You Know You Are a BetaMom if…

You have forgotten your Snack Day.

You have not Called the Person Back.

You lost the Thing You Borrowed in the First Place.

Your biological clock is chronically fifteen minutes later than everyone else's.

You have lost all existing copies of your School Directory.

Ditto, child’s report card before signing it.

Ditto, Karate Uniform.

Ditto, credit card.

Ditto, keys. Actually, You have not been able to find your keys to the point where you have had to have new keys made.

You have had Taco Bell for at least two consecutive meals in the last three days.

You have been known to visit Starbucks, the Coffee Bean, or any combination of the two more than one time in the course of your day.

You have been known to leave your house with all your children dressed but have found yourself at Dodger Stadium with no shoes. Literally. No. Shoes.

You have bounced a tuition check to your incredibly expensive elementary school, and had the headmaster call you personally about it.

Your toddler may or may not have a black front tooth from running races in their socks in your house and smacking into various countertops.

Your child may or may not believe that their siblings plus the nanny’s children constitutes a birthday party.

Your child may or may not at one point have been saving up her money to “go back to Guatemala and visit her mother.”

You have given up on any given night and up to three children may be found in your bed, or you in theirs, but thanks to Lunesta, you no longer care.

You have had three or more of the props you made for the fifth grade’s Walk Through the American Revolution rejected or redone as they were not authentic enough; alternately, your child has woken up in the morning and said, “I need a Benjamin Franklin costume to wear to school today,” and you need to drive away in 45 minutes.

You have been to Targets in at least three states, or, you have a favorite Target that regard as your own, and have considered giving your friend a Target-themed baby shower.

You have spilled your first cup of coffee all down your jeans in the morning but wore them into school anyway. You no longer even register the dog hair or small amounts of other excremental incidentals that may also affect your look, smell or demeanor on any given day.

Your message box on both your cell and home lines routinely fills up to the point (what is that, like more than 20 messages?) where you are outed to the strangers just trying to leave you a message…and then your email goes down.

You sometimes turn off your embarrassingly large family car when you get back to your house in the morning and just sit in it until the nanny comes out to look at you from the front porch and wonders if she should intervene.

Friday night means Diet Coke and Cheaple: ie, People, Us, InTouch, OK, Celebrity Living, Star, or any combination of more than three of the above on the same day. Your idea of a book group, same. Your idea of a plane trip, same. On your vacation to Cabo, you may or may not stalk Sandra Bullock with your camera while you pretend to take pictures of your own friends.

You practice Tivo Therapy, and much of the conversation you have with your children (and spouse!) involves anecdotes from American Idol, America’s Next Top Model, and Project Runway.

You could write a book about women and the Crime Drama, and sometimes have dreams narrated by Jerry Orbach.

You have to save up the energy to watch 24 and Lost, which in terms of your TivoQ are the equivalent of reading Dostoyevsky.

You and your twelve your old have both gotten dressed in the morning to find that you are wearing nearly the same outfit, down to the overpriced jeans, Converse slip-ons and hoodie.

You thought about wearing better shoes but the toes were too pointy and they hurt your feet more than the Converse, and you knew your day was not going to involve anyone worth justifying foot pain.

You have been mistaken for your child’s “weird older sister” while picking her up from middle school in said outfit.

You thought you were going to dress like this for just “one day longer…”

You would rather stick a fork in your own eye than rsvp to any event that does not allow you to email your response.

You would rather stick two forks in your own eye than rsvp to any child’s birthday party.

You have called to rsvp to a child’s party past the deadline for responding and have been turned away.

You have called to rsvp to a child’s party past the deadline for responding and have never heard back from the family, thus thrown into the nether world of whether to attend or not, solved only by dragging your entire family, plus your invited toddler, plus one present, to the same movie while buying your own tickets, just so you can both attend and not attend the party, “just in case.”

You have ignored a cough long enough to warrant a chest x-ray.

A doctor has asked if you have had breast implants removed, but that is the only thing that could explain the sagging in your breasts that is so extreme that it shows up on the xray.

You are reading this after 3 a.m.

Comments

[Abbey]

Am I a Betamom if:

-I occasionally let my five year old have a bottle before bed.

-I sometimes secretly stick a Pull Up on my five year old while he is asleep to be sure I won't be woken up.

-I'm still nursing my almost 2 and half year old because I simply cannot figure out an easy way to stop.

-I'm considering hosting a birthday party for my husband at the Citgo down the street (seriously--they have a tapas bar!)

-I think my five year may have missed school the last 3 Fridays for important things like errands at Target (which is in entirely the opposite direction from school)

[mbs]

I do know a mom who actually used to give her toddler a diet coke bottle with ice. If you got really desperate you could borrow it for a swig. Downright Theta!

BTW I do love the pull up as insurance concept. And Target, that is like Disneyland in my house...

[lkd]

Ha!
I work for California Weekly Explorer, the producers of the "Walk Through" programs. Our General Manager read this list at one of our staff meetings a few months ago and we all thought it was hilarious.
Nice work.

[Nina Frye]

Hi Beta Mom -

I love your blog. I am very much a Beta Mom. That is why Cindi (my business partner) and I created LTDchix. If you take a peak at our website www.ltdchix.com (and I am not trying to plug our Company but trying to show you why we are NOT Alpha Moms) and see what we are all about. Thank you and we would love your opinion. Have a great day and look forward to hearing from you.

Nina and Cindi
Founders of LTDchix.com

[Betamom]

OMG! LKD! Having lived through Walk Through the American Revolution, Walk Through Ancient Civilizations, and Walk Through California History, times two children, thus equalling 18 hours of your presentations in our school's highly functional yet badly lit multipurpose room, Betamom feels as if she has been emailed by the God of Social Studies itself! Oh the togas I have badly pinned! Oh that one day a child of mine would pick the lollipop with the gold tip! But that just doesn't happen to Betachild! So honored! Being a Betamom, it's a little sad that it took 8 months for me to reply to your post. Sadly, that's record time! Thanks for reading xx

[Betamom]

OMG! LKD! Having lived through Walk Through the American Revolution, Walk Through Ancient Civilizations, and Walk Through California History, times two children, thus equalling 18 hours of your presentations in our school's highly functional yet badly lit multipurpose room, Betamom feels as if she has been emailed by the God of Social Studies itself! Oh the togas I have badly pinned! Oh that one day a child of mine would pick the lollipop with the gold tip! But that just doesn't happen to Betachild! So honored! Being a Betamom, it's a little sad that it took 8 months for me to reply to your post. Sadly, that's record time! Thanks for reading xx

[Betamom]

Hi Nina and Cindi,

Having just broken down and bought the BetaVan, i found that one particularly funny!

Keep Livin' the Dream,

Love,
Betamom