Category Archives: motherhood

Would You Break the Law to Change Your Kid’s Grades?

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Comic about Parents and Grades
I fear for the youth of today.  Seriously fear for them.  Not because of global warming or cyberterrorism or a zombie apocalypse, but because of their parents.

I’ve been quite outspoken on my distress that helicopter parenting has elevated (heh heh) to a point that would have seemed ridiculous a generation ago, and I keep hoping I’ll be proven overly cynical, the girl who cried wolf, or completely wrong.  After all, I am personally invested in this serious problem as a citizen, an educator, and … well, someone who sees an awful of parents whose kids control them the way a puppeteer directs a marionette.

But I think I’m right about this one, much to my chagrin.

There are news stories that crop up all the time, giving credence to my theory that far too many underage inmates are running an increasing number of asylums.

Consider this, from Time Magazine:

A Pennsylvania woman faces six felony charges for doing just that. Catherine Venusto, 45, hacked into the Northwestern Lehigh School District computer system and altered the grades of her two children, ABC News reports. Venusto had worked at the district as an administrative office secretary from 2008 through April, 2011. A year before she quit, Venusto, of New Tripoli, Penn., had been accused of changing her daughter’s failing grade to a medical exception. And in February, 2012, she was accused of changing her son’s 98 to a 99.

I have worked in enough school districts to know that, if a medical exception is warranted, it is given.  In fact, it’s not exactly difficult…

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Being Brad Pitt’s Mom Means You Can’t Have an Opinion

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Photo of Brad Pitt and Mother Jane

Before joining forces with Angelina Jolie, Brad Pitt was known primarily for being hot, an endeavor he was remarkably good at.  He has moved from eye candy to political awareness, though, and he has shown to be even better at this undertaking.  Whether giving time and money to victims of Hurricane Katrina or raising awareness about issues such as same-sex marriage, Pitt is a guy that’s used his popularity to get more than laid.

But does that mean that his entire family agrees with him?  Apparently not …

From Yahoo News:

In a letter to her hometown paper, the Springfield (Mo.) News-Leader, Jane Pitt writes that Christians, like herself, should not refuse to vote for Mitt Romney just because he is a Mormon. The published response to an earlier opinion in the paper describes President Barack Obama’s opponent for president as “a family man with high morals, business experience, who is against abortion, and shares Christian conviction concerning homosexuality.”

What I don’t understand, though, is why this is news.

My mother was raised in an extremely right-wing family.  As she grew into adulthood (at the height of the sixties, I might add), she developed her own ideas and opinions, becoming quite liberal.  There were never any turkey-throwing incidents at Thanksgiving over politics or anything, and I had no clue how different her views were from the rest of her side of the family until I was nearly an …

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A Mother’s Pain When Her Daughter is Involved in a Violent Crime …

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Photo of Brittany Tibbets
Let’s face it, parents have a tendency to want to believe the best in their children.

This idea hit me especially hard when the mother of a young woman involved in an unspeakable crime spoke out in her daughter’s defense as the media increasingly implied that her daughter was … well, maybe not that great a person.

In a nutshell, five police officers from a drug task force were serving a search warrant on a suspected drug dealer at his home when the guy, Cullen Mutrie, opened fire on them, injuring several and killing Greenland, NH’s Chief of Police, Michael Maloney.  Mutrie went on to kill a girl who was in the house with him at the time and then himself.

It was, to say the least, a clusterfuck … and one that really rocked the state of New Hampshire.

I was personally distraught on a number of levels, the first being that senseless death is always upsetting.  It also seems especially horrible when someone is killed because of the nature of his job—I guess that I, as a public school teacher, always think back to school shootings.  Finally, this took place less than ten minutes from my house.  I literally watched police cars, ambulances, and even the ubiquitous black FBI van go charging past.

It was scary as hell.

But after the shock and the fear and the deep sadness that Chief Maloney, who was days away from his retirement, had been killed settled in a little bit, I started to wonder about Brittany Tibbets, the 26-year-old girl that Mutrie shot before turning the gun on himself.  Who was she?  Why was she there?  What had her final minutes been like?

And then, almost on cue, her mother spoke out to the media, stating that her daughter and Mutrie had an on-again-off-again relationship.

From WMUR:

“Did we have, maybe, concerns? Yes, but she’s 26 years old. We hoped we raised someone who made good decisions, and she’s the type of person that sees the good in people. Right now, it wasn’t good,” Donna Tibbetts said.

Despite the family’s concerns about Mutrie, Donna Tibbets claimed they “never saw this coming”.

The Tibbetts believe their daughter was only at the scene to help.

“I just don’t want this to be what people remember her for,” Donna Tibbetts said.

I have to say, I felt so damn bad for Donna Tibbets when I saw that on the news. I mean, no one wants to hear awful things about her kid in the media, especially when the family is deep …

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Mom Chronicles 7-Year-Old Daughter’s “Obesity” Battle in Vogue

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Photo of Dara Lynn Weiss and Daughter Bea
Let’s talk about fat, shall we?  In fact, let’s just throw caution to the wind and talk about the potential damage parents can do to their children in the name of curtailing the national trend toward childhood obesity.

Or we could just talk about what a crazy bitch Dara-Lynn Weiss, who recently wrote a piece for Vogue focused on the alleged need for her 7-year-old daughter’s need to lose weight, is.

Incidentally, her daughter Bea was 4’4” and weighed 93 pounds.  She is now sixteen pounds lighter.

And, in case I haven’t already mentioned it, seven.

According to Weiss, Bea’s diet was recommended by her pediatrician, who felt that “she was clinically obese and could be at risk for high blood pressure, cholesterol, and diabetes.”

Just for shits and giggles, I put Bea’s stats into the BMI calculator at the National Heart Lung Institute.  It came out as normal. While, to be completely fair, the CDC has a pediatric BMI calculator that does classify Bea as “overweight” considering her age, I think there’s more than meets the eye here.

To wit, here’s what Weiss had to say about Bea’s dietary habits … and her own actions undertaken as…

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