Author Archives: alexis

by Alexis Novak

I think I could conduct a Parent Teacher Conference whilst in a coma.  I sat through hundreds of  6:30  a.m. ones with my same co-teachers until these meetings morphed into a script:

Parent: “I just can’t get Billy to do his homework. He plays video games all night long and then I can’t get him out of bed in the morning”.

Teacher 1: “Have you tried taking something away that he cares about? Like his XBOX?”

Teacher 2: “I think he needs a heart to heart about your expectations.”

Parent: “What can be done at this point in the semester?”

Teacher 3: “He can’t do extra credit now. He earned a D. Extra credit is just extra crap. He’ll have to try harder next grading period.”

Guidance Counselor: “I think Billy can do it, but he has to want it. Here are our recommendations so that Billy can be successful at our school…”

The parents looked exhausted.  Frustrated. They would glare at their teen who stared at his shoes. Or worse, try to defend himself.  Some ended with weepy moms pleading for help.

The irony wasn’t lost on me that exasperated parents were asking me, a green 23-year-old new-ish teacher, for parenting advice.  I had no freaking idea how to make their kid come to school every morning.  My skill set encompassed how to get 15-year-olds jazzed about Romeo and Juliet, how to show them that Eminem was poetry in disguise, and how to follow my only classroom rule, “Be a decent human being.” After that, parents were on their own.

Fast forward a decade.

Now I am the parent.  And Punky has a 23-year-old teacher.

Punky, my introverted “Barnacle Babe”, became a preschooler three weeks ago. It felt like the little cocoon that I had protectively woven around my sensitive child for three years was bursting open and she was flying out into the big scary world, without me. Even though I love her school. Even though I am confident she has an awesome teacher.

Punky drew a picture that week that she described as, “It’s you Mommy, when your head popped off.” I had to remind myself that I’ve been her devoted teacher for the last 3 years, 3 months and 7 days, and it was time for a team approach. Or the whole village. She was bored. I was frizzle-frazzled-fried.  Punky was ready to socialize; she just didn’t know it yet.

On the first day I couldn’t get feedback from the teacher soon enough. I wanted to hear from her the first few hours. Did she make friends? Did she cry all day in the corner?  Did she play on the playground? Did I dress her correctly? Did she pee?  Did I label everything the right way? My teacher self knew that this kind of communication expectation is straight-up Helicopter Parenting, a style I do not identify with, but, I now understood how anxious parents are about their kids’ school lives. Especially since kids are mum on the subject.

Grilling Punky that first week I never got anything more than, “I like it but I don’t want to go back. I want to stay with you and sissy all the time.” I took no behavioral notes in her folder to be good news.

This week her teacher said, “She sure is coming out of her shell”. My heart leapt.  Punky’s been holding her head higher; she seems proud that she’s no longer functioning as one of my appendages. Since I haven’t cried to her teacher yet or written her an email a day I’m holding my head higher too.  We detached. We really did it.

Next week: I explore why moms in our generation are homeschooling in droves.

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by Alexis Novak

When I asked my former student and current babysitter Stephanie how she would grade my parenting she quickly replied, “B plus. Have to take off a few points for your oversharing”. I laughed though I’m still perplexed why my 20-year-old babysitters don’t want to know about the wonders of childbirth, specifically as it relates to new moms eating their placentas. I was trying to prep her for the gore. But OK. Fine. No more vulva-tearing jokes for you Steph.

I thought we had all become immune to oversharing in our social-media-obsessed culture, tweeting and Facebooking every mundane detail of our daily lives. “Eating a grilled cheese, dipping it in tomato soup. Yummo.” On any given day, I know who went for a run, who has diarrhea from bad Mexican food, who is hung over, who is composting and who got a new hairdo. Thanks Facebook!

The problem might be that I am overly logged into my Facebook account, but still, I’m constantly stunned by the cringe-y overshares. Nowhere is there a better stage for acting out one’s inner middle schooler.

The top five offenders that surely bug the hell out of you too:

5. Chicken Littles- These people write cryptic cry-for-help messages to illicit response, making you feel emotionally manipulated. Chicken-Little-Drama-Queens say things like “I can’t go through this all over again; never going to make it” or “I do not deserve this”. Then everyone says, “Are you ok? Worried about you. Call me later.” It’s a private convo made visible that should stay invisible. (I swear whole mood disorders could be diagnosed based on people’s statuses alone.) If you play Chicken Little I will ask you only the first five times you post suicidal-sounding statuses if you are alright. After that, another sap will have to give you their attention. Please understand, “I have asses to wipe.”

4. Paris Hiltons- “Cannes was so boring this time of year. Rained all three weeks we were there”. Seriously? We feel terribly for you that you don’t know how to spend your inheritance/can’t find a Neiman’s/your Range Rover is two years old. We are in an effing recession; show some sensitivity to the common folk.

