So i’m with you. I’m not, nor do I try to be a perfect parent. I absolutely adore my children and try to give them everything I can, but that’s really not a WHOLE lot, and I’m not going to kill myself to give them more. I can’t, there aren’t enough hours in the day. My kids do activities but I limit them to one per…

We have 5 kids... what is this “sanity” that you speak of? Does your organization have a pamphlet or app that I can review for 7 seconds?

As a kid, I grew up in an era when I basically entertained myself and stayed occupied with bikes, books, and buddies —- from the time I was 4 or 5, my own mother was free from breakfast on (unless needed for bandaging duty).

Yep.

Honestly you should be taking your kid to the zoo at least TWICE a day if not more. For her birthday you should take her there six times if not more.

I don’t think you understand what standardized testing has done to ruin school cultures. It’s not about socializing and learning anymore, even at the Kindergarten level. It’s about passing the fucking tests. I am a public school teacher, but I am seriously considering private school for my kiddo for at least K-3 if I…

Disappearing middle class for me and my hubs. My husband and I make what I would objectively call good money (esp. my husband in the tech sector), but living in Southern California with a house payment that equals about 1/3 of income (in an “up and coming” neighborhood at 1190 sq. ft.), after car payments on the…

When we do a full clean my kids say, “Who’s coming over?” Because they know we only race around cleaning if we’re having company.

If a section of my families house is clean, I win at parenting.

NONONONONONONONO... not blaming anyone for having a zoo membership, I’m just saying it’s a birthday-worthy event for us to even go to the zoo. At all. And growing up, it was a vacation-worthy event going to the zoo.

I’d just like to say that I work full-time and have a toddler and a husband who does more than half of the house work. We don’t have our kid involved in any extra-extracurriculars or make precious lunches for our kiddo and it’s still fucking hard and I still miss my friends and my hobbies. Maybe, just maybe, it has to…

Great. That way when she grows up, Persephone will be able to call you an asshole in at least 9 different languages.

It really, really is enough.

I think the root of a lot of that is class anxiety. We’ve a very downwardly mobile society now (I’m not doing as well as my parents, it stands to reason my kid won’t do as well as me) and some middle class parents are feeling very very anxious about the possible loss of their current class status for their child. So…

Yes, yes, yes. The fact that good childcare isn’t subsidized means that MrStu and I live in a rented townhouse instead of a house or condo.

E. Self-imposed neurosis

Can we add “too judged”? Because parents that try to let their kids fall down and be more feral and learn from their mistakes get arrested now. Somewhere along the line we made imperfect parenting a crime.

Yes, but do that and suffer the judgement of all the other parents around you. I totally agree with you on all this though! But it sucks to have to defend ever parenting choice you make, whether it’s to be a helicopter parent, or a bit more free range.

We’re still going to teach them Cantonese though, right? RIGHT???

May I offer my “head up my ass” opinion as to why?