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Judith Warner joined guest host Sarah Crichton to talk about her new book, "Perfect Madness: Motherhead in the Age of Anxiety"

Here are some listener emails:
I think the crux of the problem is the basic idea that good motherhood means spending as much time as possible with your child. My mother spent a lot of time leaving my brothers and me alone. Her philosophy was (and is) that no child can withstand the full-time attention of an intelligent woman.
Thanks,--T.

I need to move to France. I have four children, I work full time and I'm pregnant with my fifth. Everyone including my friends family husband and employer looks at me as though I've committed a mortal sin and as though I've committed it by myself. I hear a lot of derogatory comments as to how much I must love sex when I'm walking down the street or from rude cab drivers who think they're being funny. My husband is almost praised and certainly never judged for having so many children. I constantly feel guilty and I have to fight off shame. --D.

What about stay-at-home fathers? Continue reading...

Moreover, those of us who leave careers and
stay-at-home face all the potential frustrations of
women who do the same. And IF (note if) we are a
society of conventions, men may also face an added
question of their own identity in a society that has conventionally treated men as the "breadwinners". --I.

Those services for mothers mentioned by the author are not "free". The
French people pay incredibly high taxes for these benefits. We do not
have the same level of benefits in the U.S. because the American people
do not want to pay high taxes.
Convince the American people to pay higher taxes and we will get more
public benefits.-- E.

This is the worst kind of self-involved, navel-gazing upper middle class self-obsession (and I speak as a charter member of same).

We who have children are lucky to have them. It is our responsiblity to raise them as we best determine. Millions of our less-financially-able peers do not have the luxury of such worries, and we embarrass ourselves with this kind of self-conscious whining. Life's difficult; get over it, get on with it, cope. Show your children by example what it means to take responsibility and live a life.

Judith Warner is mining the same kind of mothering anxiety she theoretically decries. Why does no one call her bluff; she's making a big income out of the 'poor me' syndrome, while women read her text and wallow in same. discouraging, and very narrow in view. Please show me the world, not the narrow vision of the chronically yearning, moneyed few.
--H.