Mojo Mom's thoughts on the 2000's--learning that we're all in this together.

Right now I am consumed by the whirlwind that always accompanies the final stages of editing of a new book. I can't wait to share the new anthology Courageous Parenting with you, but the one temporary downside is that during this final push I don't have a lot of time for blogging. But I did want to share a few end-of-decade thoughts about what I learned in the 2000s.


Amy as a proud, tired, happy new Mom with her cute little schmoo in fall 1999.
It's interesting to see my personal journey as a mother develop together with my professional development. When I became a new Mom in late 1999 I looked at the world through a thoroughly individualistic perspective. I really thought that I needed to show how I could "do it all" myself. Even as I learned to embrace the participation of family and friends, I still thought that motherhood was mostly about me and my personal life choices as one woman. I felt that I chose to leave my teaching career, and without even realizing it, I was constructing a life story that put me firmly in the driver's seat. This was actually a pretty functional way of thinking that worked for me in the short term, but as I lived through all of the challenges of motherhood, and thought about what other women faced, I realized that I was missing the big picture.

When the original "Opt-Out Revolution" narrative first came along, saying that educated mothers were choosing to leave the workforce, it made sense to me, if I looked at my life as a rugged individualist. My teaching career just "didn't work" any more so I chose to leave. My personal situation was complicated by a cross-country move, that made it seem even more natural that I didn't return to my job, and I was fortunate that my family could afford to live on my husband's salary.

But even as I started to write Mojo Mom all on my own way back in 2003, not really knowing any other writers, and without the benefit of blogging, which had not exploded yet, I started to see that motherhood wasn't just all about me as one person.

I started to think about what it meant that work "didn't work" for me as a mother of a young child. How much of this was my individual choice, versus larger social structures that ranged from my family, to employers' attitudes and policies, to public policy, most notably the fact that American women don't even have paid maternity leave?

My husband's job was all-encompassing at the time, which did not leave a lot of room for me to work any kind of traditional schedule. And the idea of truly-flexible, valuable part time jobs didn't seem plausible. I craved a new professional, creative outlet, and I had a renewed interest in writing, so I reinvented myself as an author.

I was fortunate to be able to do so, but even though this worked for me, the dangers and fallacies of the Opt-Out storyline started to come to into focus for me. First of all, most women and mothers need to work for basic financial reasons. So the idea that motherhood = not employed is a worrisome one, because the workforce truly needs to figure out how to retain us and stop punishing us for being parents--specifically, mothers, because fathers are more respected in the workforce and are often assumed to have a wife who can do the majority of the caregiving. As Opting Out? author and sociologist Pamela Stone has pointed out, too often, parenthood means that fathers step on the accelerator of their careers and mothers step on the brakes. For women of Gen X and Y this can create a major fork in the road that has lifelong consequences.

Also, taking an off-ramp from paid work can leave women in career limbo and financial jeopardy. I hope that in the 2010s we'll find better solutions for building more on-ramps. Life is long, and women in particular should expect to have several careers interwoven with seasons of caregiving.

So as these challenges accumulated it became incredibly clear to me that no one is truly a "rugged individualist," and we are all in this together. As I was completing the first edition of Mojo Mom I started to think, "What we need is a social movement. Damn, am I going to have to try to start one?" Fortunately for all of us, MomsRising.org burst onto the scene. I could instantly see that founders Joan Blades and Kristin Rowe-Finkbeiner were well positioned to launch an activist revolution, and I've done my best to support their work because it is spot-on, working to end job discrimination against mothers, to get health care coverage for all children, and other key advocacy goals.

Joan and Kristin also started their work together by writing a book, The Motherhood Manifesto, which I highly recommend.

So from being one aspiring writer, working in near-secret on my own, to getting the updated 2009 edition of Mojo Mom published, working with other writers, and participating in MomsRising's grassroots movement with a million members, I have come a long way in the 2000s.

And as my appreciation of cooperation of mothers has grown, my next book is, voila, an anthology, with chapters written by fourteen talented experts! I had spent years getting to know other writers, reading their books, appreciating their work, and doing Mojo Mom Podcast interviews--now the circle of experts who I have come to think of as a special group in my mind are really collaborating on the new book, Courageous Parenting, which will be a comprehensive guide exploring how to end overparenting, and carve out a new, healthier path to independence for our kids and ourselves.

