Let me be clear: I am NOT pregnant. This is NOT a pregnancy announcement. (Sorry to shatter your dreams yet again Mom, happy early Mother’s Day btw :) But one of my favorite pastimes is fear-spiraling about childbirth and what an inadequate mother I’ll be one day, so And Now We Have Everything really spoke to my soul. Laughed out loud (and ugly-cried even louder) a lot. It’s a memoir about motherhood before being ready for motherhood by a brilliant and hilarious writer named Meaghan O’Connell, who I have never met but am now determined to try to The Secret-her into becoming my best friend.

If you’re like me and have hit the age where society (and science) are telling you it’s time to have a baby already BEFORE IT’S TOO LATE and you miss the chance to do the ONE thing women are good for, but you still don’t feel ready (but also feel like a monster for not wanting a baby yet, and a pussy for being scared, and also like maybe you’ll be punished by not being able to have one when you ARE finally ready) (then worrying if you will EVER feel ready) (then trying to remember where you hid your xanax because you are a garbage person, further evidence you’re not prepared to be a mother)… This book will feel like a lifeline. If you DO have a baby, and childbirth felt like more of a traumatic nightmare than a “miracle,” or you are generally feeling like a husk of a human instead of a woman who has finally found her purpose… This book will feel like a lifeline.

My fear is that new motherhood looks like this. I’ve written about The Baby Question before. This book made me feel less alone, like less of a bad, selfish female for all the self-judgement and fears running around in my head.

Had 2 sleepless nights this weekend NOT because I have a baby, but because I couldn’t put this book down. I read the funniest (and most terrifying) parts out loud to Tony. (There were a lot.) (Of both.) I told him it’s required reading before he gets a baby. PLEASE join my book club party of 1 (maybe 2 if Tony realizes I wasn’t kidding) and talk to me about this, because I can’t stop talking about it and I think Tony is sick of hearing about fourth-degree tears and how I think the author might be my platonic soulmate. I LOVED THIS BOOK SO MUCH. (Not enough to have a baby yet though, sorry again Mom & Tony & society)

Unrelated bonus reading if you’re an antisocial hermit nerd like myself, who also read these books this month:

Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng (SO GOOD SO GOOD SO GOOD)

Before the Fall by Noah Hawley (FARGO is our favorite TV show and I loved this book just as much, which makes sense because the author is the showrunner)

The Woman In The Window by A.J. Finn (campy thriller fun, making me nostalgic for the Hitchcock class I took in my carefree wrinkle-free USC days)