great with child: letters to a young mother

my bestie, chelsey, sent me this book last week. and, i honestly read it in two days. if it hadn't been for normal adult obligations i could have read it in half a day. it is that good. before i pass it on i thought i would do that thing i used to do and copy my favorite quotes here to "keep forever."



"you understand yourself as lodged in history in a way you didn't before. your beliefs will be tested, your hypotheses put into action, so you'll consider them in a new way. whether you're explaining where pets go when they die or teaching your child to recycle, your philosophies have ramifications. for the rest of history, echoes of your voice will be heard."

"i don't know, i realize daily, how to be the perfect mom. i'm making mistakes, but there's no answer key. sometimes i think the most i can hope for is to observe her closely enough that i can at least make different mistakes next time."

"one of the really strange things i've come to learn about the culture of motherhood is that it's very judgmental. the harshest critics of mothers are other mothers. i'm not sure why this is so - perhaps because expectant mothers receive so much hysteria-tinged advice that we feel paranoid. so perhaps we've grown so confused and doubtful of our own instincts and abilities that we cling fiercely to the idea that our decisions are right - which must mean all other decisions are wrong."

"only women can bring forth a living creature. we do this with our bodies. we do this with our hearts."

"sorry to hear about how tired you are. don't feel guilty about the naps, though! why shouldn't you be tired? you're growing bones and teeth, you're forging a liver and appendix, you're molding the spongy Play-Doh chunnels of the brain! you are making unique fingerprints, pixie prints no one else can make, no one else will have. and inside you now, your baby opens its eyelids. of course, you're tired girl."

"you are a warrior. you are a warrior, and for your whole life your body has been warming up for this great fight. these last months have been consumed with training everything inside you, all of the hormones and the loosening of the joints have been in preparation for this, and you are ready. you know, more or less, the day, the place, of your battle, and you will meet it because you are destined for it, it is the greatest challenge your body will ever know. oh we women needn't play at war and its games like men i've known who can't disguise their aggression and excitement when the bombs begin falling on some country or other. we needn't play at war because if we give birth, we go to war, and at the deepest level, deeper than bone-deep, or evolutionary history tells us that it's a matter of life or death."