The power of collaboration is truly amazing. I have spent several years cultivating these connections, but once I had the idea for the anthology and recruited my contributors, we decided to launch the book in a fast and timely matter. The anthology will be current as of January 2010 and will launch in early spring. To me this is the best combination that takes advantage of the immediacy of blogging while preserving the substance of book writing.

As my blog readers you've been an important part of my entire journey as well. Books take a long time to writer, and my life as a writer improved greatly after blogging enabled me to connect with my readers. So to say thanks to you, I will be offering a free digital download of the new anthology "Courageous Parenting" to anyone who signs up on MojoMom.com before the book is published.

I hope you will sign up now, so that I can send you a free complete electronic copy of the new book when it's released this spring.

Getting my mojo back; Podcast will return

Phew, this has been a long week. I didn't mean to neglect my blog, but I've had to give my wrists a rest. I had to work overdrive to get my manuscript in, and even thought my brain knew that it was interesting to write, my arms just wanted me to stop.

The rest of the week was either ON or OFF--I spent Wednesday listening to talks by Pam Stone, and I got to meet with her yesterday. Her research into the reasons why Moms really leave the workforce has been an essential resource for my continuing work as Mojo Mom, and it was really a pleasure to meet her in person.

I snagged an autographed copy of Pam's book, Opting Out? Why Women Really Quit Careers and Head Home to give away to one of my loyal blog readers. I will randomly choose a winner among all the people who leave a comment on the Mojo Mom blog between now and noon (ET) on Monday the 22nd. Just add a comment to any post on my blog and I will pick a winner on Monday.

Here we were at the talk Pam gave at UNC's Kenan-Flagler Business School: MBA program associate directors (and Mojo Circle members) Anna Millar and Meghan Gosk (on either end), Pam, me, and our good friend Katherine Asaro.



Other than those engaging hours, I've felt like I've been swimming through molasses. I have enjoyed time with my family but I am definitely experiencing en energy lull. The good news is that after revving my brain up so fast that I could practically feel steam coming out of my ears, I am back to catching up on lost sleep, urging my daughter to go to bed early because I am not far behind her. I know from my previous experiences with sleep deprivation that the sleep debt does literally need to be paid off. (One of the few debts that is getting retired by the original borrower this week!)

So the blog will pick up, and we'll have a new podcast in two weeks, but I am going to give myself another week to focus on getting my life back to normal...at least until my editor catches up to me with her revision requests!

Mojo Mom Podcast: 'Opting Out?' author Pamela Stone

We posted our Mojo Mom Podcast episode a little early this week to give you time to listen to Professor Pamela Stone and register for next Wednesday's Carolina Parent Women@Work breakfast, where she will be the keynote speaker. The registration deadline is this Friday, September 12.

Last week's podcast guest, Kella Hatcher of Balancing Professionals, will also be offering a satellite symposium later that day, a Career On-Ramping workshop. If you are thinking about work but don't know where to start, both halves of the Women@Work event could be inspirational, rewarding, and a great opportunity to network.

Listen to the podcast now:


Here's the podcast episode description:

Amy and Sheryl are in a giddy mood this week, which is a nice change of pace!

They are happy because Pamela Stone, author Opting Out? Why Women Really Quit Careers and Head Home, is the guest on the podcast, and she'll be speaking in Durham, NC in person next week.

So if you are in the area, we hope you'll register for the Carolina Parent Women@Work Breakfast on September 17, and join us to form a Mojo table!

Mojo Mom Podcast with Balancing Professionals

We have a new podcast up and I think it's a good one.

Listen to the podcast now:



Amy and Sheryl discuss the successes of their Mojo Circle, a group of ten women who have met monthly for two years now. The group has a shared background as mothers, but when we meet we talk primarily about entrepreneurship, and serve as a sounding board for each other.

Amy and Sheryl talk about the keys to success in forming a group, and you can also find resources in the free Mojo Mom Party Kit on MojoMom.com

Then Amy talks to Kella Hatcher, co-founder of Balancing Professionals and expert on alternative work arrangements (flex-time, telecommuting--the strategies that allow people to get their work done and have a life, too!).

Balancing Professionals will be presenting a Career On-Ramping workshop in conjunction with the Carolina Parent Women@Work event in Durham, North Carolina on September 17, 2008.

