• Last updated 10/18/12 by Melanie Mayo

I’m going to try and keep this post short and to-the-point. A handy toolkit to ease the stress of mothering, regardless of the “brand” of mothering (working, stay-at-home, by fathers, by others, you name it). This is a summary of the gems that emerged from my appearance this week with Mallika Chopra and Sarah Ripard at the California Women’s Conference. The audience loved what we shared, so I wanted to share it with you! First, why do so many of us tend towards feeling overwhelmed with the stress of mothering these days? Since humans are by nature... read more

• Last updated 11/9/12 by Marcy Axness

Nancy Verrier is an adoptive mother, therapist and author of the groundbreaking book The Primal Wound: Understanding the Adopted Child.  In a session at today's Adopt Salon conference in Los Angeles, Nancy shared some reflections almost twenty years after publishing one of adoption's landmark works.  In the following interview (that I did some years back), Nancy shares her views on a variety of adoption’s “hot topics,” but all emerge from a basic theme:  adoption creates “different kinds of relationships” and some unique challenges for adoptees.   MA:     I’m... read more

• Last updated 2/6/10 by Jennifer Margulis

This weekend was our 11th wedding anniversary. James and I dated for three years before we married so we’ve been together now for fourteen years. Only, James isn’t here. On Friday he flew to Buffalo to visit his dad, who’s undergoing chemotherapy for Stage III metastasized throat cancer. I’m not usually the sentimental type but it felt sad to acknowledge our anniversary with nothing more than a phone call. At least I know James will be back soon. My friend Lori doesn’t know when her husband’s coming home. Her husband, let’s call him S., is also a good friend of mine... read more

• Last updated 12/5/11 by John Martin

Hearing Bilingual – the benefits of foreign languages for kids   The New York Times recently published “Hearing Bilingual: How Babies Tell Language Apart.”  The demand for education programs focusing on foreign languages is growing among parents with young children, who are realizing both the cognitive and social benefits of their children growing up multilingual.   The New York Times published the results of a new research, in which researchers at the University of Washington calculated the electrical brain responses of “monolingual” babies (those from homes... read more

• Last updated 5/9/12 by Mothering Editorial

By Christina SchmidtWeb Exclusive When we had our second baby, I secretly feared we'd made a terrible mistake. My older son had just entered the notorious Twos. The new baby demanded constant attention and required maddeningly little sleep. I'd wanted my children close in age so they would be friends, but I often doubted we would survive to see that day. As the months passed, I anxiously awaited any sign of sibling bonding, but for the most part my older son regarded his baby brother with nothing more than curiosity, boredom, some jealousy, and occasional disdain. I'd... read more

• Last updated 12/4/12 by Cynthia Mosher

When my husband and I moved into a new home with our two kids last year we talked about options for creating a new play area in the small room off of our living room. Normally, our children simply play and read wherever they see fit, and usually that is in the living room. We love that and don’t want it to change. But the 15ft by 9ft addition to our living room was calling out to us as a place that would be a perfect kid-centered addition to our living space–with special areas for reading, art, and play. Flash forward a year and the room was still empty–busy... read more

• Last updated 11/7/12 by Melanie Mayo

Talking about adoption honestly supports healthy emotional development for both children and parents. Yet it is not always the easy choice. False cheer and inaccurate platitudes often feel like the less challenging way to go. (As Mitchell discovered in a light-hearted treatment of this issue on a recent Modern Family. He found it easier to tell Lily her mother was a princess--until she became obsessed with princesses!)   The road to adoption is invariably a challenging one for many adoptive parents, marked by many losses—the children they might have had, but for... read more

• Last updated 3/21/10 by Mothering Editorial

I read your book and it gave me a lot of good thoughts! But I am not sure what to do in that situation: My 4-year-old son does not want to play with other children. He never did it. He watches them, but if they approach, he gets frightened or angry, sometimes even rough. Until now, I thought, it would be best to let him do as he pleases and he seems to be happy. But I don't want to make him miss some important step in his social development. Perhaps there is something I should do? I have given him opportunities to meet other children since he was a baby. I would love... read more

• Last updated 10/18/12 by emilyfrischmann

Why They Whine: How Corporations Prey on our Children By Gary Ruskin Web Exlusive Cheryl Idell knows a lot about nagging. She has written reports for major corporations with such titles as the "Nag Factor" and "The Art of Fine Whining." She tells her clients that nagging spurs about a third of a family's trips to a fast-food restaurant, to buy children's clothing or a video. Idell, who is chief strategic officer for Western Initiative Media Worldwide, a major market research firm, speaks with the cold precision of a physicist. "Nagging falls into two... read more

• Last updated 4/7/13 by AdinaL

Athena, 3; Etani, 8 months; Hesperus, 5 I understand why people raise their eyebrows at us for being pregnant with our fourth baby. The vast majority of Americans still only have two children but there is a small subset of the population creating such large families that one Women’s Health writer suggests the craze for more children stems from an addiction to being pregnant. She argues that women become pregnant because they like being treated like rock stars and being in the limelight and she dubs women like me with more than two children... read more