Maternal Instincts Quotes

After having your first child, it's a massive shock to the system. I work in an industry where people judge you and the way you look, and you always want to put your best foot forward when you can.

Every act of motherhood contains a dual intent, as the mother holds the child close and prepares it to move way from her, as she supports the child and stands it firmly on its own feet, and as she guards it against danger and sends it out across the yard, down by the stream, and across the traffic-crowded highway. Unless a mother can do both - gather her child close and turn her child out toward the world - she will fail in her purpose.

There is a tension in relationships between wanting to return to the womb, but also wanting to be free. Because sometimes the woman's attentions can be overly maternal, and you want to go, 'Ahhhh!'

…American women… have learned it should be for them to decide when and how often they shall take upon themselves the sacred duties of motherhood, but as law and custom give to the husband absolute control of the wife’s person, she is forced to not only violate physical law, but to outrage the holiest instincts of her being to maintain even a semblance of that freedom which by nature belongs to every human soul.

The transparency men have enjoyed for generations, about their ability to frankly work while also reveling in fatherhood, is still complicated for women. Which is not to say that anyone can have everything.

I am the mother of a 6-year-old now, so that's changed my entire perspective.

I never went through a biological clock experience. I never even heard it ticking.

Our bodies are shaped to bear children, and our lives are a working out of the processes of creation. All our ambitions and intelligence are beside that great elemental point.

The first few weeks of being a mom were profound, not just emotionally but also, physically. All the changes you instinctually go through are miraculous.

I'm a Cancer, which means I'm maternal and emotional. So in relationships I'm screwed.

When I had a baby, I didn't leave the second floor for six months. I nursed my babies. I was a full-time homemaker. I taught them all how to read before I let them go to school. So I gave them that care in the early life that somehow feminists have been led to believe is demeaning and is not worth the time of an educated woman.

For many women, going back to work a few months after having a baby is overwhelming and unmanageable. As strange as it may seem, things get even more difficult for a working mom after the second and third baby arrive. By that time, the romance of being a modern 'superwoman' wears off and reality sets in.

I think it's really important for every mother to find their own way.

I think the hardest part of being a working mom is that I miss my kids a lot.

Being a mother is complicated because it's not just a paternal culture making demands on you; it's those internal demands and expectations that women have and are self-generated.

Now I know why tigers eat their young.

I think obviously we need to work harder at extending the women's movement. How do women who have prepared for careers and have a child get back to the workplace and still fulfill maternal roles?

My favorite thing about being a mom is just what a better person it makes you on a daily basis.

For me, nothing has ever taken precedence over being a mother and having a family and a home.

We should be able to carry on our careers and be women and mothers without fearing that if we show a vulnerable side, that will be attacked.

The highest and noblest work in this life is that of a mother.

Were women meant to do everything - work and have babies?

The more affluent women become, the less likely they are to have more children

Being a mother and wife are big roles.

I love being a mother...I am more aware. I feel things on a deeper level. I have a kind of understanding about my body, about being a woman.