I'm Okay, You're a Brat!: Setting the Priorities Straight and Freeing You From the Guilt and Mad Myths of Parenthood

Whether you are already a parent or just suspect you will be one someday, I'm Okay, You're a Brat is sure to change your perceptions about the responsibility. With individual chapters devoted to topics such as full-time parenting, breastfeeding, custody in case of divorce, and remaining childfree, the realism presented will shatter any remaining illusions you may be harboring. Determined to explode the myth of continually joyous parenting, author Susan Jeffers replaces it with a more realistic view of the life changes and emotional difficulties associated with such a long term and essentially thankless task. Jeffers accomplishes this by emphasizing the difference between loving your children and actually enjoying parenting them, a difference that is rarely examined in this age of guilty, overworked parents.

Peppered with quotes from parents, researchers, and her earlier works (Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway and End the Struggle and Dance with Life), the first chapters may come as a bit of a shock to parents not able to freely admit to the daily struggle of parenting--while there are most definitely rewards, who among us enjoys being spit up on? Where's the fun in attending soccer matches when soccer bores you to tears? Who loves parenting when the child just dented the new car and broke curfew? Jeffers insists it's time to openly talk about the downside of parenting--the loss of privacy, lack of sleep, financial struggles, and the instantaneous guilt felt by the majority of parents whenever they attempt to express these downer feelings. Often funny, and always thought provoking, you'll feel quickly reassured that you are not a bad parent for feeling this way--in fact, by freeing yourself from the good/bad parent complex, you may ultimately find greater personal fulfillment both as an individual and as a parent. --Jill Lightner