Afterbirth: Stories You Won’t Read in a Parenting Magazine
Six years ago, after giving birth to my first son I was having a really hard time doing that most unnatural of natural acts, breastfeeding. I was home a lone a lot of the time with a very hungry infant and quickly losing my sense of humor. This isn’t good even for normal people, but I was a comic. I actually considered the possibility that in giving birth to my son, I had killed the part I knew best. I needed to laugh and quickly. I decided to call my friends who were parents and could still appreciate a joke and get them together to tell stories about how they went from where I was to where they’d gotten too.
Fortunately, these people were more than happy to expose themselves publicly with the most honest, well written, and heartfelt stories about what it means to be a parent today. Really what it means. Thus was born the stage show, “Afterbirth: Stories you won’t read in a Parenting Magazine.” An evening
of first rate story telling that continues to run in LA, started playing in NYC last year, just played to a sold out crowd in the NY Comedy Festival, and has also enjoyed great success in Boston and San Francisco.
As a performer myself, certainly when it all began I was also interested in creating an artistic outlet for myself, but as the years have come and gone, I have to admit that I have used the show as much for personal as professional reasons. The tales I read and hear performed as part of “Afterbirth…” inspire me without exception. Whether they describe the heartbreak of a failed adoption, the joy of finally getting a child to sleep for more than four hours straight, or of being caught mumbling obscenities at them, the courage, humor and balls out love brought to life in these stories keep me going in my darkest days as a parent.
From the very first show I asked people to write about, more or less, “the moment you knew your life changed forever becoming a parent.” I was looking for that event, or series of events, where you knew there was no going back. That this particular predicament you found yourself in would never have happened if only you’d stayed in that one room apartment ordering in Chinese take out for the rest
of your life. What has come out of this question is the on-going show with an ever changing cast, and also an anthology of “Afterbirth…” stories published in April of this year by St. Martin’s Press with the same name. Parents who want the truth and want to laugh about it can’t get enough of it. Obviously, I
recommend you get the book and keep it handy. If you do, I know firsthand you will never again feel isolated and alone in the specific way in which you are screwing up your children.
Until then, honestbaby will be bringing you some of the stories from “Afterbirth…” to comfort you in the wee small hours of the morning when you can’t stuff another Luna Bar in your mouth, or watch another
“Law and Order” re-run praying your baby will finally go to sleep or your teenager will remember to text you. Enjoy!
