Afterbirth: Stories You Won't Read in a Parenting Magazine

by Dani Klein Modisett

Afterbirth is about what parenting is really full of inappropriate impulses, unbelievable frustrations, and idiotic situations. It’s about how life for some parents changes for the worse after their kids are born. Or so it feels. It’s about how not every threeyear- old is charming and delightful and about how sometimes when your kid is having a tantrum, you have to stifle the impulse to round-house him. And Afterbirth is funny—the participants are some of the best comic writers and performers today, turning their attention very close to home and sparing no one, particularly themselves. The thirty-five pieces • Caroline Aaron on what it feels like when the kid moves out of the house (“The New Parenting Paradigm”)
• Christie Mellor on why it’s dangerous to tell people what you really think about being a mommy (“Yahooey”)
• Joan Rater on parenting the unexpected (“Attachment Adoption”)
• Neil Pollack on unforeseeable and unreasonable parental rage (“The Tennis Pro”)
• Matt Weiner on trying not to parent violently like his father did (“Go Easy on the Old Man”)

Genres: Parenting, Nonfiction, Humor, Adult

272 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2009

Reviews

[Eva-Marie Nevarez]

This is horrible. Pure trash. This will be an on-going review even though I can already rate it one star. It's just like a car accident - I must look. And, I'm shocked. Modisett must have actually gone out of her way looking for fucked up people to write these essays. At the very, very least, if there is a semi-normal person, then they're parents are/were fucked up. Are there no normal people where this chick lives?

I took this off the two lists I had it on, 'humor' and 'parenting' because it's neither humorous nor about parenting, parents, anything parental you can think of besides being fucked up parents who are trying to fuck their kids up.

Oh, this is going to be a long one folks. If I could turn back time I would never go to the library on the day I saw this awful book.

Let me just say this: I'm not a goody-goody. I cuss. I make parenting mistakes. Hell I make mistakes all over the place. I can take jokes. The only jokes I don't like are racist or otherwise prejudiced, besides those you can't offend me. Yeah well.....

*Oh, and by the way, to those reviewers calling these people "celebs", what world do you live in? There is exactly one person, ONE person, in all of these so-called "authors" that I've heard of - Moon Unit Zappa. (I can't believe I even typed that.) Why not just name your baby Shit Eating Brick. wtf. Anyway, that's it. No one else. Writing for Seinfeld does not a celebrity make peoples. Sorry. Do you credit the burger flipper at McDonald's with giving you your burger? Noooooo. The person who gave you said burger gets the credit. That's the way the world works whether we like it or not.

So, onward and upward right?

We may as well start with the prologue eh? Here's the big joke in a nutshell: Modisett felt pain in her head, finds out she's pregnant, and "apparently becoming pregnant was such a shock to my system, it almost blew my head off." Hardy fucking har.

Marta Ravin - drug addict, hangs with strippers, (in other words fine upstanding citizen) decided to "rebel" while pregnant. No drugs or alcohol, nope. Not for Marta. She decided not to take her prenatal vitamins. Not the end of the world you say? It sure isn't. And hey, why take something that's been proven to be beneficial for your unborn baby, something that takes about all of two seconds and no energy or strength to take, when you can "rebel"? We get a fun amount of drug related little tidbits, wanna-be jokes we'll call them for lack of a more suitable term, and pretty much nothing else. Now, as if having a fucked up mom isn't enough for this poor kid, and I think we can assume the dad is fucked up to for even marrying this drug addicted slut who doesn't want to take care of her baby in even the simplest way, there's at least one fucked up beyond belief grandparent to throw into the mix! Whoo-hoo! Marta's dear old mom apparently sees nothing wrong with sticking her nipple in her grandsons mouth to sooth him. Um, is it just me or is that not normal? I'm left hoping that's another wanna-be joke.

Dana Gould - seemed half way normal I guess but nothing even remotely humorous in her story and certainly nothing to actually take away from the book with the reader.

Merrin Dungey - apologizing to her vagina was sort of funny. Could have been I guess. Wasn't really here.

Moon Unit Zappa - I did it again. I don't think I need to give examples of why her kid has fucked up grandparents do I? I'm not going to be too harsh on her because she had to have had one of the most messed up childhoods ever. And while, from her story, it seemed that she was on the road to becoming the same screwed up mother and wife I think she may have seen the error of her ways. Who knows. You'd think the first thing she'd do would be to change her damn name.

