Your best life is their root system

How’s your budget as the back-to-school expenses come rolling in? Because I’ve been using You Need a Budget for a while, I had the money I needed saved in advance for the first time. A life-enhancement enthusiast, I’ve been delighted to discover that consciously spending and saving is core to my self-care. For my son Theo’s first eight years, I … Read More

When does it start to feel good?

How are your last days of summer treating you? Back-to-school season always puts an extra skip in my step. As I’m readying my son for the fresh, unwritten pages of fourth grade, I’ve been contemplating one of my own primary school memories. Reproductive education started in 6th grade in the suburban New Jersey public schools where I grew up. Not-quite-ten-years-old, … Read More

Join me in Brooklyn to discuss co-parenting

Coping as Co-Parents A panel brought to you by UNtied Wednesday, February 7, 2018 // 6:30 p.m. 17 Willow Place, Brooklyn Heights, NY “Just because you don’t share the same home, doesn’t mean you aren’t family.” We hear this more and more these days. The new ideal divorce is one in which partners or spouses work together to create a … Read More

6 steps to move from divorce to Happily Ever After

Divorce is commonly considered the unhappiest ‘ever after’ — but that hasn’t been my path. I believed my son’s happiness depended on my own, so I set out to make divorce the best thing that ever happened to me — and all of us. In my article in Best Self Magazine, I share how I moved my life and my … Read More

Barefoot Divorce

“Shoes block pain, not impact! Pain teaches us to run comfortably! From the moment you start going barefoot, you will change the way you run.” – Barefoot Ken Bob, from the Naked Toe Manifesto I have been thinking of you and your divorce journey on my morning dog walks these days. At age 14, my beloved dog Machi’s multiple surgeries … Read More

He Taught Me How to Go Pro

This week I read Turning Pro by Steven Pressfield and attended Sam Blackman’s celebration of life, two events that seem deeply intertwined as I settle more deeply into Sam’s loss. In a museum-sized swell of mourners that could not begin to fill the space Sam left in his wake, I was seated next to my eight-year-old son, Theo. Next to … Read More

Radical Coparenting Strategy #3: Bite the Monkey

I live with a twelve-year-old German Shepherd mix named Hamachi. A large dog with a large mouth, Machi gets mouthy when she’s excited. For example, during her younger days, at walk time, she would have a friendly nosh on anything in reach—my ankles, her leash, my butt—while yowling and leaping around. Years ago, I learned to intercept this behavior by … Read More

Radical Coparenting Strategy #2: Leave the Dance Floor

Most divorcing parents I speak with have a story that goes something like this: Our relationship sucks, and it’s the other parent’s fault. If he would just stop doing X, Y, Z, I could be happy. Sound familiar? Another comment I can count on when people see my coparent and me getting along is this: Well, YOUR blended family works … Read More

What are you listening for?

In the largest tree of my neighborhood sits an invisible bird who shouts, with great urgency, “Mom! Mom! Mom”. Every morning dog walk is punctuated by this ricochet of demand that registers in my nervous system and puts me on high alert. As I go into autopilot solve-for-the-child-in-need mode, I remind myself each time that the sound I am hearing … Read More

Radical Coparenting Strategy #1: Lean In

My son and I share a passion for knowing the world. My obsession is the inner world. And his, the natural world. Where I see a decaying animal body or pile of poop, he sees the path to answers: What did this creature eat? How did it live? What is it made of? Where has it been? As he delved … Read More