Silicon Valley Moms Blog

What Happened to the Girl I Married? by Michael Miller: A Silicon Valley Moms Group Book Club

Silicon Valley Moms Group bloggers' monthly book club is tackling a subject today that can become heated. What DO stay-at-home-moms do all day?? We are a diverse group here on Silicon Valley Moms Group - we are SAHMs, working moms, WAHMs, moms somewhere in between. We ALL have different perspectives and we're sharing them today as we discuss what this guy, this dad, a Silicon Valley executive, learned when he walked a year in his SAHM wife's shoes. 

Join in as Silicon Valley Moms Group bloggers discuss the book What Happened to the Girl I Married? by Michael Miller.

• Silicon Valley Moms Blog's Jessica leads us off with a confession
• Julie from Just Precious toasts another 111 years of understanding, love, trust and family
• Sophia from Moody Mommy says she's NOT the girl he married
• Cynthia from Cynthia718 announces that the woman you married has left the building
• Bonnie from Just Peachy Baby loved the payback!
• Stacy from The Fabulous Miss S wants her husband to take another dude's word for it
• Erica from wellthoughtoutspot thinks about a parent's identity: segmentation or fragmentation?
• Nicole from Not Just a Working Mom and her husband don't really fit into a parenting category
• Silicon Valley Diva from Blog on the Wall turns the tables and asks what happened to the (french) guy she married?
• Melanie from Tales from the Crib thinks her husband will be getting a crash course on staying home with kids when she heads to BlogHer next week
• Bonggamom from Finding Bonggamom will also be leaving her husband next week to live her life...sort of...while she's at BlogHer
• Jennifer from Connect with your Teens asks: did marriage and kids change you?
• Amy from Le ShallowGal took the Seal/Heidi Klum angle on this book
• Rox from Rox and Roll muses on adaptability
• Chefdruck from Chefdruck Musings re-establishes a balance of power
• Laughing at Chaos from Never a Dull Moment says "OH, I'll tell ya what happened to the girl he married"
• Musings from Me from Musings from Me bristled at Mr. Fix It
• Linsey from Me Too You has never-ever-ending laundry
• Heidi from Coast 2 Coast Mom advises you to man-up and find yourself already
• Teresa from Elebelly thinks she may be at the point where she is ready to take care of herself, so she can take care of others
• Robin from My Life As It Is says I'm right here, you're right here
• Lori Landau declared The Girl You Married is a Woman 

More posts will be put up throughout the day on our writer's personal sites, so be sure to check back to follow along.

.... and if you have a post up on YOUR personal site on this topic, please leave a comment below and we will add your link!

About the book - read a description here.

Past Silicon Valley Moms Group Book Clubs have included:

• Testimony by Anita Shreve
• Comfort Food by Kate Jacobs
• Much to Your Chagrin by Suzanne Guilette
  
• It Started with Pop-Tarts by Lori Hanson
• Who By Fire by Diana Spechler
• The White Trash Moms Handbook by Michelle Lamar
• Writing Motherhood by Lisa Garrigues
• The Vaccine Book by Dr. Robert W. Sears
• The Other Mother by Gwendolen Gross

What Happened to the Girl I Married?: Join us for Silicon Valley Moms Group's next Book Club on Friday, July 17th

Let's face it - sometimes a couple's relationship changes once they have kids. Join us Friday, July 17th as we discuss the book What Happened to the Girl I Married by Michael Miller and talk about what we think happened for our next book club.

About What Happened to the Girl I Married (from the author's website): In What Happened to the Girl I Married?, Miller steps out of his corporate executive job and into his wife’s uncomfortable shoes at home. With no staff or administrative assistants to support him, Miller’s “ah hah moments” begin on day one and become more profound with each step down the path. Through his journey, Miller offers a new found appreciation for the tireless efforts of stay-at-home mothers and clues as to why women might lose themselves in the job. For the men they married, Miller lets them connect with his evolution through humor, man-isms and motivations for change that are hard to resist.

