Gemma Hartley

Raise a glass to Friendsgiving - feasting without any sides of controversy or conspiracy theorizing. Friendsgiving is the best of all feasts.

It wasn’t the name I would have picked — not originally, at least — but as days turned into weeks, it grew on me.

We are often so focused on what we say to girls, that we forget the impact our words have on our boys. One flippant mention of my son’s “skinny” figure has turned into a source of unnecessary turmoil for him, and has lead to this difficult but important conversation about body image.

Mom friends were the ones to whom you were supposed to spill all those dark parenting thoughts. I wanted that mom-magic. I knew it was out there somewhere.

My husband and I have been together for 12 years, eight of them married, four of them teenaged.

I wonder because I think I'm making the same mistakes with my daughter. She hardly eats. She's very picky. I feel like food is a constant struggle between us. I also feel like it's all my fault.

Starting a new year makes me look toward the future, looking at all the choices that lay ahead of me. But it also nudges me to examine my past in a very certain way. It's the time of year I always find myself thinking about the choices I didn’t make — about the life I didn't live.

I was lucky enough to avoid a great deal of body negativity growing up.

Clearly, it does not take long for my over-ambition to turn me from a vision of perfection into a train wreck you can't look away from. Behold, my first week of school splendor, versus my second week of school ineptitude.

Like many progressives, the early days of Trump's presidency have left me angry, exhausted, and fighting with strangers on Facebook.