From licensed educator and TikTok phenom Laura Danger, an insightful and practical guide that will teach you how to recognize unproductive dynamics at home, transform your relationships, find your community--and break free from a life of mediocrity. All of us are running a race against a culture telling us we need to be more, to hustle more, and that we should be doing it all ourselves. It’s a cycle that needs to be broken, and in this book, Danger, an experienced educator, facilitator, and domestic equity advocate, sets out on a path of unpacking the inequity and rage in the erasure of domestic labor and care to guide readers toward a healthier and more balanced life. Organized into seven chapters covering topics like harmful stereotypes and communication models, as well as the nag paradox and weaponized incompetence, A battle cry for better, Laura Danger shows that there are countless practical ways to maintain bonds, beat back against the status quo, and to meet our own and one another’s needs, because <we all deserve more than mediocre.<

Autorentext

A licensed educator, facilitator, and domestic equity advocate, Laura Danger has worked closely with the Fair Play team and has been interviewed in HuffPost, InStyle, Business Insider, and others as an expert on weaponized incompetence and inequity within partnerships. You can find her online at @ThatDarnChat.

Leseprobe
Introduction

In October 2019, I stood in my kitchen staring at a birthday card, which sparked a full-blown identity crisis and eventually led to my burning a lot of my life down (in the best way). The card, which read, Happy Birthday, Mom! You're the best wife and mother in the world! We you! was well-intentioned and sweet. But as my eyes traced the words in front of me, I struggled to catch my breath. The room suddenly felt smaller, the walls closing in around me.

It was my thirty-first birthday. That morning, my husband and kids presented me with a handmade birthday card in an envelope and some garden-picked flowers. My six-month-old sat in her high chair next to my three-year-old. They beamed with pride at what they'd made me.

As I stood in the kitchen holding the birthday card, I was running on fumes, barely holding it together. I was deep in the raw, never-rested fog of my youngest's first year while also navigating life with a threenager. On top of everything, I was only eight weeks into a new teaching position at a new school. I'd had the rug pulled out from underneath me that June when, just days into my maternity leave, my position was eliminated and I'd been laid off. After a summer of uncertainty, I started a new job in September and now, two months in, I was still scrambling to find my footing. I was pumping on my prep periods, grading papers after bedtime, and using periodic child-free trips to the grocery store as my main source of self-care. I'd worked hard to hold on to bits of myself through my transition into motherhood-staying involved with neighborhood organizations and finding creative projects I could do from home-but those things were the first to go as I struggled to maintain balance. I'd been powering through the days and weeks, but I was beyond exhausted.

Right as I was reading the birthday card, my husband, Jack, announced that it was a "whatever Mom wants to do" day! My heart sank. I was the "best mom and wife" according to them, and yet, all I wanted for my birthday was to not figure out the plan. A real gift would have been an entire day during which I didn't have to make a single decision. I didn't want to have to think about what kind of activity everyone would like, what restaurant had the chicken strips the kids might eat, or take into consideration how we'd work around nap and nursing schedules. Even on my birthday, which was supposed to be a celebration of me as a person, I was a mother and a wife first. Despite all the good intentions and love being launched my way that morning, I couldn't help but notice how suffocated I felt.

Jack was doing everything in his power to encourage me to put myself first, but what wasn't clear to either of us at the time was how many barriers were in the way of actually making that possible. He thought he was being supportive, but by tossing the reins to me, my husband was unintentionally giving me more work. Just telling me to do "whatever I wanted" disregarded all the mental and emotional labor that went into having a fun day with a family of four. The Mom Day and the card that addressed me by my roles, with no mention of me as a person, felt like clear proof of what I'd feared: that my value was measured by what I was to others, and that the work I was doing was invisible. I didn't want to force my family into doing something I wanted to do; I wanted them to notice what might be enjoyable and then make considerate plans for me.

The sting of sadness that came with my gifts was paired with shame. I felt like an ungrateful brat for being bothered by the sweet gestures of the people who loved me. I felt like I had no reason to be upset. I thought I was being a total fool for not being satisfied. I didn't have the energy or the understanding to express what was actually going on with me. So rather than ruining the mood by confronting whatever weird feelings were coming up, I sipped my coffee, choked back confused tears, and picked a place for lunch that I knew had something my kids would eat.

On the surface, that birthday looked the same as all the others-buying a few plants and getting ice cream-but something in me had changed. I'd frequently found myself in a cycle of rumination and resentment, acting like a nag or denying my feelings so I wouldn't come off like one, but as the day went on, rather than pushing away the feelings that came up for me, I let them linger. I realized I'd been walking around most days with a rain cloud over me, going through the motions without giving myself time to process anything. I was so tired and worn out, exhausted from making decisions all day every day about the kids, the house, my job, and the groceries. I wanted a break. A real break. Not just a solo trip to Target. But I was so tired that the thought of the effort I'd have to put in to getting that break made me want to scream. The thought of picking out what I wanted to eat for lunch felt like one decision too many. On the day of my thirty-first birthday, rather than wallowing in familiar self-pity, I allowed my feelings of resignation to transform. I couldn't accept a future full of tearful birthdays during which I felt like a ghost. That card propelled me forward.

You Got This, Mama

I'd been told through Instagram and Facebook posts featuring tired but happy moms that the struggle would be worth it, and if I could just try to be present, motherhood would fulfill me. I was smart and resilient and had great support, so whenever I felt like I was hitting a wall, I figured if I kept moving forward, things would eventually ease up. I thought motherhood was a muscle I needed to keep exercising, and if I continued to pick up more responsibilities, I'd just get stronger and more capable, like all those model mothers online. I'd heard every variation of "It's just a season, Mama!" but the seasons just kept hitting, always with inclement weather. Standing in the kitchen on my birthday, fighting back tears, I didn't feel strong. I felt deflated and defeated. I felt resentful and alone. I had been quietly Momfluenced and had internalized the ways motherhood requires martyrdom.

I was Jack's wife, Charlie and Frances's mom, dedicating myself willingly to those roles and then quietly resenting them for how much I'd felt pressured to sacrifice for them. I'd allowed myself to be swallowed up by those titles to the point where I didn't recognize myself that morning. I was a wife and a mother, and I loved my husband and kids, but who was Laura? Believin…