I’ve been reading about Amy Chua’s book ‘Tiger Moms” everywhere and I’d like to chime in and say this:
When you think you may be dying, none of this crap matters. Whether Amy Chua or Oprah or Dr. Spock or Dr. Sears agrees with you, how you raise your child is your business. As in: trust your instincts, your experience, your friends that you admire and the children you hope your kids turn out like. Find out what worked there and morph it into what works in your own living room–not what works in some distanced country 6 thousand miles away.
I am so very tired of bookstores and talk show guests making me and you feel like we don’t know how to do a job that 200 years ago everybody had to figure out on their own. You may have asked your local preacher or your auntie or your governess for help–not every single person who just tweeted their new formula for mommy success or the 300 titles stacked neatly in a row at Borders or Amazon.com’s pediatric growth and development section.
I say enough already–parenthood doesn’t come with a sticker price and a road map. Figure it out and love your kids on your own–
while you’re still lucky enough to be here to do it.
When you think you may be dying, none of this crap matters. Whether Amy Chua or Oprah or Dr. Spock or Dr. Sears agrees with you, how you raise your child is your business. As in: trust your instincts, your experience, your friends that you admire and the children you hope your kids turn out like. Find out what worked there and morph it into what works in your own living room–not what works in some distanced country 6 thousand miles away.
I am so very tired of bookstores and talk show guests making me and you feel like we don’t know how to do a job that 200 years ago everybody had to figure out on their own. You may have asked your local preacher or your auntie or your governess for help–not every single person who just tweeted their new formula for mommy success or the 300 titles stacked neatly in a row at Borders or Amazon.com’s pediatric growth and development section.
I say enough already–parenthood doesn’t come with a sticker price and a road map. Figure it out and love your kids on your own–
while you’re still lucky enough to be here to do it.
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Lissa Stewart
Lea Lane
Kerry Lauerman
lpsrocks
Joan Walsh
Sarah O'Leary
Salon.com
Comments
I'm also wary of blanket generalizations and admonishments which typify media blitzes around newly published books.