Joni Edelman

4. A high school government class.

When I had my first child, I couldn't have prepared for the way it would make me feel.

By baby three, well let’s just say things are a little anticlimactic, at least where furnishings are concerned. Hand me down crib. Check.

You can work your butt off and still be left with a tummy. Bummer.

"She has created an important space on the internet and in the real world, a space that women and girls are free to take up however they please."

I didn't get a lot of mothering as a child, but when I did, it was from her. She taught me how to sew, how to crochet. She taught me how to stand up for myself, to be tough. She taught me how to make fried chicken and fried okra, which I will never make, because it's fucking gross.

I don’t think anyone who has been to the spirited child parenting rodeo would call a mother who screams, “bad,” or who loses her temper, a “failure.” I think we all understand parenting is really really hard from the get go, and parenting a kid who won’t sleep, who screams and kicks and says they hate you, is its own challenge

You should know that she is a really awesome human.

With the help of the midwife—and immense effort on my part—Ella finally slid out into the water. But she was limp, pale. It was scary.