Parenting Facebook groups have obsessions with the many "natural remedies" they think will cure all childhood ailments. My favorite supposed cure-all miracle is breastmilk. For some reason, crunchy moms think that breastmilk can do anything. I will give credit where credit is due: breastmilk offers babies essential nutrients they can't get anywhere else. Unfortunately, breast milk does not cure ear infections. You cannot squirt breastmilk in a blind man's eye and make him see again. Breastmilk…

Stephen Sondheim said the following in his Pulitzer Prize winning musical Sunday in the Park with George. “There are only two worthwhile things to leave behind when you depart this world of ours: children and art.” Of course, this is not an objective fact. You could argue that there are many worthwhile things you leave behind when you die that go beyond those two rigid categories.

Babies are cute and all, but sometimes it feels like new parents literally believe the world revolves around them. A message to all parents out there: you're not that special, and sorry to break it to you, but your kid isn't the divine spawn of God. Just chill. In a recent r/amitheasshole post, u/miraclebabyniece explains that when her brother and sister-in-law finally had a baby after years of struggling to conceive, it was big news in the family. But you can only milk the “miracle baby” thing…

I learn new things about parenting by looking at parenting fails. While some aspects of parenting are intuitive, there are about a million things that you need to learn about child-rearing before you actually have a baby. For instance, I was completely ignorant about bed-sharing and safe sleep until I started willingly exposing myself to all of this discourse within mommy Facebook groups . I can't imagine wanting to sleep in the same bed as your baby every night. I move so much in my sleep that…

When you're a kid almost everything feels like it's the end of the world. When I was 4 I became absolutely convinced that the “cool” way to eat pizza was upside down. Cheese facing plate. Ridiculous. The first time my mom took me for pizza after this idea got into my head, I attempted this method between sips of Hawaiian Punch. Once she noticed what was happening she freaked out, grabbed the slice, and tried to get me to eat it the right way. I had a meltdown so explosive that she refused to se…

Based on experience

It's not necessarily uncommon for parents to offload certain responsibilities to their offspring, but it's important to ensure that these responsibilities are appropriate for a kid. When parents make one child responsible for their sibling, it can create an unfair and imbalanced dynamic that can lead to resentment and frustration. While it's totally natural for older siblings to help out and look after their younger siblings, it's important for parents to avoid overburdening one child at the ex…

They're certainly imaginative

The golden age of parents on Twitter lying about the esoteric things their young children say has long passed us. Back in the ancient years of 2016 and 2017, parents were obsessed with tweeting things like, "My 3-year-old son came just up to me and said 'Papa, I have a childlike solution to great economic and social problems that will go viral instantly through the retweets of easily fooled rubes.'" Unfortunately for these parents, a lot of Twitter users have caught on to these unbelievably cor…

Millennial parents are already starting to mentally prepare for the teenagers they're going to be raising in the near future...

Parents embarrass their kids all the time. It's a natural part of the parent-child relationship , and it's often completely unavoidable. Once a child becomes a tween, they can't stand to be seen with their parents in public. Tweens want their parents to drop them off at the mall far out of the view of any other tweens, because having a mom is apparently extremely embarrassing. Tweens and teens don't want their parents to take pictures of them, be seen in public with them, or generally be around…

Most decent able-bodied human beings out there don't even have to think before offering their seat on the bus to an elderly person or someone with a disability. It's one of those basic unspoken rules in society that everyone ought to understand. Of course, there are always people who won't get up for one reason or another, whether out of sheer absentmindedness or maybe just not giving a shit, but it's pretty rare to experience someone so entitled that they actually have the audacity to ask a pe…

Hello mother, hello father. These funny memes, really holler!

It's finally March, and you know what that means? Spring Break is imminent, and there's nothing you can do about it. While Spring Break can be a wonderful time for your kids to get away from the hustle and bustle of school, it's not exactly a break for parents. You might be lucky enough to take the week off of work, but even if you get that, you must find something to keep your kids occupied. Spring Break is simply a preview of what's to come after Memorial Day. Your kids are lying around all d…

Not the best parenting strategy

Why do so many young parents want their kids to have unique names ? Do they know that having a unique name doesn't make them a unique person? I'm lucky enough to have a name unique enough that I never have to go by my last initial but normal enough that I've never been bullied for my name. That is the ideal sweet spot for names IMHO. Sometimes, your kid gets bullied for their name because of things out of your control. I would never begrudge somebody naming their daughter Isis or Katrina before…