A few more details about the Carolina Parent Women@Work event on the 17th. The event has two parts, the morning breakfast featuring a keynote talk by one of my favorite authors, Pamela Stone, the sociologist who wrote Opting Out? Why Women Really Quit Careers and Head Home. Her book is one of the most important motherhood books in recent years, because she did actual research investigating why women leave the workforce. She delves into the complicated mix of pushes and pulls that send mothers home. Pamela is a compassionate, mercifully polemic-free writer and speaker. We really needed a true sociologist to help us cut through the media static that clouded discussions about "Mommy Wars" and "Opting Out" storylines.

The morning event also covers the presentation of Carolina Parent magazine's Family Friendly Company Awards to local businesses, nominated by our readers and selected in partnership with UNC Kenan-Flagler Business School.

Then, at 11 am, Balancing Professionals will begin their lunchtime Career On-Ramping workshop at the convention center just a few blocks away. If you are thinking of returning to work but are not sure of the steps along the journey back, this is the event for you.

A separate registration is required for each event which can be accomplished on the Carolina Parent website. I am very excited because this is basically my dream day of events, and I didn't have to lift a finger to make it happen.

I'll definitely be at the breakfast, so if you see me, sit down and we'll get a Mojo Table going!

The amazing Mojo Circle and an upcoming Triangle event

Networking is such an important activity for Moms. When you meet cool people, it's important to "capture" them into your network, whether that means developing friendships, connecting people into social networks like LinkedIn or Facebook or getting to know people through traditional business-oriented groups like the Chamber of Commerce.

Whenever you meet new people, project your whole self--including your Mom identity--making sure that you include your professional accomplishments, hopes and aspirations as well. You never know when the person you meet on the playground or at a classroom meeting could become your next client, boss, or business partner.

A couple of years go I was meeting so many amazing women through my work as Mojo Mom that I decided I needed find a way to bring them together. It was as though I was finding dazzling gems on my path and I needed a mechanism to connect them into a necklace. The Mojo Advisory Circle was born, a group of ten women meeting monthly to advise each other on life and business, and it's been a fantastic success. The cross-pollination among the members is amazing. Each of us are solo entrepreneurs or in business partnerships. When we started, most of the women did not already know each other, and I did not know all of them well--just well enough to know that I wanted to get to know them better.

There is an event coming up in Durham NC on September 17th that has strong Mojo Advisory Circle connections: the Carolina Parent Women @ Work event featuring a morning keynote talk by Opting Out? author Pamela Stone. I love her research and I can't wait to meet her in person.

After the breakfast event, your can sign up for the optional Career On-Ramping Workshop offered by Balancing Professionals principals Kella Hatcher and Maryanne Perrin. This half day workshop, running from 11 am to 2:30, including lunch, is for anyone who wants to sharpen up their rusty work skills to get back out there on the job market. Kella and Maryanne are true pioneers in this field and I highly recommend their workshop. This is a great opportunity to tap into their expertise, and you'll notice that the day wraps up in time for school pickup.

I am not presenting in any official capacity but I will be attending the event, so I hope to see you there. If you are reading this blog, you are in the extended Mojo Circle, so I hope you'll come up and say hi if you see me.

"Pushed out" of work by a weak economy?

So The New York Times, the source that brought us the so-called "Opt-Out Revolution," back in 2003, now reports that the "Poor Economy Slams Brakes on Women's Workplace Progress." Here's a quote:

After moving into virtually every occupation, women are being afflicted on a large scale by the same troubles as men: downturns, layoffs, outsourcing, stagnant wages or the discouraging prospect of an outright pay cut. And they are responding as men have, by dropping out or disappearing for a while.

“When we saw women starting to drop out in the early part of this decade, we thought it was the motherhood movement, women staying home to raise their kids,” Heather Boushey, a senior economist at the Joint Economic Committee of Congress, which did the Congressional study, said in an interview. “We did not think it was the economy, but when we looked into it, we realized that it was.”

Now they tell us!

Actually, sociologist Pamela Stone already did. For an in-depth look at mothers & work, be sure to read her book, Opting Out? Why Women Really Quit Careers and Head Home.

If you live in the Triangle, you can hear Dr. Stone speak in person this fall at the annual Carolina Parent Women@Work breakfast. Whether you are currently employed or taking time out of the workforce, this is one talk you'll want to hear. That day you can also attend an optional satellite workshop, On-Ramping: Strategies for Re-entering the Workforce, conducted by our talented local experts Kella Hatcher and Maryanne Perrin of Balancing Professionals.

