ELIF SHAFAK - LAPTE NEGRU

"In a society where motherhood is regarded as the best thing that can happen to a woman and with an upbringing that tells us to settle for nothing less than excellence, how can I not compare myself to other mothers? And when I weigh myself against other moms, how can I not be envious of their accomplishments and ashamed of my deficiencies? I am not proud of feeling this way but this is what I experience deep down. It is not my love for my baby that I doubt. Love is there, pure and tender, enveloping my soul in its pearly glow. It is my talents as a mother that I find lacking." 

"How much of my womanhood is biological, how much of it is socially learned? Of the will to become a mother, which part is innate, which part is imposed? Is it sheer coincidence that I have started contemplating motherhood in my midthirties? Is it because my biological clock is ticking? Or is it because the social chronometer, which continuously compels us women to measure ourselves against one another, is speeding ahead?
When everything is so culturally loaded, how am I going to know what is really natural and what is environmental?"

Mi-a ajuns la suflet de la primele rânduri. O poveste despre eterna luptă dintre carieră și familie, dar și despre patologia care începe să ia amploare : depresia postnatală. Are substrat, inteligență, dialoguri interesante cu sinele, merită citită. O recomand cu drag! 

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Lapte negru by Elif Shafak
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

"Today, we do not speak or write much about the face of motherhood that has been left in the
shadows. Instead, we thrive on two dominant teachings: the traditional view that says motherhood is
our most sacred and significant obligation and we should give up everything else for this duty; and the “modern” women’s magazine view that portrays the quintessential “superwoman” who has a career,
husband and children and is able to satisfy everyone’s needs at home and at work.
As different as these two views seem to be, they have one thing in common: They both focus
solely on what they want to see, disregarding the complexity and intensity of motherhood, and the way
in which it transforms a woman and her crystal heart."

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