By now the fact that an article in The Atlantic titled “Why Women Still Can’t Have it All,” brought more online response than any other article in the magazine’s history is, well, history—or herstory.
But the response is solid evidence that the topic still is important and relevant to many women.
My children are both in college, but I remember vividly the years when I combined full-time mothering with a full-time career. I have said more than once that you can’t combine a career and children without spending a lot of time feeling tired. And, whenever I say that, I always get instant agreement from other women.
That’s why I stopped when I heard these survey results during a discussion of the article on the Diane Rehm show on National Public Radio. One survey asked women with careers and children what was their central issue, and they answered “not enough time.”
When the children of these women were asked the same question, they answered that they wished their mothers weren’t so tired and stressed.
How do we combine careers and children with a little more time for sleep and time to relax? There are no easy or simple answers. What do you think? We would love to read your comments.
In her article in The Atlantic, Anne-Marie Slaughter concludes that society needs to make changes, adjusting social policies and bending career tracks. We need to focus on helping all Americans, men and women, “have healthy happy, productive lives, valuing the people they love as much as the success they seek,” she says.
We’ll write more about the struggle to balance families and careers in future blog posts.
–Joy