Jennifer Senior quotes:

That women bring home the bacon, fry it up, serve it for breakfast, and use its greasy remains to make candles for their children's science projects is hardly news. Yet how parenting responsibilities get sorted out under these conditions remains unresolved.

The phrase "having it all" has little to do with having what we want.

We enshrine things to memory very differently than we experience them in real time. The psychologist Daniel Kahneman has coined a couple of terms to make the distinction. He talks about the experiencing self versus the remembering self.

Children live life as a controlled experiment.

Vocabulary for aggravation is large. Vocabulary for transcendence is elusive.

The 20th century, the author observes, fostered the idea that fulfillment is possible on Earth.

What makes a mother? Looking at your child and identifying emotion

The author says this socially respectable option NOT to parent has actually made parenthood more stressful. The knowledge that parents have chosen that role allows for unrealistic buildup of expectations and unavoidable second-guessing.