What I Love About Parenting Magazines

So the latest issue of Parents magazine just came in the mail today, and while I've decided the time has come to discontinue the subscription, since I rarely manage to even open it up until my husband comes around and threatens to toss it in recycling because it's been sitting on the coffee table for a month and if I haven't read it by now, then I'm never going to look at it. Of course, since I'm still a parent, it's still applicable and should be saved as a Reference. I mean, I never make him scale down his large stack of medical journals that he claims he will get to if I ever give him the free time away from work and hanging with the kids to get a chance to read (because in all my time away from the kids, I just sit around and read magazines and eat bonbons, right? I do seem to have 28 hours to his 24 hours each day, a math I've never been able to reconcile).

But anyhow, here's the thing about Parenting magazines... they are always relevant. Take, for example, the headlines on the latest issue:

"Oh, Behave! The One Discipline Secret Every Mom Needs"
"12 SUPER-HEALTHY SUPER-EASY SNACKS"
"GET YOUR KIDS TO PICK UP THEIR TOYS (FINALLY!)"
"IS YOUR CAR SEAT SAFE? Are You Sure?"
"Fewer Tantrums/More Confidence/Better Bedtimes/In Just 5 Minutes a Day"
"Lose the Baby Weight! (NO DIETING, WE PROMISE)"
and in a circle on the right, "HAPPY SPRING! EASTER CRAFTS, SWEET TREATS"

So as I read each one, all I can think is, "Oh my god! How perfect! This is exactly what I need to read right now! I was just thinking about this the other day!"

I got it out of the mail slot after picking up the boys from school, wondering what the heck I was going to give them for their snack. Why, if only I had an idea that was better than handing them a PopTart and a CapriSun!

Meanwhile, the kids have run off into the play room and there are toys scattered all over. As I go to call them to the dining room for snack time, I can't help but wish I knew what to do to get them to clean up their toys!

But of course, my thinking is interrupted when my seven-year-old pushes down my two-year-old for not sharing the toy kitchen, and I lose it. How can I stop this behavior!

I walk back to the kitchen, where I've left the magazine sitting, and glance at the headlines, feeling a sigh of relief. I did look through the snack recipes, and discovered that they would require a trip to the grocery store before I could actually make even one of their twelve suggested healthy snacks, and ended up letting the little one eat six-month-old caramel corn (and toss a few pieces across the dining room while I talked to the seven-year-old in his timeout chair; meanwhile, the four-and-three-quarter-year-old did have two bowls of banana vanilla yogurt, so I'm at least batting .333, which would be considered a respectable batting average if I had some excellent fielding skills - like eliminating skunk smell from the interior of my minivan - and few errors - like locking myself out of my house).

So here's what I've come to conclude. Whether I read these magazines or not is irrelevant. I rarely actually learn anything new from them, or at least nothing that I can retain long-term, but I do like having them around. Being married to an Emergency physician, I don't worry about medical emergencies. I could probably learn to handle many situations better, perhaps remembering what dose the kids need to get of this or that medicine, perhaps even remember how to convert their weight from pounds to kilograms. But since the answers are as close as a yell or as far as a phone call to the ER when he's working, I don't bother. But, and here is the key, because I have this great resource, I don't panic. I can stay (or at least appear) calm because I know the situation is under control. Of course, when I saw my dog's tumor swelled up and bleeding with something coming out, I freaked and went to the vet, where I then proceeded to pay $150 for the consultation and meds that didn't help and was told that I should have made a better medical decision last year (how does that help me figure out what to do now?) and ultimately told them I couldn't make a decision until my husband came back to town three days later. Because I'm not a vet and I don't know what to do in this situation, and where can I turn?

So I believe I'm hooked on these magazines because they give me somewhere to turn that does not necessarily involve exposing to any particular person what a horrible mother I really am (you did what?!) and, in a parenting emergency (non-medical, of course), I'll have a resource to help me figure out what to do.

Imagine, if you can, the following scenario:

Kids have thrown their toys everywhere while Mom cooks. Mom calls them to dinner. Kids fuss through dinner, barely eating. Mom yells at them to eat. After dinner, Mom tells kids to clean up their mess and then get ready for bed. Kids go back to toys and keep making a mess. Mom screams at them, and they finally go upstairs and fight over the toothpaste, make a mess of the bathroom, and jump naked on their beds, day clothes tossed on the floor and pajamas still in the drawer.

Meanwhile, how the same scenario might play out with the parenting magazine:

Mom cooks, and kids play with one toy at a time, putting each away as they finish with it. [GET YOUR KIDS TO PICK UP THEIR TOYS]. Mom finishes cooking and finds that the table has been set by the kids (since they were done putting away their toys and were hungry). They sit down and eat up their healthy, well-balanced meal silently, politely asking for seconds and answering questions about their day using their inside voices. When they finish, they ask to be excused, put their dishes away, and one clears the table while another cleans the table. They then run upstairs to put on their pajamas, brush their teeth, and pick out their clothes for the next day. They lie under their covers, waiting for you to come upstairs and read their bedtime stories. [FEWER TANTRUMS/BETTER BEDTIMES].

See, how could I resist having them around with that kind of promise packed inside?