Quote image editor
“This idea—that what parents need or want will play a role in choices—can be hard to admit. In a sense, I think this is at the core of a lot of the “Mommy War” conflicts. We all want to be good parents. We want our choices to be the right ones. So, after we make the choices, there is a temptation to decide they are the perfect ones. Psychology has a name for this: avoiding cognitive dissonance. If I choose not to breastfeed, I don’t want to acknowledge that there are even small possible benefits to breastfeeding. So I encamp myself in the position that breastfeeding is a waste of time. On the other side, if I spend two years taking my boobs out every three hours, I need to believe that this is what it takes to deliver a life of continued successes to my child. This is a deeply human temptation, but it is also really counterproductive. Your choices can be right for you but also not necessarily the best choices for other people. Why? You are not other people. Your circumstances differ. Your preferences differ. In the language of economics, your constraints differ.” — Emily Oster