The following podcast contains explicit language.

Welcome to Mom and Dad are Fighting, Slate's Parenting Podcasts for Thursday, December 6th, the Parent Like It's 1985 edition.

I'm Gabriel Roth. I'm the editorial director of Slate Podcasts, and I'm the father of

Leo, who is four, and Eliza, who is eight. I'm Rebecca Lavoie. I'm a journalist and podcaster in New Hampshire, and I am mom to Henry, who is 17, Teddy, who is 15 and a half, and my stepdaughter, Lily, who is 18. And I'm Carvel Wallace, a writer and podcaster in Oakland, California, and I'm the father to Georgia who was 13 and Ezra who was 15.

Today on our show, And I'm Carval Wallace, a writer and podcaster in Oakland, California, and I'm the father to Georgia, who was 13, and Ezra who was 15.

Today on our show, we have a question about an overprotective daycare center and another about what to do when it's your kids who are excluding other kids from neighborhood fun times.

Plus, as always, we will have triumphs and fails.

We'll share recommendations. And on our Slate Plus bonus segment, mom and dad are fighting host

emeritus Dan Cois joins to share a parenting triumph. But first, it's time for triumphs

and fails. Rebecca, triumph for fail. I've got a small triumph, but before I get to that,

I just want to thank our own Carvel

Wallace for being my personal parenting support group this weekend when I experienced something

very similar to the fail he described last time.

And my younger son, Teddy, was just in a super teenage place and just full of drama and swirling and I got totally

sucked in and I texted Carvel to commiserate and he texted me back and I want to thank

you for that Carvel just goes to show that we can get each other through these stupid fails

when they happen. But onto my triumphant triumph, which is that this year, I think probably for the first time,

all three of our kids are totally holiday gift self-reliant, where they all are doing their

own holiday shopping. They all have their own lists. They all have their own money. They all

have their own debit cards. They can order things. They can buy things. And I don't have to do anything. And I'm hoping that I don't get the last minute week before Christmas panic thing of like, mom, did you buy anything that we can just pretend I bought for Henry? So far, it doesn't seem like it's going that way and that's really exciting because

that's like a whole like chunk of holiday related work that is really annoying when your kids

are thoughtful enough to want to get gifts for people but incapable of actually choosing or doing

...