Perfect Madness: Motherhood in the Age of Anxiety [Paperback]

Judith Warner's work illuminates several key issues about modern motherhood. I felt a quiver of recognition when reading her discussions about the ways that women who grew up in the era of 1970's feminism are shocked to see how quickly the constraints of traditional gender roles re-emerge once we have kids. She also puts forth the admirable goal of of ending the so-called "Mommy Wars" that keep stay-at-home-Moms and employed Moms bickering with one another instead of working toward mutually beneficial social and political reforms. If Warner's work can inspire a renewed sense of activism in the newest generation of mothers, she will have provided a real service.

After reading the Newsweek cover story featuring an excerpt of "Perfect Madness," I thought I'd really connect with the book. But in expanding Warner's argument from a half-dozen pages into an intensive, repetitive analysis, several problems arose with "Perfect Madness."

1. Warner has been consumed by the "learned helplessness" that she sees in other women. In her view, the situation mothers find themselves in today is so awful, hopeless, and socially enforced that there is little that any one woman can do to improve her life, and it is just "settling" or rationalizing if we think we can improve things on our own.

Even though she covers the recent history of motherhood that shows us that every generation of women has faced similar struggles in one form or another, Warner makes it seem like our generation suffers from a unique and insurmountable challenge. I believe that it's our turn to take up the challenge, using our the gifts of our education and talents, to claim our place on the public stage.

2. Throughout "Perfect Madness," Warner continuously switches back and forth between discussions of serious economic and social pressures that affect women and their families, and the narcissistic, 24/7 "Total-reality Motherhood" that many well-off women have bought into, bringing untold stress into our lives. She intermingles stories of rich Moms stressing out about throwing the "perfect" birthday party with the justifiable panic of women who find that their earning power is not enough to pay for quality day-care, putting them in an economic double-bind.

I reject the connection Warner attempts to make between these two phenomena. Rich women are not going to fall into poverty because they refuse to throw an elaborate birthday party, and it is insulting to poor women to conflate these two "lacks of choice."

3. "Perfect Madness" leaves out all that is fun about motherhood. In my experience, motherhood has been a challenge in many of the ways that Warner describes, but I have also experienced tons of joy and a positive sense of self-reinvention, which are utterly missing from "Perfect Madness." A childless woman reading Warner's book would wonder why anyone would ever choose to ruin her life by having kids. Warner makes it all sound so depressing--a passionless, resentful relationship with your husband, no prospects of creating a satisfying career, and kids who are smothered until they don't even want you around.

On the very last pages of the book, Warner does profess that "I still believe in that dream of American womanhood: the sense of limitless possibility, that unique potential for unbounded self-creation." This glimmer of optimism is cold comfort after reading the pessimistic 281 pages that precede it.

I can see why the core concept of "Perfect Madness" has resonated with women and propelled the book to the top of the bestseller list, but I predict that when they sit down to read it, many busy Moms will lose patience with Warner's dim view of motherhood long before they reach her faint declaration of hope.

I am a French mom, I lived in France as a working mom and as an 'at home mom' and I really like it more being a mom in Colorado! Judith was very lucky to have all these advantages in France, I wasn't able to find a place in the over crowded government day cares for my son. I struggled to leave my job at 6:30pm every evening, to find the babysitter sleeping in the couch! I had to fight with the millions of people in the supermarket on Saturday morning, since all the stores are closed evenings and Sundays. I didn't have one minute for myself! And as an 'at home mom', in France, I felt very isolated, I didn't have the support group she is talking about, the pediatrician made me feel inapropriate, and I had a dreadull experience in giving birth in a French public hospital. Plus children are unwelcome wherever you go!

I delivered my second daughter in Salt Lake City, and my third daughter in Colorado and I had a great experience. Here I really have a support group of Moms, doctors and nurses. And I can have some time for myself! Plus I am waiting to have the work permit to start working again. In some ways, as Judith says I find that children have too many activities and I try to avoid this for my kids, but I don't want people to think that in Europe it is much better, and to be decieved if they go there. There are certainly some advantages, like long parental leaves, but it is not night and day!

As an older mom in a partially empty nest, I found this book interesting and important -- albeit, a very long and difficult read. Difficult, because it is painful to read and rehash how the current generation of mothers takes parenting to the painful point of obsession. Social critics suggest that feminist mothers of my own generation -- baby boomers -- invested more time and energy in building careers as opposed to nurturing our families....So perhaps it shouldn't surprise us to discover that our 'domestic neglect' inspired an over-parenting backlash?

I've often wondered whether competitive parenting, such as Warner described in her book, is an outgrowth of social or personal guilt. Whatever the cause, I am amazed at the sheer aggression with which today's younger parents approach soccer games, birthday parties, playgroups, and other things that are supposed be recreational. Are we having fun yet? Watching younger families in my neighborhood, I can't say that anyone's really thriving in such an over-booked and frantic climate. (A couple of these young moms are always out of breath. Seriously.) As another reviewer pointed out earlier, you have to wonder if any of the mothers Warner writers about are even remotely enjoying their children. At the risk of waxing sentimental, motherhood CAN have sweet, enjoyable moments. (Ironically, they are usually un-complicated, un-orchestrated moments.)

It will be very interesting to see how today's new mothers deal with the empty nest a few years down the road. Will they be competing for the most interesting midlife crisis while over-managing their kids' college careers? More importantly, what impact will all this over-managing and over-parenting have on the kids when they are out there in the world, on their own?

At this point, it's hard to pinpoint which is worse -- under-parenting or over-parenting. So, I think it's great that writers are tackling this topic and getting us to talk about it. Hopefully, books like "Perfect Madess" will force us all (women AND men), no matter what stage we are in our parenting lives, to take a long look at what we are doing or not doing for our kids -- and help us return to sanity and balance.