Baby Laughs: The Naked Truth About the First Year of Mommyhood

I read McCarthy's first biography about pregnancy - while I was pregnant - and it made me laugh out loud. I appreciated it. Her complete honesty was refreshing, and her vulgarity was funny, and appropriate, because being pregnant can be pretty vulgar at times, even while it is also awesome and miraculous. Now that my oldest girl is already three and my baby is ten months old, I thought it was time to read her memoir about being a new mom.

This book is very similar to her previous one, Belly Laughs. The chapters are short, with outrageous titles, and the stories are enveloped in humor, often vulgar, which doesn't hide the real heart that McCarthy has for her son. Clearly, the way she handles challenges is through laughter. I respect that; show more I think it is a healthier way of coping than many others have. However, I didn't find this book as funny as the one on pregnancy. I wonder why that is? Maybe it's easier for me to laugh at myself than to laugh at obstacles with my kids, or maybe it's because I am reading this not as a new mother, but a mother with three years under her belt. Whatever the reason, this book didn't resonate with me nearly as much.

Not that I didn't laugh. Some chapters were spot-on for me, like the several that shared about her fight to get the baby weight off, her funny accounts of leaky breasts, and her bouts with competitive moms. Each chapter breezes by in minutes, and the book is a super fast read. I still appreciated blowing off steam by laughing along with someone else at all the hilarity of parenthood.

Some chapters, though, felt like she was trying too hard to cover all the bases, by discussing subjects she hadn't fully experienced. For example, her chapter on postpartum depression was inaccurately named. She had a good case of the baby blues, but not postpartum depression, which is much more severe than what she experienced. As someone who lived through that horrible mental alteration, I was upset that she labeled her experience postpartum and said that if anyone had anything worse it was postpartum pyschosis. Wrong, wrong, wrong - psychosis is a much more dangerous and extreme mental break! Postpartum depression is the depression that lingers past the normal hormonal fluctuations and often requires counseling and even medication, but is not a break with reality (like psychosis). What she had was just the typical baby blues, which a lot of women experience and which clears up on its own, and it really bothered me that she considered that postpartum. Other sections where she wrote about subjects that she hadn't actually experienced were on nursing and feuding grandmas (she states that hers were great and just ruminates on the problems that some of her friends had). She did better when she related personal experience; it grated on me each time she made sweeping judgement calls on a matter she hadn't actually lived through.

The book is funny, and very honest, and certainly shares stories about which many parents will knowingly shake their heads and smile. Honestly, I've read funnier books about parenting, and this isn't the top of my list, but it was nice for a light read that made me laugh and was over quickly. show less

My sister just made me an aunt so I wanted to be ready for all the
changes that would happen to both the baby and her.
My sister loved the funny insight from Jenny McCarthy's earlier book
on pregnancy called 'Belly Laughs' that I wanted to know what she had
to say about the part I could actually help with; the baby part.

This book was laugh out loud funny in parts and extremely informative
throughout. I felt like I was chatting with one of my best
girlfriends. If you just had a baby or a baby just came into your
life, spend a couple fun hours with Jenny McCarthy :)

A must-read for anyone new parents, friends of new parents, and anyone who wants to laugh at the craziness of that first year together. Truly funny, but also poignant and perceptive. And honest as hell!

I was really looking forward reading this book. It looked and sounded full with funny stories about baby's first year. Turned out, most of it wasn't funny at all. I didn't like the author's sense of humor (language). Don't think I will read belly laughs. Book was a disappointment.

A very funny memoir about her experiences with her baby. I read this shortly after finding out I was pregnant with my second child so I related to a lot of it.

Jenny McCarthy is not as funny as Jenny McCarthy thinks she is.

"Jenny McCarthy’s hilarious, no-holds-barred personality has made her an instantly recognizable TV personality and a bestselling author. In Baby Laughs she examines the full range of challenges that new mothers face, including:
* The humiliations of postnatal “numbing spray,” Tucks medicated pads, and adult diapers; jelly belly, balding, and gum disease; and becoming a “five-foot puke rag” for the baby
* Heart-stopping terrors, such as baby manicures, breathing checks, and burp failures
* Inadequacies, such as lullaby illiteracy and the need for a “heavy rotation” of toys, videos, and mobiles
* Daddy antics, such as infant wrestling, home-movie mania, sleeping like a log, and expecting sex
* Dueling grandmas, germ-ridden show more guests, Olympic-class competitive mommies, anorexic pets— and much more.
Mothers and fathers will find much-needed relief and insight in this sometimes touching, sometimes gritty, but always perceptive and outrageously funny account of what it truly means to have your very own small bundle of joy." show less