need to justify my choices to judgmental people.

But lately, I’ve been noticing a new type of backlash, especially on the NYC moms blog. There’s a wave of moms critical about parents who decide to leave the city for the suburbs. A recent post about the should-I-stay or should-I-go quandary received only comments in favor of the former, including one that said that suburban moms do nothing more than drive minivans. It made me wonder: Do people really think that a woman changes just because her zip code does?

Love is in the air

Does anyone really like Valentine’s Day? When I was single, it was just a big fat reminder of what I was supposed to have – but didn’t. And after I was dating and then married to my husband, it felt silly to force romance on one specific day each year, especially since we were doing just fine all by ourselves.

Don’t get me wrong – I love being surprised with a dozen or two long stem roses. But I enjoy them so much more on those ordinary blah days when my hubby notices that I’m in desperate need of a pick-me-up and a reminder that to him, I’m still more than just a spit-up covered, sleep-deprived mom. But sending them because he’s “supposed” to? It just doesn’t hold as much weight.