In his journey to enlightenment in What Happened to the Girl I Married?, through both laughter and tears, Miller provides readers with:

• A revealing perspective on the job of a stay-at-home parent and appreciation for it’s unique challenges
  (from a man who never had it)
• Creative imagery and colorful examples to help communicate the job’s complexities and the feelings they can generate that are sometimes hard to put into words
• A non-threatening way for the partner of the stay-at-home parent to examine how their words and actions might be contributing to a loss of self worth and identity
• Ideas for small, manageable changes that can have a big impact on the relationship, and how the stay-at-home parent feels about themselves and their job
• A simple terminology that both partners can use to help get their love affair back on track and keep it that way

What Happened to the Girl I Married? is an honest and enlightening love story that’s funny and thought-provoking throughout. The story’s messages help heal old wounds and offer both partners a language to get back on a loving path together – and stay on it.

Read along with us: Buy your copy of the book today and get ready to discuss with us on Friday, July 17th. See you at book club!

Past Silicon Valley Moms Group Book Clubs have included:

• Testimony by Anita Shreve
  
• Comfort Food by Kate Jacobs
  
• Much to Your Chagrin by Suzanne Guilette
  
• It Started with Pop-Tarts by Lori Hanson
  
• Who By Fire by Diana Spechler
• The White Trash Moms Handbook by Michelle Lamar
• Writing Motherhood by Lisa Garrigues
• The Vaccine Book by Dr. Robert W. Sears
• The Other Mother by Gwendolen Gross

Read along with us: Buy your copy of the book today and get ready to discuss with us on Friday, July 17th. See you at book club!

Past Silicon Valley Moms Group Book Clubs have included:

• Testimony by Anita Shreve
  
• Comfort Food by Kate Jacobs
  
• Much to Your Chagrin by Suzanne Guilette
  
• It Started with Pop-Tarts by Lori Hanson
  
• Who By Fire by Diana Spechler
• The White Trash Moms Handbook by Michelle Lamar
• Writing Motherhood by Lisa Garrigues
• The Vaccine Book by Dr. Robert W. Sears
• The Other Mother by Gwendolen Gross

Testimony by Anita Shreve: A Silicon Valley Moms Group Book Club

This month, for Silicon Valley Moms Group bloggers' monthly book club, we read a novel that many of us, as mothers, found tough to read. But probably every mother should read it. And their teenagers too - especially their teenagers.

Join in as Silicon Valley Moms Group bloggers discuss the book Testimony by Anita Shreve.

• DC Metro Moms Blog's Amy G. leads us off with hoping she has done enough
• Wife and Mommy from Wife and Mommy thinks of all the moments she knew her life would never be the same
• Jennifer from Connect with your Teens discusses the ramifications and repercussions of teenage drinking
• Melanie from Tales from the Crib forecasts the future
• Bonggamom from Finding Bonggamom remembers temptation
• The Fabulous Miss S from Fabulous Miss S screamed in her head "No! Don't do it!"
• Silicon Valley Diva from Blog on the Wall shudders when she thinks back to her teenage years
• Kim from Passion & Art says no one asks to be raped
• Chefdruck from Chefdruck Musings gives her own testimony
• Jessica from It's My Life thinks about when the best isn't the best after all
• Robin from Who's the Boss gives her testimony
• Gayle from Everyday I Write the Book reviews Testimony
• Christina from The Carpool Reader goes through the evolution of a marriage
• Linsey from Me Too You is glad she got caught

More posts will be put up throughout the day on our writer's personal sites, so be sure to check back to follow along.

.... and if you have a post up on YOUR personal site on this topic, please leave a comment here and we will add your link!

About the book - from the publisher Hachette Book Group:

At a New England boarding school, a sex scandal is about to break. Even more shocking than the sexual acts themselves is the fact that they were caught on videotape. A Pandora's box of revelations, the tape triggers a chorus of voices--those of the men, women, teenagers, and parents involved in the scandal--that details the ways in which lives can be derailed or destroyed in one foolish moment.

