Elizabeth Skoski

Last week, as many parents of young children were celebrating that COVID-19 vaccines finally were available for children under 5, the American Academy of Pediatrics released an updated policy statement about breastfeeding. In addition to the previous recommendation that babies are exclusively breastfed for six months after birth, it ups the ante: "Furthermore, the AAP supports continued breastfeeding, along with appropriate complementary foods introduced at about 6 months, as long as mutually de

Back in 2008, Betty Draper, Mad Men’s long-suffering wife and everyone’s favorite “unlikeable mother,” stormed up the stairs after her husband, hollering, “I’m here all day, alone with them. Outnumbered.” (Them meaning their two kids, of course.) The line didn’t hit me then, but over a decade later, trapped at home with a toddler and an infant while COVID-19 raged into yet another wave, her words came flooding back to me. That word, outnumbered, was so much more precise than the other platitudes

I’m laying, unmoving, in the dark. Any sliver of light that might enter the room is stopped by thick blackout curtains. There are scratches on my upper arms from where sharp nails raked across the skin just a bit earlier.

Staying still as possible, I count the seconds until I dare try to move. To 500. To 1,000. It’s been almost an hour since I finished reading her bedtime stories. Almost two since I bounced, swayed, and walked her baby sister into a deep enough sleep that she could be put down

Recently, I found myself in a parenting dilemma. After my morning “workout” of wrestling my wet-noodle-limbed toddler into the required sweatshirt, sweatpants, snow pants, coat, hat, mittens, and mask, we headed out to meet her cousins for sledding. On the way, I stopped for gas. From the backseat, my toddler declared she absolutely had to have a snack.

I froze with indecision. Leave her in the car for the five minutes it would take to run in and grab a bag of pretzels? Or extend the task by br

The Netflix hit Maid, which after only a few weeks has already vaulted into the service’s all-time Top 10, seems to have come exactly when it’s needed. Inspired by Stephanie Land’s memoir, Maid: Hard Work, Low Pay, and a Mother’s Will to Survive, the 10-episode series is striking a chord so often left unstruck, a deeply moving exploration of domestic and emotional abuse, generational trauma, and the infuriating catch-22s of government systems built for failure. Its raw, unflinching depictions co