Free Republic

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - American women are anxious these days and no wonder: They've been vilified as inadequate mothers, desperate housewives, lackluster academic scientists and -- most rudely -- too fat to be French. These characterizations have come in guilt-edged packaging on television, in newspapers and a raft of non-fiction books about the plight of U.S. women in the 21st century. One of the most celebrated new works takes aim at the fallacy of having it all as a mother. Author Judith Warner dubbed the problem, and her book, "Perfect Madness: Motherhood in the Age of Anxiety." It isn't just about...

In an old "ThirtySomething" show, one mother observes to another, "we obsess about our kids -- our husbands obsess about their jobs." Bang on right. Only we women not only obsess about our kids -- we obsess about ourselves too. Are we fulfilled? Are we happy? Do we like ourselves? Our bodies? Our relationships? So it is with Judith Warner's hot new book, "Perfect Madness: Mothering in the Age of Anxiety" (Riverhead Books), which has the tone of, "I am woman why isn't my world all about me?" Warner tries to tap into the "boiling resentment" of at-home moms who...

You may have had a swing set in the backyard when you were growing up or, if your dad was especially handy, a tree house. Nowadays, among America’s affluent class, a “mere” swing set or tree house might qualify as child neglect. Instead, nothing less than a castle will suffice. Really. The “Atherton Castle” comes with a two-story, seven-foot-square “fort,” and a ten-foot bridge that connects to another five-level fort with a “crazy bar” climb—all for only $54,600. If that price seems steep, there’s a “pirate’s haunt” for only $35,000. Or if you choose to spend more, you could pick...

The Perfect Madness of "Mommy Stress" ...And the Myth of "Having It All"... [Carol Platt Liebau] 2/21/05 In last week’s Newsweek, Judith Warner – author of the new book Perfect Madness – asserts that mothers today are uniquely “stressed out” and unhappy. This phenomenon causes her to ask, [W]hy has this generation of mothers, arguably the most liberated and privileged group of women America has ever seen, driven themselves crazy in the quest for perfect mommy-dom? It’s a fair question. After all, women raised children for years on the American frontier – and today, throughout much of the world –...

Back in the days when I was a Good Mommy, I tried to do everything right. I breast-fed and co-slept, and responded to each and every cry with anxious alacrity. I awoke with my daughter at 6:30 AM and, eschewing TV, curled up on the couch with a stack of books that I could recite in my sleep. I did this, in fact, many times, jerking myself back awake as the clock rounded 6:45 and the words of Curious George started to merge with my dreams. Was I crazy? No—I was a committed mother, eager to do right by my...

When Judith Warner returned to Washington after several years of living in France, she felt she was a pretty good mother to her two young daughters. A few months back in the States cured her of that. Suddenly, she was caught up in the modern American mommy rat race and wondering why on Earth what had been so easy in France was so hard back at home. Friends and acquaintances all seemed fellow sufferers, despite outward appearances. "They had comfortable homes, two or three children, smiling, productive husbands, and a society around them saying they'd made the best possible choices...

Manifestoes blast their way into the popular consciousness on two kinds of fuel: recognition (we see ourselves in them) and rage (we can no longer tolerate the injustice they describe). Judith Warner's ''Perfect Madness: Motherhood in the Age of Anxiety'' brims with both. She clearly means for her denunciation of American-style mothering to do for overstressed 21st-century upper-middle-class American women what Betty Friedan's ''Feminine Mystique'' did for underemployed 20th-century ones. ''Perfect Madness'' is not half as good as ''The Feminine Mystique'' -- not as painfully accurate or cleverly argued -- but, like Friedan, Warner channels a big, explosive feeling, which...