3. Status Stabs- “Some people know how to be a REAL friend. You know who I am talking about!” Passive-aggressive status stabs for the world to see. How clever. I wish I could say that my former students in their twenties are the vengeful culprits but I have seen many a mom write these posts too.

2. Low Jacks- I am private; I do not want people to know where I am until I’ve left for fear of being stalked. Other people “check-in” everywhere. This is an especially good weapon following a break-up or divorce to show your ex how many cool bars you frequent now that you’re single and on the prowl. Or to paint your life Fabulous to people who you went to high school with who thought you were a loser; another type of social media revenge. Which brings me to the point that a whole carefully edited existence can be marketed and sold, your Facebook life, which may not be anything like your actual life at all.

But by far the worst oversharers are The Breeders, a.k.a,

1. Mommy Bloggers- Suddenly, social media has made everyone a writer and anything new moms have to say about their children must then be relevant, right? Stay-at-Homes vs. Working Moms, breast-feeders vs. formula givers, cloth diapering tips, homemade baby food ideas, minivans, vaccines, and Mother-In-Law tirades. New moms either blog about sewing, or their new photography biz, or hair bows they make in their living rooms and sell on etsy.com. But there are only so many baby-centric topics to discuss before it gets stale. OH. Wait a sec.*

*Alexis doesn’t consider herself a Mommy Blogger per se, even though other people may define her that way. She does have an actual writing degree from an accredited university and considers her real self pretty Fabulous even if she has selected her Facebook pics to include only those featuring her former, pre-children bod when she was actually quite hot. Also, she understands very little about mothering, as evidenced by the fact that she has been bribing her toddlers with multiple cups of mini marshmallows for the duration of the time it took her to write this piece.

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by Alexis Novak

My brother has been actively dating for years and I’m exhausted.  When is my wonderful new sister-in-law going to surface already?

I’ve taken steps to help the cause.  In a few entertaining and compelling essays I’ve tried to convince “The Bachelor” producers why my brother should star on their show.  Besides being hilarious, smart, driven and handsome, he is sweet-as-all-get-out and I’m not saying this because he’s my blood.  Ask all of my friends whose voices go up three octaves when he walks in the room; my brother is the real deal.  Unfortunately his dating record could best be described as more tragic than comic and I believe his female problems could relate to a “broken picker” as Patty Stanger would diagnose on “The Millionaire Matchmaker”.  I am not a therapist or a matchmaker, so that’s all my husband and I can figure out. And trust me, we’ve spent many late nights analyzing.

So I asked my beloved brother why he isn’t finding his wife/my new BFF.  After his thorough research, he says that the problem is that women have become the players in the game of Natural Selection and they’ve adapted some formerly-masculine strategies. The women he meets, his dating equals and “total package” types, are obsessed with keeping their options open and marketing themselves to the best catch. When an issue pops up, they quickly cut the line.  If better, bigger fish are biting soon, no one’s motivated to actually work at a relationship that has a glimmer of potential.

And he said that social media creates the sense that new sexy fish are just a friend away.

In being so picky, daters miss the big picture.  There is a whole generation of singles that would rather “die than settle” and that is hilarious to me.  Call me cynical, but one person isn’t supposed to fulfill all your everythings.  In fact, when you take responsibility for your own happiness it is much easier to be not so needy and psychotic in relationships.

Whatever the case may be, we are growing weary of his missed matches. I get excited when I meet a new lady friend, imagining our Starbucks dates and all my passed-down unsolicited mothering advice and then poof! She is gone by the following week. But we don’t pressure my brother because we know firsthand how hellish a poor match can be.  Hell was my former sister-in-law that refused to discuss anything but her three conversation topics- kittens, Jessica Simpson and sex toys. You can imagine Thanksgiving.

This time around I am much more verbal about my sis-in-law needs: My daughters need a fun Auntie that will babysit so mommy can go to Happy Hour with her girlfriends.  I need a friend to share the endless holiday cooking and hosting with.  Someone that will whisper and laugh with me in the kitchen when the guys are watching football.  And most importantly, she must have good birthing hips because we need some baby cousins STAT.  I’m sick of doing all the breeding around here.

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by Alexis Novak

Before I was a mom I never paid attention to the age of other women.  Sometimes though, I worry I should have had kids in my late 20′s and this brings me to wonder what age other women decided to become moms. When I see a mom older than me I like to play a game I call, Nanny, Older Mom or Grandma? This game stems from me putting my foot in my mouth a few times at the park by assuming that the nanny was the mom or the older mom was the grandmother. Oops. Follow my flowchart to avoid embarrassment.

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