Writing with a pace and intensity surpassing even her own greatest work, Anita Shreve delivers in TESTIMONY a gripping emotional drama with the impact of a thriller. No one more compellingly explores the dark impulses that sway the lives of seeming innocents, the needs and fears that drive ordinary men and women into intolerable dilemmas, and the ways in which our best intentions can lead to our worst transgressions.

Past Silicon Valley Moms Group Book Clubs have included:

• Comfort Food by Kate Jacobs
• Much to Your Chagrin by Suzanne Guilette
  
• It Started with Pop-Tarts by Lori Hanson
• Who By Fire by Diana Spechler
• The White Trash Moms Handbook by Michelle Lamar
• Writing Motherhood by Lisa Garrigues
• The Vaccine Book by Dr. Robert W. Sears
• The Other Mother by Gwendolen Gross

Birthday party etiquette?

It feels like I attend a kid's birthday party every other weekend.  While I am sick of hot dogs, apple juice, and goodie bags full of crap, birthday parties actually give me the chance to spend time with my daughter and her friends. Parties give me the chance to see how she interacts with other kids, so I can do a "manners check" every once and a while.  And, most importantly, we have fun together.

All that aside, birthday parties are also an opportunity to experience other families' behaviors.  I recently attended a birthday party where some parents' behavior absolutely blew my mind.  Please, help me, I need a sanity check. Here's what happened:

My husband and I took our daughter to a classmate's fifth birthday party a few weeks ago.  The party was in a public park, where the host-mom had paid to reserve picnic tables for a group of about 60 people.  The party-spot was decorated with balloons and streamers. There was a cake and lots of food. It was completely obvious that everyone was gathered for a kid's birthday party.

Being a Single Parent For a Week

For one week, I became a single parent. It wasn't even a full week. For five days, I was left at home to fend for a six week newborn, a three year toddler, and myself.  Hubby had to fly out of town for a business trip, and I had been dreading it for months.  I was still postpartum, not even hardly healed up yet, and still new at this mom-of-two-kids thing.  I did my best to prepare by lining up friends and family to bring me meals and by getting a babysitter during the witching hours at dinner and bedtime.  Still, I had a very uneasy feeling about it all. 

I tried to get my "game face" on to press into the challenge.  First, I told myself, Look, your mom was a single parent when your little sister was a newborn.  She did it.  If she can do it, you can, too!   But, that comparison didn't really help because my mom was a young twenty-two when that happened.  At an age closer to forty-two, I shuddered at the thought of doing feedings around the clock, wrestling with the older one during night-wakings, and wrangling two kids during the day.

Multiple Moms Madness: Kate Plus 8 Versus Octomom

I have watched the TLC reality show Jon & Kate Plus 8 (a family consisting of older twins and younger sextuplets) for the last year or so. As a mom of twins and an older sibling, I related to their challenges. I appreciated that Jon & Kate Gosselin showed the not so perfect side of parenting by losing their cool now and then. I reveled when they would discuss that with multiples there is always someone unhappy at any given moment, which describes my daily struggles. I stood up for Kate Gosselin when many said she was too controlling because the kids all looked well fed, dressed and overall happy. I saw the way Kate took care of the sextuplets when they were babies and thought that her nursing skills  were very helpful in treating the kids ailments. I aspired to be as organized as Kate was in planning out her days. The fact that Jon & Kate Gosselin invited cameras into their daily lives seemed to be the price they paid to earn enough money to stay home with their kids while upgrading their house to make room for their big family.

However, from the beginning, I dismissed the Octomom Nadya Suleman  (who now has 14 kids, the last octuplets) as a publicity hungry, Angelina Jolie wannabe, narcissistic person who had kids as props to further her fantasy of becoming famous. At the hospital after delivering her babies, Nadya Suleman had perfect makeup, long fake nails with a FRENCH MANICURE and an insincere way with the babies. Any multiple mom knows that you need to cut your nails short when taking care of infants. I felt nothing but pity for her kids.

But Nadya Suleman really lost points in my eyes when she "dubbed Kate Gosselin 'a cheater' for relying on plastic surgery to get her bod back in bikini shape". As many multiple mom I know believe, tummy tucks should be a standard medical expense after having multiples.

