In an evenhanded manner she broadens our conception of female identity, until now too-narrowly defined by our culture, apart from the social and psychic reality of women. Beyond this significant contribution, she artfully considers their stories in the context of clearly presented psychoanalytic theory and feminist thought. Ireland holds up a mirror in which the diverse group of women who are not mothers can finally see their reflection. By sharing the stories of childless women she has interviewed, Dr. Ireland has written an outstanding, pathbreaking book that gives a long-absent and much-needed voice and place to the 'other' women in our culture. Lillian Rubin, Ph.D., author of Worlds of Pain: Life in the Working Class Family and Intimate Strangers: Men and Women Together If you want to understand who these women are, what they think and feel, how deeply the ideology of motherhood has infected our thinking about women and femininity, read Mardy Ireland's insightful and sensitive analysis of women who, even today, remain an anomaly, seen as less than 'woman' simply because they are not mothers.” “Finally, a book about women who are not mothers-normal women who by choice or happenstance remain childless. “Reconceiving Women will be of interest to clinicians, especially those who work with women who are struggling with decisions about childbearing or who are confronting the impossibility of conceiving.” Read this book.“ smart, challenging book.Accessible and necessary.” This is a needed book for the twenty first century because we need to not only focus on individual and national identities, but, we must also begin to address the responsibilities we have as world citizens to our entire planet and its diminishing resources. She lays out a clear roadmap for those in childbearing years to think through their decision to be or not to be a parent and offers compelling reasons why in fact not every adult “should” become a parent. She details seven assumptions that make up this ongoing pronatal bias and summarizes relevant research from the last twenty years thereby effectively drawing the reader in to actually ‘think’ about each assumption.ĭ escribing seven post-pronatal assumptions she then brings the reader toward seeing a society in which every adult would have the psychological freedom to find her/his way to creating a fulfilling adult identity that would not by necessity include parenthood. “In The Baby Matrix Laura Carroll articulately and systematically challenges the multiple conscious and unconscious assumptions that go into the insistent ‘pronatal’ view of our American culture. Mardy Ireland, PhD, psychologist and author of Reconceiving Women: Separating Motherhood From Female Identity, reviews The Baby Matrix:
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