Mama Needs A Do Over (A Book Review)

There are three typical types of parenting books.

First, there are those books that are very dry and very technical written by someone with a PhD who usually tries to fit as many Latin derived 7 syllable words into their writing as possible.  These books are generally written for other people with PhDs and are not written for you to understand.

Second, there are those books that seem extremely condescending, as if written by the "perfect" parent who have a whole hoard of Stepford kids who would never think about getting dirty or trying to flush your cell phone down the toilet.    These books are great for other parents with Stepford children but not so great for the parent who's stressed out and at the end of their rope, because lets face it, if you're grabbing a parenting book, you're NOT that family.

Finally, there's the occasional book where the writer, typically a mother just like you, details some of the very same everyday struggled that you face - who knows how it feels to open your eyes in the morning and wish you didn't have to get up at all because you know it's not going to go write. You start reading this type of book and you think to yourself "this person gets it"..

Well, Mama Needs a Do-Over by Lisa Pennington is this third type of book.  She's not perfect, her kids are not perfect and she's willing to admit this to the reader. She does not pretend to have all the answers to how to make your kids perfect but instead taps into other resources from other authors to provide a collection of advice to help make your less than perfect life much more manageable.  Each chapter offers questions to answer in a journal to help focus in on goals and dreams for MOM rather than the lil heathens tearing up your living room, because while you cannot change other people, you can change your own behavior and thinking.  Using examples from her own life , Lisa does a great job of explaining how looking at an impossible problem differently can lend to a solution.

I found Lisa Pennington very relate-able and down to earth. She is not all "me me me" as some other parenting books I have read as of recently but instead sincerely wants to lend advice to help other frazzled moms. Her tone is friendly and upbeat as opposed to condescending and preachy; reading this book is more like having a conversation with a girlfriend about your kids over coffee rather than sitting in a lecture room with the head Soccer Mom telling you why her kids are perfect and yours are not.

I would highly recommend this book if you find that you have more stressful days then not..