Kell Cahoon - Oh God this is a good one. Dear Lord help these people. They're not even people I don't think. Whatever they are send them some help. One, at the airport, after forgetting the baby's birth certificate, the "mother" starts screaming, yelling 'fuck' all around the airport, in front of said baby, and then proceeds to punching herself in the forehead long enough for the baby to get scared and start wailing. Yeah. Oh so normal right? These are those 'real' stories you don't find in Parents magazine. Two, the grandfather tried to take a pic of author's two nephews and can't get them to smile. So, this normal family turns to the oh so normal option! Grandma gets up and grabs her tits, calls the boys, and starts jiggling them yelling, "Look at Grandma's jello boys!" I don't want to live in this world any more if that's true. I'm going to operate on the assumption that it's another wanna-be joke - I have to do that to stay sane. That is one of the most disgusting this I've ever heard. If ANYONE ever grabs and jiggled tits at my kids I'd hurt them. Bad. Then I'd call the police and have them arrested and if I have to do a quick 24 hours because I kicked their ass then so fucking be it.

It should be noted that the grandfather was so pleased with his wife's actions that he actually praised her aloud. Duly noted. Three, the take the baby to the grandparents so they can go out to dinner and the room is filled with weed smoke. 'Nuff said there.

Mimi Friedman - this is one half of a lesbian couple who adopted. The sanest so far although there are still characters, ha, characters, in here who are - say it together now - FUCKED UP. The birth mother is so against having a scar she says no to the procedure (being talked about before hand as a 'what if') even if there's a complication. Leave it to this author to find sane people who adopted a baby from a wack job. They themselves seem cool as hell though and fairly normal.

Mark Hudis - I'm not sure what to say about this guy. He creeps me out from just reading his story. Compared to the others I've read about here though he's borderline normal also.

Christy Callahan - a non-atheist who doesn't believe in God. Of course there are those out there! Duh! Doesn't seem too wacky but in all honesty the wacko's I've already read about more than make up for the saner ones so far.

Johanna Stein - jokes about punching her baby in the face. I mean, yeah, it's a joke but isn't that a little tasteless? I don't get those kind of jokes. It's trashy pure and simple.

Eric Weinberg - this guy is a loser. He's so upset he had a girl the second time around that he made a huge deal out of it and not his second son gets to grow up, find out, and have a fucked up life courtesy of dear old fucked up dad.



You know, on second thought, I may not finish this. I've read enough I think. I highly doubt there's anything that can actually be called funny hidden in any of the essay's.

This is going to piss people off but hey, it is what it is and I am who I am. (And, the people that get pissed off and probably the ones this is targeting.) If you read this, and liked and found funny the few bits and pieces I threw together here, and you have children, please, please, stop breeding NOW, take whatever children you already have to a police station, fire house, hospital or church and walk away. Pretend you really love your kid and you want to do what's best. Because trust me, you aren't what's best. If you don't believe me, pull your tits out, jiggle them up and down while yelling 'fuck' in front of the kid and punching him or her in it's face. Then see what happens.

[Laura]

Disappointing, the best part of this book was the prologue. This was an attempt by the author to put together a unique book but failed. There are some funny lines that parents can relate to but overall just not that funny.

I was going to give this book as a gift to new parents, but glad I read it first. Drug references and too much swearing. I am surprised Parenting magazine recommended this book, did they really read it?

There are truly so many funny stories about parenting that could have been used.

[Cindy]

This collection of short stories is incredibly memorable and brings on great bursts of laughter.

My favorite one (so far) is titled Oliver's Pink Bicycle by James Braly. A father tries to convince his three and a half year old that he really does want a red bicycle but to no avail. They go looking for a plain pink bike and are told by a bike shop owner that the kids in the playground will rough him up if they do end up getting one.
The day of the birthday party the father shows up at school with a pink plain bike. Oliver happily rides it through Central Park and doesn't notice all of the kids pointing at him. They bike all the way home, where there is a pink themed party waiting for Oliver. His friends arrive with their bikes and they park next to his pink one. Oliver's best friend parks his dark blue bike and then screams to his mother "Mommy! I want a pink bike! Just like Oliver!"

Some other favorite lines from other stories:

"When you fight in front of your children you change who they are" from the I Yelled story.

