I need to evangelize about a product that has changed my life and the three men that live with me. It’s called Sarafem and it’s a very low dose of Prozac that you take for two weeks out of the month. Normally I’d never talk about needing to take a pill like this. I mean, I know it’s become normalized and everyone takes an anti-anything pill, but for a long time I felt shameful about needing a drug to chill me out. I felt I should be able to mange my problems on my own with good old-fashioned friends, exercise and Prosecco. But when the stress of shuttling the boys out to school in the morning made me want to pour vodka into my orange juice, I realized maybe I should take my doctor’s offer for a prescription to deal with my PMS mood swings. Yelling and sulking were becoming my default emotional states for two weeks out of the month and it was making everyone unhappy. We we’re stuck in an unfortunate routine of me telling the boys more than three times to get dressed, then resorting to raise my voice and having to hear Conrad deliver a classic zinger like: “When you yell at me in the morning it makes me fee yucky at school all day.” It would be 8:30 in the morning and we’d all be exhausted from the tension in the house.

It was time to call in some drugs.

So I did, reluctantly. And I am here to evangelize about how I’ve become a better wife and mother through chemistry.

Sarafem has turned out to be a love letter to the men in my life. Since last week was father’s day, and I actually wrote this last week but was having too much fun with my kids to blog (kinda kidding there) I thought if you haven’t yet given your beloved a gift or he didn’t like that gadget, consider giving him a happier you. And don’t worry, this is not a Stepfordian lobotomy where I walk around the house saying, “That’s nice dear.” “More home made biscuits, dear.” “Would you like your blow job now dear?”

No, David can attest to the fact that it’s not like that at all. You don’t gain weight. Your sex drive doesn’t change. You sleep normally. You still get nuance, irony and can feel bitter, if you want too. But what’s gone is the dark spot on my heart. That insta-angry place I’d used to go to in zero-to-sixty after asking the boys for the third time to get dressed, or the face I’d make when David would say something like, “Gosh we’re low on groceries” and I’d take it as an insult that I can’t get anything done fast enough anymore. The everyday situations that could set off an anger tear are now buffered by an emotional cushion as fun as a bouncy castle.  My screaming switch that used to go all the way up to Spinal Tap 11 now only goes as has high as six. And I’m just so grateful to have figured out how to turn down the volume of my moods swings. So I offer it to you, if you’re experiencing anything similar. After all it’s summer, so consider getting a mother’s (little) helper.