MamaManagement

I have subscribed to the pervasive diet culture that exists in the United States for my entire adolescent and adult life. As a one hundred and fifteen pound teenager, I believed myself fat. My body, though I see now in the rearview mirror of age, was beautiful even by society's standards, became a loathsome enemy very early on. I compared myself to magazines and movies and friends. Everyone was always thinner and more beautiful. Everyone had clearer skin and a skinnier waist and thinner thighs. I was an attractive enough girl...and then woman. I wasn't "ugly" per se, but I was less than. Within each decade of my life, there seemed to be some magical (and unattainable) number on the scale that held the holy grail of "enough". If I could just get to that number...120, 125, 130, 135...then everything would be great. I'd be thin enough, pretty enough, fashionable enough... I'd be enough. As I got older, especially once I had kids, that "...

Okay, so this is a strangely taboo topic that I think we all need to get over our shyness and, well, weirdness about: Periods. Periods are this totally natural and actually wonderful body process that I think we look upon in entirely the wrong way. (With shame and disgust and disdain and annoyance.) And, honestly, I think it's mainly because it doesn't happen to men. I'm serious. Because we live in a patriarchal society, men's bodies and way of being in the world dominates our culture in every way. And because they don't menstruate (or have babies or lactate) these things have become at best, secretive, behind the scenes, and often misunderstood, and, at worst, shamed and regulated. I remember being mortified to buy a box of tampons or pads when I was younger...like, actually, ashamed in the drug store! I might complain to my friends about having cramps, but the details and intricacies of going through menstruation was never really talked about. Having you...

As I slowly evolve into an essential oil-using, organic food-eating, affirmation-saying, meditation-doing, Birkenstock-wearing, flowy dress-owning, new age granola lady (my evolution finish line will be Frankie from Grace & Frankie...which may involve moving to Canada), I find that a lot of the "skills" I built up during my twenties and thirties aren't really serving me well in the life I want to live today. Looking back, I see that much of what I was doing back then was cultivating survival skills. I was building my armor, proving myself as strong and independent and can-do. I was toughening up and accomplishing. And, as any good over-achiever (perfectionist/worthiness-seeker) would do, I took it too far. So now, in my forties, I find the need to soften...in most every sense of the word. To allow for softness. At 23, during my first performance review at my first real job out of college, I remember biting the inside of my cheek and and pinching the side of m...

Is it bad that I like the KidzBop versions of a lot of today's popular songs better than the originals? Not so much the vocals, but the lyrics. I realized this yesterday when driving around with my kids listening to the Kidzbop station on SiriusXM. I caught that moment in a song where they've noticeably changed the words. And I felt...relieved to not hear whatever degrading line had been altered...and not just because my kids were in the car. I realized that I didn't want to hear that junk either. And that realization got me thinking, and then asking: Does liking KidzBop versions of some songs better than the originals mean that I've lost my edge? Or does it mean that I've wizened to the impact of the words we spout freely to the rhythm of fun dance music. As I see it, the beauty of KidzBop is that they remove the misogyny without removing the fun dance beat. As I get older I find myself offended and disappointed on a regular basis by the lyrics in popular...

Birthdays are funny things. Especially as I get older. I think I'm in this limbo land right now. I exist somewhere between the excitement of a child and the nonchalance of an older adult. I'm between "OH MY GOD IT'S MY BIRTHDAY WOOOOOOOHOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!" and "What? It's my birthday? I thought it was just Saturday. Well, that's nice. I could eat a cupcake." As a full time mom of two young children I relish the idea of a day that's all about me. Like many moms, I get two a year: my birthday and mother's day. That's it. And I mean that is REALLY it. Every other day...most seconds, minutes, hours, days, weeks, months...all those measurements we use for time ticking by...is about other people. And most of the time that is quite okay with me. Most of the time I relish a life focused on others. I spent the first thirty years focused primarily on me. It's been kind of nice to not have time to dissect (worry, ruminate over) ever...

I sat here just days away from my 40th birthday...40. For real. 40…and wrote most of this post. It is now one week after the calendar rolled over to a new decade for me and I'm coming back in to tweak the post with my new-found 40 year old wisdom. So bear with me... Up until I turned 38, birthdays never got to me. I never felt bothered by getting older. I never really felt like I was getting older. I was the same me. The same work-in-progress. But something happened in the last few years and I found myself far more bothered by age than I am comfortable with. Especially in these last few months as this particular birthday approached. Because it bothered me, it got me thinking about some of the things that may be playing a part in my new-found issue with getting older (and turning… gasp ...40): Actually getting older… There is no denying that I am actually getting older. I mean 40's not exactly over-the-hill these days. 40 is the new 30 or 20 or something like tha...

Hello and welcome to another edition of Top Ten Tuesday ! Before I get into this Tuesday's top ten topic, I first want to acknowledge a little something: Yesterday was the 2 year anniversary of the launch of MamaManagement. Now, this is not a significant milestone to anyone but me. MamaManagement is a very small blog with a very small readership. And that's just fine with me. But this very small blog is very important to me. And this 2 year anniversary means a lot to me. It signifies that 2 years ago I decided to do something, small as it may be, just for me. Had that happened 10 years ago, I'm not sure it would have proved to be so significant. But when you are a mom of small children, doing something that is entirely for yourself can be a big deal. MamaManagement is not for my kids or my husband. It does not get anything off my to-do list and it does not help clean my house. It does not run errands for me and it does not take care of the dog. MamaManagement is ju...

Okay, I know this is kind of a random post, but bear with me… It all started when I saw an outfit in the Athleta catalog that recently came in the mail. I really liked the outfit and even showed it to my husband (as in, "Look honey, isn't this cute?"). Later that night, I turned out the lights and laid in bed for a bit letting my brain wind down (which it is want to do these days before it's willing to let me go to sleep). And, for whatever reason, it went back to that outfit, and then off on various tangents (as my tangential mind is known to do (as in, "Look! A Bird!")*). And this is where it went… As I think about the me I want to be as I enter into a new decade and refine how I define myself as both Mom and Me (things are changing as we leave the baby stage behind in our household), it occurred to me that one area that I can express this "refined self" in is my fashion and beauty persona. (It is also in my home/personal space, which I am...

So, folks, I have a confession. I have been nitpicking my reflection in the bathroom mirror to a much greater degree lately than ever before. To my eyes...I look older. I look tired. I look fatter. I look paler. I have more wrinkles. My skin isn't as bright or as even as it used to be. My hair is duller and frizzier…the list goes on and on. Nothing seems up to snuff lately. Maybe it's the approaching 4…gulp…0. Maybe it's the recent move craziness. Maybe it's the last 5 years since kids entered the picture and I stopped focusing on myself. Whatever it is, I feel decidedly un -attractive. Decidedly un -sexy. And I've been wallowing, on the inside, in these feelings for quite a while. I look at pictures from my wedding and honeymoon just 6 short years ago and think, "What happened?" "I used to be so pretty." "Look how rested I look, how radiant." "Look at my skin! My hair!" Me, pre-wedding, no make-up, no hair did: lovel...