Salon.com fans the flames of the Mommy Wars

Argh. The "Mommy Wars" framework lives on. I usually look forward to reading Rebecca Traister on Salon.com, but last night she put up a talking head video that referred back to her interview with Meg Wolitzer about Meg's novel The Ten-Year Nap.

In the video, Traister adds no new insight, but claims that "The Mommy Wars Rage On":

"a book like this clearly puts Meg Wolitzer smack in the middle of what are commonly referred to as the 'Mommy Wars,' the disagreements between those who have chosen to stay home and raise their children, and those who have decided to stay in the workforce...."

The Ten-Year Nap is a literary novel about women who have been out of the workforce for a decade. It does came across to me as a Rorschach test capturing reflections of readers' personal projections, but it is far from a polemic. It will elicit judgments from readers but for the most part avoids judging the characters.

I hate even writing the term "Mommy Wars" any more, because even saying "the Mommy Wars are bogus" subtly reinforces the concept. (Remember when Nixon said "I am not a crook"? "Crook" came through much more loudly than "not.")

But, now that we're discussing it, here are my distilled thoughts on this issue:

Motherhood is not about choice. Women don't often get to choose whether they work or choose whether they stay home. What if two women seek jobs, and one finds affordable childcare and the other one doesn't? Why on Earth do we try to pit those two women, or any two women for that matter, against each other? When it comes right down to it we are all facing similar challenges. Economic privilege and good luck may give some of us more options, but it's not really about choice.

I have a paper coming out this spring arguing that "choice" as a faulty framework for a wide variety of women's issues, from breastfeeding to employment to reproductive rights. We are being co-opted by a consumer mentality that conflates our major life challenges with mere "choices," as though many of our basic needs and rights are as trivial as choosing a chocolate versus vanilla ice cream cone.

We need to stop judging women for leaving the paid workforce to care for their children. Feminists most of all should understand that without providing an infrastructure that supports working parents, there will be a wide range of circumstances that lead women to leave paid employment: being pushed out by employers, pulled home by kids and family, and sometimes just plain deciding it's what they want to do for now.

I think that the biggest mistake we've all made over the past 40 years of discussing women's changing roles is to underestimate the VAST amount of work that it takes to raise a family and run a household. When kids get sick, grandparents get sick or frail, someone needs to be there to care for them. If the workplace and society can't provide the support to help us do all of this and still remain profitably employed, then please don't tell any mother that she is making a poor decision by leaving a career track or staying home.

If men took half the caregiving load, if work was based on performance rather than hours, if men were culturally "allowed" to take paternity leave or work fewer hours, if we had good, affordable childcare, paid maternity leave and sick days, and welcoming institutional "on-ramps" back into the workforce, then we'd be having a very different conversation.

Two practical antidotes to this situation:

Read Pamela Stone's book, Opting Out? Why Women Really Quit Careers and Head Home. Stone's book is the only one that has done in-depth sociological research on this issue. It is truly The Feminine Mystique of the twenty-first century. Stone writes with respect and compassion for her subjects--compassionate academic writing, what a breath of fresh air.

If you haven't joined me over at MomsRising.org yet, what are you waiting for....?

"Opting Out?" author on podcast and in Durham next week

Sociologist Pam Stone has done all Moms a great service with her book Opting Out? Why Women Really Quit Careers and Head Home which is currently my pick for the top motherhood book of 2007. When Stone began to wonder about the back stories of stay-at-home Moms who had formerly held high-powered jobs, she didn't rush to judgment. Instead she put in the hard work required to research the trends in Moms and employment. Her book is compassionate, intelligent and thorough. It has influenced my thought about "life choices" and reframed the issue. Stone understands why women like me would naturally embrace a narrative that we have "opted out." She tells women's stories with great compassion--and at the same time she blows the lid off the opt-out storyline and shows why it does us a disservice. Stone shows us that far from "opting out," many women are "pushed out" of their careers despite efforts to keep working. Instead of blaming women for their individual situations, Stone puts the focus back on employers and the workplace. I hope that over the next 5 to 10 years we can develop some win-win strategies that will address these issues on a society-wide level.

Pam was the headline guest on North Carolina Public Radio's program The State of Things earlier this week, and you can access it here by podcast through WUNC's archives (also available on iTunes--free in either case). We are blessed to have this uncommonly good show produced right here in our community, with a extraordinary host, Frank Stasio, so I recommend the show to you.

Pamela Stone will be visiting North Carolina in person next week, for a book reading and signing at The Regulator Bookshop in Durham. She'll be appearing next Wednesday, October 3 at 7 pm.

