My four-year-old made me so angry yesterday I had to call my husband so he could talk me down. It was just the usual antics fed on by tiredness and boredom. She just kept pushing and whining and sassing and at one point I looked at her and thought, “Oh, man. There’s so much more to come.” It’s amazing how angry they can make you! But then moments later after you kiss and make up, they become your little girls again and not Veruca Salts in training, and you look at them and think, “Oh! There’s so much more to come!”

It’s a complicated, awesome, fiery thing–relationships between mothers and daughters. Sweet, sour, hot, refreshing, nourishing. It’s like Thai food.

I have an essay in an anthology that just came out called Because I Love Her; it’s a collection of essays, edited by Andrea N. Richesin, all about the complex Thai-like relationship I tried to describe above.
Jacquelyn Mitchard, Tara Bray Smith, Joyce Maynard, and Karen Joy Fowler are in here, as well as Rachel Sarah from Single Mom Seeking. It’s truly a great read. Funny, true and oftentimes unbearably sad.

To lighten things up I’ll send a copy of the book to a random commenter who shares a mother-daughter story.

Bonus Material:

Becasue I Love Her book trailer on YouTube
I Just Want to Kiss Your Butt
The Last Bachelor
Real Live Girl!
Extra! Extra! Mommy was Slutty!