Two Sticks or a Lighter

The Behind Of Every Great Kid...is probably red.

Posted by Sherry , Monday, May 30, 2011 Monday, May 30, 2011

I did it.

The unspeakable. The unthinkable. The thing that, as a contemporary suburban mom I've been fairly certain I wouldn't do.

I.Spanked.My.Child.

I can hear my own mother, a happy, educated, well-rounded woman, raised in the 1950s/60s, laughing aloud as she reads this. “Oh the DRAMA” she's saying! For her life and for mine – although not an every day occurance – spanking was pretty much, well, expected. Mom would say she's no worse for the wear and that I'm not either. My father would probably even go so far as to say that spanking is an ESSENTIAL part of child-rearing and damn the “experts”.

Full disclosure here – I was not breastfed, was left in a car while mom ran in for groceries, I ate non-organic blueberries and was allowed to ride my tricycle without a helmet so it IS quite possible that deep down, I hate my parents and I am a serial killer. Also, these are probably the reasons I got fat.

The 'why' that follows the “I spanked my child” statement is long, dramatic and quite frankly, unimportant. The significant part to know is that I DID spank out of frustration and not from a place of 'this is for your own good'. Ruby was not trying to run into a busy street or touch a hot stove for the 20^th time in a row – the few whispered reasons that some brave (ashamed?) souls have given to me as explanations of when they 'would, perhaps, maybe' spank their child.

Not surprisngly for a girl that tweets, facebooks and blogs, I'm a member of a number of 'parenting' support websites. Dichotomies that pop up in child-rearing discussions on these boards would not suprise you. On everything from breastfeeding to pacifier use, mommies can get their panties in a bunch supporting their opinion. I've even seen full fledged ARGUMENTS about the importance and/or uslessness of COUPONING.

Personally, I'm much too hungover most Sunday mornings to be bothered clipping coupons so I don't participate in that discussion.

What I rarely see, even in the most open and honest parts of my mommy community, is even the slightest mention of spanking used as a child rearing tool. Spanking isn't even a 'hot topic' because, well, it's just not DISCUSSED. Its like the giant elephant in the room with a red handprint on its ass.

If you were to poll my upper-middle class neighborhood, community playgroups, the local Gymboree, you'd likely find that if anyone DOES spank, they don't ADMIT to it for goodness sake.

These same women will swap anti-anxiety medication suggestions, brazilian waxing mishaps, “Deceptively Delicious” recipes and even used snot rags for little noses – but stories of spanking? Um.. NOT.A.CHANCE. Its the forbidden. Its the taboo. Its judgement.

Like most new moms, I did a lot of judging before I became a parent. There was a laundry list of things I'd never do and an even longer list of things I WOULD do. Clean the binky by SUCKING THE DIRT OFF?! Letting my baby “cry it out”?! Feed her formula?! Let her eat FRUIT SNACKS?! Uh-uh. No way. Not this mommy. Suffice to say, those particular philosophies went right out the window about the time I looked over to see my 2 year old playing with a “dangerous” plastic bag, sitting on a recalled toy and realizing she'd been entertaining HERSELF for 10 WHOLE MINUTES and so, naturally, I gave her ANOTHER plastic bag.

Like I hear my mom and her mom and her mom before her snickering over my 1am diatribe of confusion and guilt over ONE SPANK, I also hear the clicks of the “unfriend,” the “unfollow” and the “uninvited” that I WILL – mark my words – I WILL receive after having admitted that I spanked and that I'm not 100% certain that I will 'never do it again'. I will be judged.

As moms today, we're all carrying around these little secrets lest we be judged. We don't want to tell that our 4.5 year old still isn't potty trained, that we served Kraft mac & cheese for the 8^th night in a row because we're too tired of the fight, we sometimes use the television as a babysitter and actually DON'T hate Dora, we fight in front of our kids, we leave them in the car to get the dry cleaning, we spank.

I'm scared of being judged and I think most moms are too. What's really unsettling for me though is that I think the hardest jury to sway, the harshest judge in the county is the one that's on the bench inside of me. She's throwing the book at me for every.single.mistake.

The crappy part about this is that all parenting seems to be, from my perspective, is one mistake, one stumble after another, in the hopes we stumble into something good.