If you can go, you should GO, even if you can only get out by yourself. I know it can be hard to mobilize a Moms' Night Out but this one is worth a serious effort. Unfortunately, I will be out of town, or else I would be there. The Triangle is full of incredible women who have important stories to share, so why not go, introduce yourself to the person next to you, and make a new friend.

Mojo Mom's A-Ha Moment: Cracking the Privilege Code

After all the years of researching and writing Mojo Mom, reading the Mothers Movement Online, working with MomsRising.org and reading the Mothers & More POWER loop, I believe that sitting on the Today Show couch with Leslie Bennetts and Lisa Belkin and reading Pamela Stone's new book, Opting Out? have pushed me over an important tipping point of understanding.

I have cracked the feminist code and I understand why the Baby Boomers are mad at us younger women who have opted out. The text is about money and career, the subtext is about power and privilege. Boomer feminists worked to give us a place in a man's world, the world of power and privilege. That world is built on a foundation of a lower class, low-paid support system that is assumed to exist but rendered invisible. This could be the unpaid work of wives or the low-paid wages of service workers.

In the 1970's, women were given begrudging access to this kingdom, as long as they "played like a man."

Fast-forward to our generation. The invisible work, the second shift is still there and "playing like a man" just isn't working for many of us. We are able to eke out egalitarian relationships before we have children, but gender roles haven't changed that much. Men still don't expect to divide that work 50/50. When babies arrive, this invisible workload shoots through the roof. The truth is that someone has to do it, and we don't have a social infrastructure that lifts this burden off women's shoulders. So in the most privileged couples, the "opt-out" dynamic becomes very apparent when a high-power woman leaves her place in the man's world to go home.

Boomer femininsts are mad that women would leave behind the position of power, privilege and money that they worked so hard to earn on our behalf. One woman leaving the corporate ladder signifies gender failure when one man leaving the corporate ladder is just a guy making a choice.

Privileged men are generally glad to see women move home because this allows the men to have more time and energy to focus on their careers, thereby exercising their male privilege. Egalitarian marriages become more "traditional" to some degree when women stay home.

Women who leave the workforce are frustrated to see that they lose their previous status and become socially invisible and devalued in their role as a mother. Work at home is necessary and important but it is not admired, valued, and privileged. Sometimes this work it is only noticed when it is NOT done perfectly, which is expecially frustrating. We mothers see the value of the invisible work we are doing. We certainly see how much of life is made up of that work. Our eyes are opened to this big picture and we can't comprehend why others don't understand it.

So I finally understand why opt-out women are truly radical: we expect to be able to leave the world of privilege, take the blinders off our eyes and see the whole picture of life, expect others to do so, and return to the world of privilege on our own terms. Although we say in our democracy that "all men are created equal," the last thing the world of privilege wants is to be asked to see the big picture that includes caregiving, poverty, and discrimination. This is why I want more mothers in public life. Nancy Pelosi may play the political game with the best of them but I love knowing that she knows understands what it means to be a caregiver.

The younger generation of mothers hopes that we are reclaiming power in a new way by creating a career spiral to replace the old career ladder. Our plans challenge the whole system. With Mojo Mom I aspire to be more than just a writer telling individual women how to cope within an unfair system. This is why the short-lived Total 180! magazine and the book Happy Housewives drive me crazy--they are at best gallows humor that helps women adapt to the current system of privilege without challenging it.

For the first time I feel like our generation is attempting something truly radical. In Mojo Mom I consciously traced a path from self care to women's leadership and that trajectory continues to soar. We have to keep working to get caregiving counted in our society. As Pamela Stone says in Opting Out? mothers are the canary in the coal mine for an often inhumane workplace. We are cracking under the double-bind pressures of being an ideal worker and and ideal mother and we are finally demanding that something has to give. I want to be a good mother and a good worker. I want to work on my own terms and have paid opportunities to contribute even though I've taken time away from work. I am determined to make this happen even if I have to create my own path, in a manner that I hope paves the way for other women to do the same.

There is a tsunami of caregiving need coming our way. We are the ones who will have to shepherd the older generations through 20, 30, 40 years of retirement and elder care. Many of us will spend more years worrying about our parents than we will caring for our children, and as I have written before, that is not a matter of choice. If parenting cracks us, will elder care crush us? There is only so long we can get away without making the invisible work visible and dividing it fairly. We'd best get started now.