Kristi Pahr

Don’t be an asshole is my barometer. It’s my go-to for figuring out how to respond to any given situation, big or small, personal, local, or global.

I think we can all agree that there is some messed up stuff happening right now.

It is understood that to effectively and officially attachment parent your child, you need to hit all the markers, check all the boxes, and do it without dissolving into a crying mess on the floor when your baby won’t stop crying and you only slept for two hours and you have to go to the supermarket because you’re out of coffee, but you shouldn’t even be DRINKING coffee and you’re the worst mother in the world.

“Is she Black or white?” I asked another mom who was describing a little girl in her son’s class that she thought my family might know.

I have to go shopping tomorrow and I’m dreading it.

My version of self-care is a little less “best life” and a little more “no life”, but it works for me.

When my oldest son was a baby, my husband and I used to talk about what sports he would play.

Life looks a lot different at 40 than it did at 25, and I have a whole new list of things to worry about. It's a very long list, and it makes me anxious on the best day, plain terrified on the worst day, and on a run-of-the-mill day, it just keeps reminding me that I'm clueless about what to think and what to do and how to be grown.

I found my first gray hair when I was 12 years old. Twelve. I had gray hair before I had a period.

As a mother of boys, I find this trend disturbing. Yes, we need to build up our girls. We need to empower them and teach them that they are capable and viable and powerful — that they are smart and that they matter. But we cannot devalue our boys in the process.