[Original Mike]

First, its great to hear from you again, Yvette!! You are one of the great ladies of this Board!!

In our situation, it's Mother's Day that can get things stirred up. I can almost guarantee a higher level of surliness from my older son as Mother's Day rolls around. He's still internalizing a lot of anger at his bio mom and still isn't ready to let it out. Thus, I try to keep Mother's Day related stuff to a minimum, even avoiding Mass on that Sunday to skip the "Mom" themed sermon.

In day to day stuff, I've had to politely re-educate a few teachers that there is such a thing as a single male parent. One teacher in particular would always ask me when scheduling parent-teacher conferences "When can you and your wife make it?" Now, both boys find it funny when we get "official" mail addressed to "Mr and Mrs". I told them "Well, maybe I got a little drunk in Vegas and married Brittney Spears. I wouldn't be the first guy she did that with."

As a rule, however, I have been surprised by how great most teachers, coaches, etc have been.