"And when you humiliate another child to make yours feel better, that's good parenting" by Matthew Weiner in the story Go Easy on the Old Man.

"It's pronounced pumpkin, honey, not fuckin. Please don't tell Mrs. Clemens you saw her fuckin in the window of her front room last night" by Beth Harbison in the story Stop Licking the Wall.

And of course the tear jerker, My Almost Man by Caroline Aaron "Here is the conundrum. If I hadn't reaised him to be himself and let who he was emerge over these very short eighteen years, then I might not be so in love with the man he almost is and I might not be so heartbroken that he is growing up and ready to move on."

[Anne]

This is a collection of mostly humorous, but sometimes painfully heartbreaking, essays by Hollywood writer and actor types, about the joys of parenting. With that loose theme to bring all the stories together, the essays themselves actually cover an incredibly wide array of subjects - from infertility to adoption to accidental pregnancies to parenting like our parents to parenting nothing like our parents to huge mistakes to regrets to unimaginable happiness. This book will make you never want children while simultaneously making you smile at the wonder that children bring into this world and all our lives - even if they aren't our own children. I particularly enjoyed one essay about a woman who adopted a one-year old daughter from China - and the difficulties she encountered with attachments disorder. There were also a couple essays that dealt with the conflict between Ferberizing (allowing your baby to "cry it out") vs. sleeping indefinitely in an enormous family bed. In this day and age where there is a book about everything, and people are so quick to hand out definitive and judgmental advice about child-rearing and who should and shouldn't be having babies, this was a refreshing collection of evidence that there is no one way to do it right - and while there are many ways that seem wrong - in the end, we're all just experimenting and hoping to do our best.

[Marissa Morrison]

Remember on "thirtyomething," when the character that Peter Horton played said he was too narcissistic to have kids? Well the actor is now a father, and he's pretty narcissistic! All the writers I sampled here seem overly self-involved. Maybe that's because they're a bunch of Hollywood writers and entertainers?

A better title for this book might be, "Afterbirth: I had a baby, but let me tell you more about ME."

[Antoinette]

Not a fan. The stories are hokey at best, and more about people afraid of growing up than actual parenting. Poorly written, repetitive, uninteresting, and just...blah. Would make an okay gift for new parents with a cheesy sense of humor...maybe.

[Patina]

Not a great book. Glorifies 'bad parenting' which is old hat at this point. We get it, you're not perfect.

There are a few laugh-out-loud lines, but overall, I'd skip it.

[Jacque]

Loved the honesty --and the overarching narrative that parenting is worthwhile despite the craziness.

[Kelly]

There are a few gems in this collection of essays, but they're few and far between.

[behsforensics]

Cutting is for Your Loudmouth Lesbian
Friend
By Marcia Wilkie

[Michelle]

I judged this book by its cover--the dead, soulless eyes of the child on here, the happy parent tied to the train tracks--and thought, I'd like to know what's going on in that book because I think I'll like it.

Here we have some real stories, folks, about being a parent. From babies to teenagers, happy and sad and difficult. I enjoyed it. It's main message seems to be: Buckle up and have a sense of humor. Also, none of us 100% know what we're doing, but trying is most of the battle. From The Tennis Pro:

"Don't do it!" she said. "We're all bad parents! None of us know what we're doing!"

I love the thought of some stranger yelling that when she can see a dad is about to lose his shit. This is her supporting her fellow parent. Ha, that's amazing.

Anyway, so all of the stories are also short and snappy, which is helpful when you're a parent of two little ones and you sometimes have a brain that won't stop bouncing everywhere. (I am lately reading six books at once. I can't concentrate ever.)

Bonus: There's a story in here from Andrew McCarthy. As in: my husband. The thought of him wrestling with a Bugaboo warmed my heart and made me want to just hug him. We've all wrestled with some tangible, real baby thing (like the stroller. Or the Moby wrap. Or something.), and it's always actually about wrestling with a whole lot more. Oh, Andrew McCarthy, you'll be okay.

A couple of stories really bugged me and turned me into the Judge-y Parent of Other Parents. OMG, take your prenatal vitamins. It's not difficult and it's not some cute act of rebellion (Baby Powder). And, please, let's not pretend Ferber says in his book to leave your kid screaming in their room for two and a half hours (Sweet Dreams), and then congratulate yourself for working out some sleep routine without the help of Ferber. I am biased because my first baby was Ferberized, but I really hate when people judge the whole "cry it out" method when they've not actually read the book. Like very clearly not read it at all.

