Freelance Writer
Health & Families
An Ex-Agoraphobe's Guide To Leaving The House
Chatelaine
“Like any seasoned catastrophizer, I’ve always said I’d rather be pleasantly surprised by something terrible not happening than get caught off guard by it. I have iodine tablets in my cupboard in case the nuclear plant 50 km away goes tits up, for God’s sake. But hypervigilance (a.k.a. thinking that if we keep our eyes open wide and wild enough, we will be able to stave off disaster) does not work."
Breaking Up is (financially) Hard to Do
Chatelaine
“Never mind if finances are already strained, if the family is down to a solo income while one parent stays home, or if daycare fees are astronomical. Today, the costs of setting up
and maintaining two homes can make divorce seem like a luxury item—up there with diamond tennis bracelets and speedboats.”
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How Adoption Made Our Family Complete
Today's Parent

“For the final drop-off, Benjamin’s foster parents were struggling badly. They’d had him his whole life. He was screaming and reaching for his foster mom, and we had to literally rip him from her arms, all of us sobbing. It was a very, very difficult day. I kept thinking it was similar to labour and childbirth in a way: incredibly painful, but something remarkable was born of it.”
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Why Donald Trump and a bad divorce made me decide to become a surrogat
Today's Parent
“I’m not what you’d call a risk-taker. But god, I’m proud of myself. I love my son so, so much. To be able to help someone else discover that kind of love is a massive honour. I’m a strong believer that we don’t own our kids. We birth them, and care for them, teach them and love them, and then we release them. With this girl, I just released her into the world a little sooner.”
Manorexia
Canadian Living

“The weight starts coming off; he likes the results and attention and wants more. He wants to be thinner and thinner. He stops putting dressing on his salad, then he stops eating anything at all. His starving brain makes his behaviour erratic, his starving body becomes more bones than flesh, and his mother can do nothing but stand by and watch as her son, the beautiful boy she had known and loved,
slowly begins to disappear.”
Are You There, Margaret? It's Me, Perimenopause
Chatelaine
“Our two main hormones made their dramatic entrance when we hit puberty, and now the old ovary factory where they’re made is winding things down. Sure, some women’s estrogen and progesterone elegantly and gradually slip away, holding hands like sleeping otters. Then there are the rest of us, whose hormones crash and dip and swoop like a couple of fighting rabid bats.”
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What it's like to foster 115 kids
Today's Parent
“There are some teenagers you can parent and some super independent ones you can just house. But babies? Oh, babies keep me sane. They are the reason I keep fostering. They are simply all heart—both heart-filling and heart-wrenching.
When I hold one, I just feel a smile in my entire body, starting in my toes and moving up. All you have to do is love them. The first time I held a foster baby, I thought, OK, I’m here. This is what I do now.”
I'm sorry - the birth mother has changed her mind
Today's Parent

“Our little boy was picked up that same day, a complete 180 of Christmas Eve. And just like that, our dream turned into a nightmare. We were devastated. I called both of our families to break the terrible news. We had been well prepared for the 21-day rule, and before he was placed with us, we’d thought, Well, how attached can you get in three weeks?”
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I am not overprotective - I am a mom who lost a child
Today's Parent
“Dreams of visits to creeks were replaced by visits to specialists. Playgrounds were replaced by living room pillow forts. Places like museums had to be avoided: Germs were terrifying, as even the slightest infection could prove to be
fatal for Zack. Our daily life couldn’t be about adventure and exploration; we all just had to lay low to keep Zack safe. We had to stay sheltered.”
7 Days, 7 Ways to Emotionally Detox
FLARE
“Here’s a transcription of that impressive first 30 seconds of meditation: “I need to buy salt. Who runs out of salt? My boob is itchy. Did I lock the door? How will I remember to buy salt?” Then my brain decides to sing a couple of lines of
“Rocket Man.” Then I’m back to the damn salt.”
Lifting the Veil
Canadian Living
“Eric’s room is still the way he left it that day in August. That morning, after he’d left for Saskatchewan, Joy cleaned the house, excited about having the long weekend to herself. She started to strip Eric’s bed, but stopped, deciding it was fine. That omission, she says, has saved her many times over the past year. ‘His sheets still smell of him,’ she says. ‘I can still climb into his bed and surround myself with him."
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