To the Alternadads,

I’ve been thinking about this for a few weeks now, and I want to say something.

I don’t think pot is bad. And while I don’t get stoned myself these days, I sure as hell still drink now and then. Everyone has their drug of choice. So I don’t mean to fault you for relaxing, enjoying, etc. Not at all. Pot should be legal.

But I want to question how you smoke up. Do you get stoned enough that you’d be unable to function at high speed if there were an electrical fire? When you’re stoned and the baby cries, do you go to him, or does your wife/partner/mom have to stand in for you? How does this work?

I had a baby 14 months ago, and it changed me in a lot of ways. There are a lot of things I don’t get to do that I used to do a lot. I don’t sleep in. I don’t drive without a seatbelt. I don’t eat fast food as much. I don’t take long baths. I don’t skip breakfast. Having a baby changed my life. Of course it did.

It also changed me. More than anything, I now have this amazing ability to wake up at a whimper, fully functioning and ready to roll. I can wake up 6 times in a night and still make breakfast at 7 am. I can’t believe it, but it’s true.

Now, if I get shnockered (which I would love to do more often) I lose this ability. So I don’t get drunk when I’m on duty. I drink the occasional beer or wine, but I wouldn’t drink much more than that unless my husband was staying sober, or we were leaving the kid with my mom for the night or something. Kind of like being a designated driver.

Like everything else in my life, relaxation comes second now. Which is not to say I shouldn’t get to relax, but it’s not at the top of the list.

So I want to ask if the mothers of your kids get to enjoy these same privileges. If this is an equal arrangement, and you’ve worked it out, cool. But there’s something that grates for me, something overly entitled about a man assuming he has the right to relax/enjoy his time. When in history has that really been true?

Parents don’t really have free time, and I’ve not heard any moms saying anything like this.

Could be a totally false assumption, but if you’re smoking up (or drinking, or whatev) while mom goes to bed early so she can wake up and make mashed bananas and rice cereal... or while mom runs to the grocery store, or stays alert in case baby wakes up in the night… that bugs me. No better than if you were playing Xbox while mom runs around picking up toys at the end of the day. Adolescent. Selfish.

And I say this as a woman with an awesome husband. But I’ve noticed that even on his best days, he doesn’t have that biological impulse I do… in the middle of the night… to wake at a whimper. If he were stoned, I’d never get out of changing a midnight diaper.

I mean no disrespect, but I needed to say this…

From someone who is probably not an alternamom after all.