I have a few jobs, but my favorite is being a homeschooling mom of four.
Connecticut
Joined April 2022
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I was driving today when I saw an elderly woman fall over on the sidewalk and stay down after she exited her car.
As a 41 year old Mom, I’m not sure saying “I leapt into action” is correct, but anyway I stopped and made my way over to her as quickly as possible.
Just passing this along, in case it is helpful (a beloved older relative has Parkinson’s):
She said she wasn’t hurt, just having trouble getting up. I took both her arms and grasped them carefully near the elbows to help her get up once she had rotated herself to be kind of lunging (a little hard to describe). Then, I put my arm around her waist and had her put an arm around me to get her back to her car.
She said a) she didn’t need help back to the car but also b) she’s not supposed to walk without her cane — cane was in the trunk of the car, but she didn’t want me to get it out.
I insisted on physically helping her to her car and made sure she was actually sitting down in the seat before I completely let go.
She then told me she has neurological disease like Parkinson’s. Her granddaughter (I think) came over to help … but also to say she shouldn’t have left the car without her cane …. which is true … but also it’s really not easy getting old under those circumstances.
Like I said, just passing along these mobility tips in case you find yourself in similar circumstances.
Ivana Greco retweeted
Saint Mother Teresa did not proselytize. She served the poorest of the poor, seeing Jesus in each of them, no matter their religious profession, in hopes that they might see Jesus in her and her sisters.
Ivana Greco retweeted
Imagine that you're someone that struggles with drinking. But you manage to get yourself out of the bar and then the bartender runs after you with another bottle. Rather than cutting you off, they’re actually chasing you down to give you more of the thing you're trying to run away from.
This is effectively what the sports betting companies are doing.
I hope it’s not disrespectful to keep this photo of Pope Leo right by my broom/mop, but it’s very nice to see him everytime I reach for the cleaning supplies.
Ivana Greco retweeted
On manufacturing boredom. nationalreview.com/2026/10/t…
Ivana Greco retweeted
I was honored to guest-host an episode of ‘Interesting Times.’ I sought common ground with a feminist pornographer.
A few points of difference emerged, too.
nytimes.com/2026/10/29/opini…
It will never happen, alas (too expensive) but this would essentially be my ideal family policy plan too.
Cash - a lot of cash - at the beginning when parents need it, including flexibility to let mom or dad stay home if desired - and then less funding as the kids get bigger.
I’m hopeful we can peel off and get done some parts of it, especially for poor/lower income parents (being mindful of marriage penalties, welfare cliffs, etc.) in the near future. You don’t need it all to make part of it work.
Setting political concerns aside, how I would fix everything.
slowboring.com/p/how-i-would…
The 30 pounds of Halloween candy I ordered arrives tomorrow. (Plus non candy plastic spinners/pencils).
1. I live in a huge trick or treat neighborhood, and we will easily give away all this candy before 8:30 pm and have to turn off the porch light.
2. You - trust me on this - do not want 30 lbs of candy just lying around the house for weeks.
3. You can now order special non candy treats for kids with allegories in bulk on Amazon, and this is wonderful.
Patrick is one of my very favorite voices in the family policy sphere. Everything he writes; I read — and @PublicDiscourse is itself a treasure. Personally sorry for myself that the two are separating 😭
At PD we want to offer tremendous thanks to former star contributing editor @PTBwrites -- after four years of bringing his expertise in family policy to our journal, Patrick will be pursuing new and exciting projects. As part of his work with @EPPCdc, Patrick will continue to write his weekly Substack newsletter, Family Matters, as well as be a columnist for the National Catholic Register and a contributing writer for The Dispatch.
Best of luck, Patrick!
Homeschool today. From time to time we pause and do some “catch up” on stuff where we’ve fallen behind. Today it was finishing a half completed art project and doing some science experiments we didn’t get done.
It’s pretty normal for me to need to move stuff around because of Life, and catch up days are one way we Deal with Life.
I’m too old at this point to be impacted by Ashely’s comments here, but when I was a young Mom, a flippant remark like hers would have stabbed me right through the heart while my babies were in full time daycare.
So, other Moms in similar situations, this comment is for *you* (not her):
My older two kids were in full time daycare after a long maternity leave, starting at around 5-6 months.
There was an adjustment period, and it was hard for me to leave them. I homeschool the big kids now, and our younger two kids were home full time with me until they started part-time childcare at ages 18 months and 3 years old, respectively. I treasure the extra time I got with our little kids.
