Getting beyond Exhaustion: Reflection, Self-Assessment, and Learning

In 1996, the New Yorker devoted a double issue, that of February 26 and March 4, to women. It included a wide range of articles, from Mary Daly's autobiographical feminist treatise, "Sin Big," to Henry Louis Gates's reflection on Hillary Clinton "haters," to Katha Pollitt's essay that asks whether there is anything that we cannot blame a poor woman for. In the midst of these articles appeared "Mom Overboard," which looked at the new lives of professional women who have shelved their careers to, as the author put it, "micromanage" the kids. What's interesting to me is how the women, first, understand and, second, evaluate their new motherly work. In language that resonates for parents generally, one mother says: