The End of Mom Guilt

I’m a criminal-defense lawyer, a law professor, and a mother of two. When my children were young and I was offered professional opportunities that separated me from them—a case hundreds of miles from home, an academic presentation out of state—I took them. The work gave shape and purpose to my life. And yet. Because time is finite, deficits added u

Eventually, my devotion to my work proved incompatible with my marriage. Like Gretchen, I had the financial security to strike out on my own and start a new life. But that did little to dull the heartbreak of the split. I came to feel that ambition and motherhood were no more compatible in the second decade of the 21st century than they’d been in t

A perfect balance is wonderful when you can strike it. But periods of imbalance are healthy and necessary, too. They demonstrate to children that the burdens and sacrifices of caregiving should not be a mother’s to bear alone, and help them understand why mothers can’t always lavish them with undivided attention.

Prioritizing your career—not all the time, but some of the time—models valuable lessons for children, including independence and resilience.

The truth is that motherhood is as beautiful as it looks on the congratulations cards, but it can also be a mess. It’s important to be honest about this. No real change is possible until working mothers stop trying to be all things to all people—perfect at work, perfect as partners, and perfect as mothers, with each role kept entirely separate. Rat