Several months ago, there was “The Mommy Myth.” Now on its heels is Judith Warner’s upcoming book, “Perfect Madness.” So if you yourself are too consumed with the pressures of perfection to even pick up this week’s “Newsweek,” which profiles the book as its cover story, allow us to share a couple of its more provocative quotes.
   
From “Mommy Madness” by Judith Warner (as excerpted in Newsweek):

“Why do so many of us feel so out of control? And– the biggest question of all– why had this generation of mothers, arguably the most liberated and privileged group of women America has even seen, driven themselves crazy in the quest for perfect mommy-dom?”
 
Warner maintains that, instead of blaming society for failing to create structures that allow women– and men– to balance work and child-rearing, moms today tend to blame themselves.
Her thesis: “Women today mother in the excessive, control-freakish way that they do in part because they are psychologically conditioned to do so. But they also do it because, to a large extent, they have to… Because there is right now no widespread feeling of social responsibility– for children, for families, for anyone, really– and so they must take everything onto themselves.”
 
As a bit of a tonic for this– we prefer the wisdom in Anna Quinlen’s companion article, “The Good Enough Mother:”

“It’s not just that baking for the bake sale, meeting with the teachers, calling the other mothers about the sleepover and looking at the SAT camp made women crazy… A lot of this was not particularly good for kids. You can’t learn from mistakes and disappointments if your childhood is engineered so there aren’t any.”

And in our favorite slice of wit, she adds: “Maybe I had three children in the first place so I wouldn’t ever have to play board games. In my religion, martyrs die.”
 
Quinlen’s assessment of all this Mommy Madness?
“There’s the problem with turning motherhood into martyrdom. There’s no way to do it and have a good time. If we create a never-ending spin cycle of have-tos because we’re trying to expiate senseless guilt about working or not working, trying to keep up with the woman at school whose kid gets A’s because she writes the papers herself, the message we send our children is terrible. By our actions we tell them that being a mom– being their mom– is a drag, powered by fear, self-doubt and conformity, all the things we are supposed to teach them to overcome.”

“A good time is what they remember long after toddler programs and art projects are over. The rest is just scheduling.”

To read the complete articles, visit newsweek.com
 

What are your thoughts on this?

Do you agree with Judith Warner’s theory about the rise of “mommy madness?” Or Anna Quinlen’s advocacy of the “Good Enough mother?” TELL US!

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Sincerely,


Marisa Thalberg
Executive Moms