I was in Hallmark around Mother's Day and found this card that said “Behind every great kid is a parent who thinks they're fucking it up”.

Hallmark greeting cards are usually spot-on so I can only hope that little Ruby turns out to be a 'great kid'. God knows I'm constantly fucking it up.

From My Colon to Yours

Posted by Sherry , Sunday, May 29, 2011 Sunday, May 29, 2011

I have the surefire solution to making your goal weight in a matter of days: get admitted to the hospital, strapped to an IV and consume nothing but clear liquids. Heck, sometimes you don't even want the sweet taste of WATER when the insides of your body feel like they are trying hacksaw their way to the OUTSIDE a la Alien with Sigourney Weaver. Or a la Spaceballs, wherein those insides then dance upon your colon donning a tophat and cane.

Now, no need to worry your pretty little heads, dear readers. I have simply been diagnosed with an old lady disease called Diverticulitis. Basically, stuff gets stuck to the insides of my colon and makes parts of it swell, pop and infect the rest of my body! Now there's some light evening reading for ya! It is a condition controlled through diet and isn't nearly as serious as it sounds. I'm just really REALLY young for such a condition, apparently.

Basically, my colon has decided it is 72 years old and doesn't like me to eat nuts, seeds or popcorn. I've also recently taken to calling everyone “dearie” and sit six inches closer to the steering wheel when I drive.

Now, this is just one of the many reasons I've been missing in the blogosphere but I'm feeling an upswing of inspiration and hope to be more present in the upcoming months.

Nonetheless, here are some awesome NSVs that I've experienced in my absence and would be remiss in not sharing them with you all:

1. while at a park birthday party for a 3 year old, a friend of mine comes over to say, and I quote: “When we pulled into the parking lot an looked over, I thought “Barbie” (as in, Ken & Barbie?!) was pushing Ruby on the swing”. Now, I won't remind you or myself that this particular friend is partially blind and wasn't wearing her glasses that day. Let's just focus on how she thought I looked like BARBIE—of course, I actually HAVE a butt crack and only stand on my tippy toes to reach the poptarts from the pantry shelves -- but otherwise, I forsee me being the next Barbie doll inspiration: “Weight Loss Surgery Barbie! Less stretch marks! Press her port and she PBs! Now with her own bottle of bariatric vitamins! Inspiration for obese little girls everywhere!”

2. Whilst folding a basket of laundry this week, I picked up a pair of my own shorts and thought aloud, “now WHO'S SHORTS ARE THESE?!” These shorts looked WAY too small for me and way too big for my 2.5 year old so I was certain that Husband was getting some on the sly with some hot tiny chick. I was being my usual calm, collected self – as you know I ALWAYS am – when I realized, “HEY! Those are MY shorts!” Again, let's not focus on how these particular shorts have that magical 'stretchy' material in them and shrink upon each washing.

3. Most of the time, intravenous fluids, using a barf basin and eating orange jello doesn't exactly conjur up the 'sexy' in us. But when the umpteenth medical professional stands there mouth agape and says “YOU had weight loss surgery? Really? You look so...normal” well, it brings out the Paris Hilton in me. Although, its hard to get your 'strut' on when you're attached to a beeping machine via your arm veins and hopped up on morphine. Also, let's try to forget about the fact that most of these nurses and the GI doctors spend most of their time looking at poop and butts and focus on the fact that even THEY couldn't tell I'd had WLS. That's hot.

4. Finally, and probably most significant for me, is that last night, for Hubby's birthday dinner, I slipped right into the dress I wore for our wedding rehearsal dinner! This dress is a size 12 and I only wore it once but held onto it because I loved it so dearly and felt certain that SOMEDAY it would fit again. Six long years later, the DRESS FIT. Let us not mention the super-sucker panties that had to accompany said dress this go-round. It still fits and damn if I didn't look as good as I did six years ago – minus the wrinkly old lady colon.

Sadly, despite all these great NSVs and the help of a starvation diet and erupting colon, when I reintroduced solid food and homemade cake-pops I bounced back up to 3 pounds over goal weight. Sigh.

So, this is my update.

And lest you walk away from the blog post forgetting the reigning, inspirational theme, I will remind you of it, once again: poopy exploding colons.

You're welcome.