Behavioral Expectations

Behavioral Expectations

Sometimes I feel bad for my six-year-old.

Not when he’s throwing a fit or refusing to eat dinner or talking back or throwing a fit or refusing to go to bed or being disrespectful or throwing a fit, but sometimes.

Dude’s had a bit of a rough run lately, what with the arrival of a little brother to not only steal some cuteness thunder but also to wreak havoc on the household without receiving so much as a cross word. Simply because he’s younger.

Toddlers get the benefit of the doubt for their behavior. Six-year-olds don’t.

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Trump’s Locker Room Talk

Trump’s Locker Room Talk

(This post originally ran on Scary Mommy, but as Trump’s habit of making sexist and misogynistic remarks continues to make news, most recently with last week’s comments to the French first lady, I thought I’d re-run it here.)

As a 40-year-old man, I’ve been in my share of locker rooms.

In those rare instances when I’m not minding my own business and/or shielding my eyes from the sight of the old men who inexplicably enjoy hanging around buck naked in the middle of midtown Manhattan gyms, I’ve had plenty of conversations with other men, both friends and strangers.

I’ve never discussed, let alone bragged about, a history and/or any methods of sexual assault. Not in a locker room, not anywhere.

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Don’t Make Me Your Cautionary Tale

Don’t Make Me Your Cautionary Tale

I don’t care what people think of my parenting.

Let me clarify: I don’t care what people who aren’t in my family think of my parenting.

I appreciate everyone who reads my stuff, even the humorless prigs who think I’m the Worst Father On Earth because I make jokes online, but I am well aware that none of you see the full picture of my parenting. Your judgment, positive and negative, is both incomplete and invalid. You see what I want you to see.

That said, there’s one reaction I can’t stomach. And it’s not the one you think.

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Addicted To Co-Sleeping

Addicted To Co-Sleeping

The other night, Detective Munch came to our room at about 1:30 AM, woke Mom and Buried and me up, and told us he couldn’t sleep. Actually, what he said was that he’d been “awake since 7” and had been lying in bed with his eyes wide open the entire time.

This was blatantly false on several levels (he didn’t even go to bed until 8!), the latest in a long line of excuses and/or lies he uses to try to get into our bed.

My son is addicted to co-sleeping, so this happens a few times a week. I don’t always handle it well.

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