However: my two older kids (now 11 and 9) are fine. More than fine. They are bright, affectionate, thoughtful kids. Moreover: the money and experience I earned working my butt off while they were tiny opened many doors for me to spend more time with them now that they are big.
My younger two kids go to the same daycare the older ones did, only part-time. The teachers there remember my older kids very affectionately, and LOVE when they stop by to pick up the younger ones with me.
One of the teachers at an in-home daycare we used for a time lives around the corner, and still stops by - years later - with wonderful Chinese dishes she has cooked. When I was postpartum with the younger two kids, she literally dropped off bags and bags of food. We see her and her family on walks, at baseball games, etc etc. I love seeing her young family grow, and know she feels the same about mine.
I’m not saying all daycare situations are the same, and I’m a firm advocate for longer maternity leave and for Mom or Dad to be able to stay home if desired/needed.
But you, Mom, can ignore people who tell you putting a 6 month old baby in daycare is tortuous. You, not an internet commentator, are best able to assess what is working for your own family.
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Ivana Greco retweeted
Pretty disappointed that @ProfEmilyOster would choose to lend her credibility to prediction markets (which are, in practice, sportsbooks with a side of wagering on elections and oil futures), particularly when one considers the harm they are bringing to kids and parents.
@DixieDillonLane, @NadyaWilliams81 and I just returned from our annual Bad Moms Homeschool retreat in exotic rural Pennsylvania (eg we rented an AirBnB together with 9 of our collective 11 children near Hershey PA).
It was again wonderful. Hard to pick a favorite moment, but it was probably this:
You can read @NadyaWilliams81’s delightful write up here: open.substack.com/pub/badhom…
3 year old: Can we get a new baby?
Me: What’s wrong with the old one?
Daughter: I don’t like that one. We can still keep him. But I want a new one.
Here is the solution, which I can report on after having four kids and many years of dating/marriage:
When you want to go out and see a movie with your friends, you say: “I want to go see a movie on Wednesday at 7:30- do you have anything on your schedule that night?”
If he wants to see a movie with his friends, he says: “How would you feel if I go out on Wednesday with [friend] to see [film]?”
If you both want to see the movie together …. highly recommended - you should keep going on dates even and especially if you have a bunch of kids together …. you hire a local babysitter, order pizza and put on a movie for the kids, and keep your fingers crossed that she’ll actually have them in bed when you get home, but no worries if she doesn’t.
This is brilliantly said. I repeat for emphasis:
"... there’s an almost autistic fixation on fairness when it comes to getting to do extracurricular activities [...] couples seem to find parity by doing absolutely nothing..."
It's completely true. I remember my Russian friend in the military was always talking about this, about how in Russia, American men are viewed as being hopelessly effeminate and pistol-whipped by their wives, and that for him, it was the only negative stereotype he heard about Americans as a kid that seemed to be 100% true...
Yet when I say to my married friends, "let's go out for a beer," it's as if I've asked them to broker a nuclear arms deal... I am sorry to ask but what sort of men are these?
For society to function, men must have a sufficient amount of liberty to spend extended periods of unscripted, non-work-related time amongst other men, and this element of a manly life is so important it should functionally preclude men from all domestic motherly roles...
The Mexicans, the Italians, the Irish, they understand these things. Very rich and very poor men appear to as well. But for some reason most middle-class white American men are caught in this weird, "carceral domesticity" at the behest of their niggling wives.
I am not trying to sound "red pilled" here, and have never cared for that scene at all -- but frankly I find this whole thing to be bizarre, repulsive, and completely at odds with a civilized conception of both family and society.
Homeschool today. One thing I really appreciate about the fourth grade language arts program I do with my 9 year old is that it still incorporates “read together” books between parent/child, utilizing complex integrated vocabulary.
It only takes around 15-20 minutes to do, but it’s such a great little lesson: reading skills, vocabulary, pronunciation and discussion questions all in one nice package.
I’m open to nuance here, but there were actually an extremely wide range of baby care practices among our ancestors… some of which were fine and some of which are clearly not appropriate for modern life - like keeping children in cradleboards almost constantly during the early months, sometimes resulting in hip dysplasia and permanent flat heads. Or feeding babies “pap” (a mix of flour and water) almost immediately after birth, often because Mom could not initiate breastfeeding well or for other cultural reasons, frequently resulting in illness (like botulism) and malnutrition. Or exposing babies with birth defects as undesirable, resulting in death by starvation, cold, or wild animal.
I am always suspicious of people who are very confident about replicating what our ancestors did, because almost certainly they are picking and choosing the practices they like best, and labeling it “traditional” when actually what they are doing is “neo trad” at best.
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