Family Vacation is hysterical. Hitler's Love Child keeps replaying in my head (you will have so many parenting moments like those shown in the story). I read Oliver's Pink Bicycle to Husband (actual one, not Andrew McCarthy). I wasn't in love with I Yelled but it still made me feel slightly better about, gasp, yelling at my kid (I know, I feel guilty still but it happens). I've already mentioned my love for The Tennis Pro. I am still concerned about Jason Nash (Ten Months In), but I appreciated so much his honesty. Those most have been tough words to write and share. Go Easy on the Old Man was pretty great ("Just drink water the way a person drinks water."). The Sacrifice was hysterical to me, mainly because I always worry about my kids' bathroom needs, but the image of the dad standing next to the police officer, nearly shouting, "That's right, officer! He can't [pee in public]. Tell him. Tell him what happens when you break the law!"...the kid confused, the office paralyzed in his own confusion, and the dad laughing it off at the end of it, congratulating himself on his stroke of genius. There is so much of parenting that is like this.

So read this if you need some parenting moral support! Remember that none of us know what we're doing!

[Ciara]

i gave this book an extra star for being so polarizing. it seems like people either love it or hate it, & most of the people who hate it can't resist calling the authors drug addicts, sluts, & borderline child abusers. i guess maybe they didn't really know what they were getting themselves into, but...seriously, these are not cutesy "my baby is the light of my life/you don't know love until you have a baby" stories. they're the warts-&-all i-can't-believe-that-just-happened stories.

honestly, i have but a dim recollection of most of these stories as more than two months have passed since i read the book, & i am learning to accept that essay collections just don't stay with me no matter how wonderful they are. but i always enjoy reading embarrassing/dark/borderline inappropriate stories about parenting. who decided that the second a lady gets nocked up, she has to be all sweetness & light? when i had my 12-week doppler scan (listening to the heartbeat), the doctor told me that i had a "good, sweet" little baby in there that wanted me to hear its heartbeat right away & know that it was doing great. i told her that we didn't know that & "the baby might be evil". she was surprisingly shocked. i thought it was weird. she's an obstetrician. surely she's heard worse than that in the delivery room. isn't it better to avoid taking this whole parenting lark too seriously?

so if you're the kind of person that likes parenting stories but doesn't subscribe to the belief that your child will be scarred for life if you cuss in front of it now & again, it might be worth checking out this book. if, however, you are the kind of person who thinks that mothers need to start wearing twin sets & joining the junior league as soon as they discover they are pregant, give this one a wide berth.

[Susan]

A solid collection of funny essays about parenthood, written mostly by parents who had their families later in life, which makes this one easier to relate to for my own demographic. I enjoyed that the book also included quite a few non-traditional parents in the mix, a few dads, as well as a lot of ethnic diversity. A good book to keep in your bag or car for moments when you have about five minutes at a time to read a quick chapter/essay, and then you can put it down again, as the essays don't have anything to do with each other besides a vaguely threaded theme of surprises of parenthood. I enjoyed it, but it isn't a must-read.

[Ashley FL]

It was fluff. Some of the stories were amusing, some were not. Nothing terribly thought-provoking, honestly, and that disappointed me. I think the goal was to make parents feel better about not being "perfect" because the author felt that parenting books were too rosy. But I think she missed the mark by a few years -- there are plenty of non-perfect parenting books out there now. Several, in fact, written by the authors of some of these stories.

I give it two stars for redundancy, but if you haven't read this sort of thing before, it would be 3 stars.

[Amelia]

Appreciated the honesty and humor. Surprisingly insightful. I have a few of these essays dog-eared to read on my crappy mom days. Some writers were better than others, as to be expected. All generally fit the same mold (Jewish television writers in L.A. with two kids) - wish the editor would have picked a better variety, it got pretty old reading about the awkwardness of a bris every other chapter (the reason why I gave a 3 and not a 4). Although if you are looking for a mohel in the Los Angeles area, I can pass-on a recommendation.

