Personally, I think four is the perfect number of children for our particular family. Four is enough to create the frenzied cacophony that my husband and I find so joyful. – Ayelet Waldman
One of the darkest, deepest shames so many of us mothers feel nowadays is our fear that we are Bad Mothers, that we are failing our children and falling far short of our own ideals. – Ayelet Waldman
By the time the children go to bed, I am as drained as any mother who has spent her day working, car pooling, building Lego castles and shopping for the precisely correct soccer cleat. – Ayelet Waldman
Look, if you ask a child, Would you rather have a fulfilled mother or a stay-at-home Sylvia Plath, theyll pick Sylvia Plath every time. But I think its really important that children dont feel their parents emotional lives depend on their success. – Ayelet Waldman
From very early on in my childhood – four, five years old – I felt alien to the human race. I felt very comfortable with thinking I was from another planet, because I felt disconnected – I was very tall and skinny, and I didnt look like anybody else, I didnt even look like any member of my family. – Patti Smith