being a mom
No Big Deal: The Phrase That Revolutionized My Parenting
Every time a celebrity releases a book about their extreme parenting method, I wonder what  I, a normal, non-celebrity mother, would write. What would be my book’s theme; my parenting mantra, if you will.
 My first thought was that my book would be, Parenting: It’s All About Moderation but that gives away the whole conceit in the title. Plus, it isn’t extreme enough. So I, random internet lady, have decided to name my as yet unwritten parenting manual No Big Deal: How The Simple Phase Revolutionized My Parenting.
“No Big Deal” was not an intuitive mantra for me. For the first two years of my older son’s life, I was an anxious, nervous wreck. Like many first-time parents, I was so consumed with how I might screw everything up that it didn’t occur to me to think I might actually be doing something right. I was overwhelmed by all the things I “should†be doing like enrolling my infant in the “right†classes, having him adhere to a strict schedule, and making my own (organic) baby food. It was hard for me to just enjoy my son and my new identity as a parent.
But constantly worrying about anything and everything was exhausting. It was annoying. It was time-consuming. But, most importantly, it was no fun. And it wasn’t good for my son, me or my marriage. So I made a conscious decision to change how I parented. I wanted to have fun but I didn’t know how – how were other parents able to enjoy parenthood and their children? How did they manage to not be constantly overwhelmed? How did they remain calm when things didn’t go their way?