[Heather Clemons-Porter]

IT cracks me up the negative reviews of this book. These reviews are from the self-righteous and narrow-minded parents who think they can do no wrong, and judge you at the supermarket when your kids is throwing that tantrum. It is refreshing to find people who tell it like it ACTUALLY is sometimes as a parent, and admit to imperfection. I come fromt he sweep it under the rug everything's "fine" midwest, so it was cathartic too. To the negative reviewers, remember that perfection is in your mind, not in your mirror.

[LeAndra]

The stories are little life tidbits that anyone who is a part of a family can relate to. Most of the authors are comedic television and movie writers, so it's funny. Most of these individuals are also Jewish or married into a Jewish family, so the jokes about a bris can become redundant. However, my favorite jokes about a bris so far are, "I'm sorry, did I cut you off?" and "I work for tips." Funny stuff.

[Kristin]

Love it. It's been a while since I have read the f word so many times, but it's almost refreshingly real. It's true. It's all true. I laughed myself silly before bed and had to put it down to try to relax for sleep.

Okay, had to abort half way through. The stories were well written, but it was too much of a good thing. It lost it's luster. I started reading the beginnings of each short story and then realized I wasn't having fun anymore.

[Lacy]

This book was so offensive to me I only got about halfway through it. Each essay had some element or perspective that was just so counter to my beliefs (pro-cry it out, pro-circumcision, doing drugs on the counter while your baby sleeps, etc) that I couldn't find any humor in them or empathy for the people writing them. I can't even re-gift the book because everyone I know would find the essays deeply offensive, too.

[Rachel]

Honestly, after some very poorly written parenting and maternity books this was a breath of fresh air. In my opinion, closer to a 3.5 than 3 stars but alas scoring really has very little meaning. This is not your typical parenting book - in fact I don't think this is a parenting book. Its like a travel book only for parents. Funny, and yes as some folks have pointed out, at times completely inappropriate - though this is also what makes it funny and at the same time likely real.

[Kerri]

The only good thing I can really say about this collection of essays is that they are all, blessedly, short. Written by a group of sniveling, self-absorbed, barely D-list "comic writers and performers," none of them really illuminated parenting or made me laugh out loud. Or even in my head. If you want funny stories about parenting that ring true, go read the Scarymommy blog. Or any of the other thousands of mom (or dad) blogs out there.

[cara]

not every story was top notch - there were some that just made me sad.

but there were others, and far more, that were AWESOME. laugh OUT LOUD awesome. i can be very anxious and freak out over the parentng of my child. i find it helpful not to take things so seriously all the time. this book provides a conduit to that. what great comic relief to parenting stress... good stuff!

[Danielle]

It's supposed to be humorous, edgy parenting stories, but I wasn't entertained. Most of the book contained boring essays by semi-celebrities. None were too shocking or edgy; book seems to be about 20 years too late in the "parents don't have to be perfect" department. The only one I remotely enjoyed was "Going to Neptune".

[Erika]

These stories of real-life parenting kept me laughing while i was awake, at 2 am, nursing my newborn daughter. Here's my favorite paragraph of the book:

"It's pronounced pumpkin, honey, not fuckin. Please don't tell Mrs. Clemens you saw her fuckin in the window of her front room last night."

Enough said.

[Andrea]

This book is about parenting in the raw. This book is meant to be read AFTER you become a parent but actually should be required reading for BEFORE you have children.
Started: 11/12/09
Finished: 11/22/09
272pps

[Megan]

"Stories you won't read in a Parenting Magazine." That's for sure. I'm really enjoying the short stories. Makes it an easy read, but warning - some of the stories may be tooo liberal/left/open for some readers. Good read for all my expecting or soon to be expecting mothers!

[Jenna]

I like the attitude and the candor that dots this collection of essays, but, c'mon - page after page of white 40-something Angeleno comedians making tired cracks about minivans and Baby Bjorns? I'm over it.

[Christine]

There was one story in here that has stayed with me and was amazing--about a woman whose family adopted a baby girl from China who suffered from reactive attachment disorder. The rest of the book was diverting but forgettable.

[Andrea]

I was really disappointed in this book. Especially after being recommended in People magazine!! It was not at all what I expected and the stories really weren't that great. In fact, I didn't even finish it. I would bypass this one if you are considering it for a read. You won't miss anything!

[Sharla]

I enjoyed most of the stories - a nice variety of viewpoints and perspectives. And one of the last ones about a mom realizing how all-of-a-sudden her little boy was all grown up totally hit home and made me cry. I've been hugging my little one a little squeezier lately!