Congrats on almost being a parent! Sounds like you will find a good balance.

I think maybe we have the same mother. She comes to my house now and paints furniture, does laundry, rearranges my cupboards (but exactly the way I would if I had the time/energy to do it, so it's great), cleans, etc. It's like...excuse me? What happened to the hard ass who made me get a job at eleven to pay for my…

Oh, ugh, that sounds fucking exhausting and discouraging! I hate martyr moms. Barf. I think that's a very common situation, at least among my friends and their parents.

She totally made it up. Enjoy your weekend! It's a great show.

Haha, CTM is relevant to EVERYTHING, my friend. You have impeccable taste.

I know "Call the Midwife" is not exactly a 100% accurate historical document or anything, but a couple episodes ago a character took "compassionate leave" after a traumatic event, so I'm thinking maybe it's just a British term for the kind of leave you'd take when your physical health isn't at stake but there's some…

Are we talking horse poop here? Because I wouldn't want to eat it, but I do sort of like the sweet hay smell.

My three children have four grandmothers - two of them are married to each other and are of zero blood relation to me and my husband (and didn't raise either of us, either). And yet as life would have it, they are the ones who live six blocks from us and take our kids to swim lessons and for sleepovers and see us…

Maybe I'm more independent because I was expected to pay for most of my own shit (got my first job at 12 and was working 20-30 hours/week by my sophomore year of high school), change diapers, do bottle feeds, babysit, drive my sisters around to multiple after-school/weekend crap, and basically be mini mom, on top of…

I color correct my babies'/toddler's pictures because I can do it (in a rudimentary fashion, obviously) on my phone or laptop in two seconds and then it looks more true to life. I guess I'm just moments away from Photoshopping them slimmer arms or something. Cute doggies. :)

My husband always wears collared, button-up style shirts (generally of the semi-casual, Eddie Bauer style and not the dressier types) and usually dark jeans/oxford-style shoes, and I wear dresses most of the time because I find them more comfortable than pants. In some places we constantly get the "Wow, you guys are…

Jetpacking (the smaller/shorter person as the big spoon) is absolutely the best cuddle position of all time.

I lived in New York state in the early 2000s and ate a toffee Symphony bar about once a week, usually procured at the college bookstore. Ah, work study money.

Chocolate ice cream, especially Ben and Jerry's chocolate, is horrific. I love chocolate chips, chunks, etc, but actual chocolate ice cream is overwhelming and bitter and ugh no.

I'm embarrassed to admit that I pretty much have no local female friends. :( I REALLY need to work on that for a number of reasons...

Oh trust me, you're preaching to the choir there. ;) I sleep trained my first at five months and haven't regretted it for a moment...I keep thinking how grateful I am that he nearly always sleeps through the night for twelve hours, or I'd be even more of a wreck. I got spoiled by him because he was sleeping through…

Yeah, I need to be more insistent. Problem is my husband's gran got hospitalized, so his mom has been dealing with that and over there all the time. And then his brother got sick with norovirus...and my other mothers-in-law, well one of them put off knee surgery until she just couldn't anymore, and it lined up with…

She's coming in about a week. We'd planned it that way since I had so much help lined up the first couple weeks, ha. I'm needing/wanting her like crazy right now. :/

Yeah I think what you had was close enough that you get the general gist. Thank you for sharing your experiences, seriously. I need to tell myself it's okay to just cry and be overwhelmed sometimes!

I just had twins about two weeks ago, and holy shit. They are wonderful and I'm so in love with them, but they are waking up very two hours at night, then it takes them about forty minutes to finish a bottle, get changed, and fall back asleep. I really hope it gets better. I can barely function. I had help and backup…