In the comic strip “Peanuts” the character Lucy is a bully, and perhaps her most famous mean trick is the football swipe: She tells Charlie Brown that she’ll hold the football for him, then swipes it away at the last minute and he falls. I hated this story line as a child. I got frustrated […]
As the parent of a two-year old, I give a lot of mini-ultimatums throughout the day. These ultimatums work because I have more responsibility and power than my two-year old does. It is my responsibility to keep my child from hurting himself and others, and I hold the power to enforce many boundaries because he […]
Almost six years ago, I wrote my first post about the Silent Treatment. I wrote it from the perspective of someone who is on the receiving end of the silence, and it struck a nerve with many people who have been given the silent treatment. I had no idea that it would touch such a […]
The other day, my daughter asked me if “hate” is a bad word. The short answer is no, because I do not believe that emotions are good or bad. The long answer is a bit more complicated. When emotions such as hate, jealousy, and anger get classified as bad and wrong, then you might try […]
Last night, I tried to make some fresh pasta and the dough got gummed up in the pasta maker, probably because it was too moist. I got frustrated and started to toss all the dough into the compost, but my daughter insisted that she make dinner out of the dough. I was in a horrible […]
Conflict is messy. Not many of us are skilled at it. Sometimes, it is tempting to try bypass it altogether to “keep the peace.” I’m not talking about choosing a battle because a particular issue is not a big deal. I’m talking about when someone crosses a line and you feel violated but decide to […]
I have the Internet on my mind lately, and today I am thinking about how much of our lives we share with the public via social media and blogging. I often struggle with how much to share about my life and my children, and how much to keep private. Today I read a blog post […]
This morning on my Facebook feed, I saw a link judging a woman’s parenting out of context. It was a link to a blog post about a mom on her iPhone written as if it were a letter to her, explaining all that she was missing out on while ignoring her three kids at the […]
The other day, I ended a frustrating long term relationship with my raspberry patch. For about eight years, I tried many things to make the patch bear fruit. Every year, it would flower abundantly, bees would pollinate the flowers, and then the flowers would shrivel up and die. Every year, I would get my hopes […]
As I’ve mentioned before, I like to look at the key phrases people use to find this website. A surprising amount of searches follow some form of “Should I break up using the Silent Treatment?” It is as if the searcher is hoping that if they ignore their partner, the relationship will magically go away. […]