Joanna Schroeder

Few things are cuter than the sight of your little boy holding hands with a little girl in his kindergarten classroom, or watching as your daughter puts her arm around a little boy from her tee-ball team. At that moment, parents often assume that what they’re witnessing is young love, even if their child has never had a crush and is just expressing affection. While it may be tempting to call your child’s friend a girlfriend or boyfriend, or to tease them about having a crush, here are seven important reasons to resist.

As I grew older, I came to rely upon dieting as a way to ease my anxiety and feel in control. I was no longer in a cycle of eating too little or body dysmorphia, but controlling my food intake made me feel less invisible in a sea of girls where I felt like I'd disappear. It was almost a form of self-medication, to know that I could go on a diet and lose a few pounds.

If you've had drama in past relationships, you may feel uncomfortable in a healthy relationship with a nice guy. Here's how to change that.

People try to keep it real by talking about the struggles of being a parent, and that’s great, but the truth is this: Parenting can be great fun.

I'm going to keep an eye on my health—but keep the scale under the bathroom vanity.

No, it’s not the presents. It’s all the little things.

Even the most well-intentioned parents sometimes make mistakes in how they raise their kids.

The biggest news in feminist parenting lately has been about portrayals of powerful girls and women. Mattel’s new partnership with DC Comics is a big step forward in this, creating a new set of dolls and action figures that feature the female characters in the classic DC comics stories.

Much of my life has been ruled by fears I didn’t want to face. Now that I'm older and have been battling them, I feel an enormous weight lifted from my shoulders. I only wish I'd been able to shrug off these societal pressures years ago

I’m spelling them out here so that other parents can talk about them and other boys can see that there isn’t just one way to become a good man.