Carolyn of Curlypurl posted a Mother's Day rant, and I won't rehash it here, but here's my two cents on it - Why do women let themselves get pushed into believing that there are these either-or, all-or-nothing choices when it comes to career and family? Why do we believe the bullshit stories from both sides of the fence - the superwoman partner in a high powered firm who "has it all" thanks to an army of paid help behind the scenes, or the supermommy who "sacrifices everything" for her children by not working are both extremes IMHO. I raised my kids as a working mother, my friends were working mothers, none of us had maids or nannies, we all had decent middle-management kind of jobs, and we didn't think we were doing anything special, and our kids grew up just fine. It was just life.

There is a middle ground of working motherhood, and that's where most of us (speaking as a "retired working mother" now that my kids are grown) live and work. Isn't it funny how nobody ever uses the phrase "working fathers? It's just a given that he can work and be a "good dad" too. In fact, working is part of being a good dad...but I digress. Anyway, in the middle ground of combinging parenthood and work, we have to compromise. Everybody doesn't have to be a partner in a 500 lawyer firm, everybody doesn't have to be a CEO, everybody doesn't have to work 80 hours a week to be successful. The women AND MEN I have worked with for years have successfully combined family and career. This isn't just a women's issue - men, if they care about being there for their kids, have to make the same choices and scale back their career ambitions at times. I know plenty who did this. There are other career paths besides partner in a 500 lawyer megafirm. I know a lot of really smart, successful people who got off the big firm track and are happy as hell now in small, family-friendly and highly successful firms - and I think this translates across other fields than law. They juggle their career and home life, run scout troops and coach sports teams, and adjust their hours and ambitions to fit it all in, and it works. They telecommute when the kids have a day off school and their spouse has a commitment elsewhere. (Contrary to the myth that "men can do it because their wives stay home" I'm sitting here trying to think of a male lawyer in my crowd with a permanent stay-at-home wife. I can only think of one.) They work it out, and life goes on.

Call me crazy, but from where I have been sitting for 25 years, I don't believe it really is that different for women than it is for men. If you care about your family you have to take their needs into consideration when choosing your career path, that's just how it is in the real world. But there are a lot more paths open to women than "bad selfish working mother who neglects her children and you'll be so sorry later," or "marytred stay-at-home mother who sacrificed all her personal ambitions for her children." Maybe it would help if we started talking about "combining career and parenthood" instead of "career and motherhood" and started viewing this as a family situation and not just Mom's Problem. And if women quit giving each other shit for making a choice different from their own, that would be nice too.