Opting In Having a Child Without Losing Yourself

by Richards, Amy

• ISBN13: 9780374226725
• ISBN10: 0374226725
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2008-04-29
• Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux

Summary

For contemporary women, motherhood has become as polarizing a proposition as it is a powerful calling. For some women this tension is manifest in a debate over whether or not to have children. For others it concerns whether to stay at home with their children or stay in the workforce. Still others feel abandoned altogether by the supposedly pro-family and pro-mother social justice movement that is feminism and are at a loss when it comes to reconciling their maternal instincts with their political beliefs.WithOpting In, Amy Richards addresses the anxiety over parenting that women face today in a book that mixes memoir, interviews, historical analysis, and feminist insight. In her refreshingly direct and thoughtful approach, Richards covers everything from the truth about our biological clocks and the trends toward extending fertility, to parenting with natureandnurturing in mind, to our relationship with our own mothers, to what feminism's relationship to motherhood is and always has been. Speaking from the vantage point of someone who is both a parent and one of our leading feminist activists, Richards cuts through the cacophony of voices intent on telling women the "appropriate" way to be a mother and reveals instead how to confidently forge your own path while staying true to yourself and your ideals.

Author Biography

Amy Richards is the co-author of Manifesta (FSG, 2000) and Grassroots (FSG, 2005) and the co-founder of the feminist speaker's bureau, Soapbox. 

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	p. ix
Introduction: Mommy and Me	p. 3
To Work or not to Work is not the Question	p. 15
The Drive to Procreate: Reexamining the Biological Clock	p. 49
Real Birth: Dispelling the Myth of the "Right" Birth Experience	p. 92
William Doesn't Want a Doll: Raising Kids Today	p. 122
The Diaper Divide: Can Men do More? Can Women do Less?	p. 165
Friends Forever: How and Why Parenting Changes our Friendships	p. 201
Our Mothers, Ourselves	p. 227
Afterthoughts: Practicing our Politics	p. 252
Resource Guide	p. 257
Notes	p. 275
Bibliography	p. 295
Index	p. 307
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