I can't wait to see the natural methods that Nadya Suleman uses to get in shape.

I even made a joke while lying on the operation table, loopy from anesthesia during my C-Section delivering twins. I said, "Hey doc, can ya do a tummy tuck while you are in there?" My doctor did not think it was funny.

But lately with all the new scandals I feel as though I lost some close (reality TV) friends.

Peter Walsh was right.

I am a long-time fan of professional organizer Peter Walsh.  I loved him on the TV show Clean Sweep, tuned into to Oprah for his advice, and even joined his private Webinar teaching moms about home-office organizing.

I absolutely believe his theory that cleaning and organizing your personal space -- whether it's a home office or bedroom or guest room -- leads to mental clarity. Part organizer and part therapist, Peter also helps people break an emotional connection to "stuff" they really don't need. He helps people realize that hanging on to physical things does not lead to happiness; in fact, a house full of physical clutter leads to "mental clutter" that can hold you back.

As brilliant as he is, I always took Peter's advice with a grain of salt. After all, MY house was not crammed full of crap, junk and garbage.  MY house was clean, organized and livable.

And then I had a baby.

Meltdown Mornings – Hand Me a Shot…Of Anything

Even worse, meltdown Mondays! When will they end? OK, OK I know that everyone has an opinion on the right parenting technique to avoid such incidents. I know that for every tantrum my girls [and I] have suffered, there’s a book out there to show me what a wonderful teaching moment this could be. Yea, well let me tell ya, when you’re in the moment, that moment just. Has. To. End!

I know I’m not the perfect mother. I know my patience has an end (which is quite faster to reach these days). I know my girls are only demanding asking for things(whatever that is) any little 5-year-old might want. But when that happens at twenty minutes to nine in the morning (preschool starts at 9 am and we still have a ten minute walk there), timeouts are just not the answer.

Take the other morning. From the moment Songwriter woke up to the time we were out the front door for our morning march to school, she complained, whined, and cried about everything, literally. She didn’t want to get dressed before coming downstairs because she didn’t feel like it. She didn’t want plain bread, she wanted toast. She wanted more milk and we just ran out. She didn’t like those socks because they were too yellow (she picked them out). She didn’t want to wear that headband (yea, she picked it out, too) because it wasn’t the shiny one. She didn’t want to wear her tennis shoes because they were too big (she has worn them for several weeks now).

Getting Sleep is Hard To Do

Sleeping is one of the most underrated luxuries that singles have.  The other day, I drove through downtown late one afternoon, having picked TJ up from preschool.  With a screaming newborn unhappy in his carseat and TJ whining about who-knows-what (it was hard to hear), I couldn't help but stare longingly at the care-free twenty-somethings sitting outside the cafes with their lattes and cappuccinos, laptops opened for leisurely googling (or blogging, in my case!).  I felt like a prisoner trapped on Alcatraz, able to see the city lights through the window bars, but shut out of everyday life.  Oh, the humanity!

You don't know how good you've got it until it's gone.  And boy, with the arrival our second born, sleep has really gone out the window.

Sometimes you lose, sometimes you fail. That’s life, kid.

The rise of “No-Fail” grading systems in schools and “Everyone’s a Winner” programs in kids’ sports is strange to me. This morning I spotted the following story in one of my Google Alerts: Are 'No-Fail' Grading Systems Hurting or Helping Students?  It caught my eye because just a few days ago a group of moms and I were discussing this very topic at the park.

My friend Michelle’s son’s little league team gives trophies to all the kids, no matter what.  But does that render a trophy meaningless?  And Michelle's neighbor always ensures that when her kids play games, no one ever loses.  Another mom at the park mentioned that her sister never uses the word “No” with her kids.  Ever.  She and her husband come up with creative ways to avoid ever saying the word, such as providing alternative choices and using distraction.  When I saw the article this morning describing “No-Fail” grading systems, it got me thinking even more on the topic.

I can’t help but wonder, are we raising a generation of kids who are too protected from failure or being told "No"?  Are we doing children and teenagers a disservice by lowering standards and giving too many second chances?