Even God Had Bad Parenting Days

“Warm, witty, and wise, Alicia Jo Rabins offers essential advice to parents. Her interpretation of ancient stories suffuses family struggles—both mundane and profound—with beauty and wonder.”      –-Vanessa Hua, author of Forbidden City.

“Alicia Jo Rabins has given parents a gift of insight, solace, solidarity, and care in this exquisite volume of spiritual nourishment. This book is a blessing for anyone in the trenches of life with littles.”      --Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg, author of Nurture the Wow and On Repentance and Repair: Making Amends in an Unapologetic World.

Do you ever have days when you feel like the least orga­nized par­ent at drop-off? When you’re cer­tain that if you hear the word ​“why” from your tod­dler one more time you’ll scream? When you just want to dis­ap­pear into a dark, qui­et room and hide from the chaos hap­pen­ing in your home? Or even con­sid­er whether hav­ing kids was a good idea?

These are the sorts of ques­tions that Ali­cia Jo Rabins asks and answers in her new book, Even God Had Bad Par­ent­ing Days, while using Jew­ish wis­dom — gleaned from the Torah, midrashim, Tal­mud, and oth­er ancient texts — to explore the not-so-Insta­gram-wor­thy ele­ments of twen­ty-first cen­tu­ry par­ent­ing. An accom­plished artist, per­former, writer, and Torah teacher, Rabins has craft­ed a deeply relat­able, com­fort­ing guide for any­one who ever feels over­whelmed by par­ent­hood. Writ­ing of the High Hol­i­day songs that so often paint God as the ulti­mate patient and lov­ing par­ent-fig­ure, she says, ​“I con­fess that this idea of act­ing with infi­nite com­pas­sion feels firm­ly beyond my reach. And that’s why, from a parent’s per­spec­tive, I actu­al­ly find it com­fort­ing to remem­ber that God — as described in the Torah — is impa­tient, imper­fect, and some­times down­right pis­sy,” such as when Korah is jeal­ous of Moses and Aaron’s lead­er­ship roles. ​“Does God calm­ly say, ​‘Tell me more about what you’re feel­ing’? No, God does not. Instead God opens up a giant hole in the ground” that swal­lows him whole. The point, of course, is not to advo­cate for crap­py par­ent­ing, but to help par­ents and care­givers feel less alone in moments when rais­ing a child is hard and patience wears thin.

One of the book’s strengths is that it is orga­nized into short, the­mat­ic chap­ters — most of them only three or four pages long — that are quick reads, acces­si­ble to even the most sleep-deprived, time-strapped par­ent. Rabins cou­ples her own tri­umphs and chal­lenges with Jew­ish teach­ings, a cre­ative deci­sion that pro­vides com­fort with­out com­ing across as patron­iz­ing or false­ly opti­mistic. For instance, Even God Had Bad Parenting Days  does not shy away from mat­ters like the author’s post­par­tum depres­sion, lone­li­ness, and finan­cial strain. This authen­tic­i­ty sets Even God Had Bad Parenting Days  apart from oth­er par­ent­ing books. It reads as though it has been writ­ten by an expe­ri­enced mom friend who’s seen it all, who lis­tens with­out judg­ment, and who always offers the best response to life’s dif­fi­cul­ties — even if that response is just to rub your back and say she under­stands. Par­ent­ing can feel like a lone­ly, stress­ful endeav­or, but Even God Had Bad Parenting Days will make any par­ent or care­giv­er feel seen, under­stood, and more inti­mate­ly con­nect­ed to Jew­ish teachings.     --Leah Grisham, The Jewish Book Council