Sheryl Sandberg, Marissa Mayer and the great mommy debate

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I've been reluctant to weigh in on the Mommy Wars, since I'm of that generation of trailblazers that didn't dwell on the career/family/fulfillment balance.

We were like explorers in the uncharted wilderness in the 1970s and 80s. There were no maps to guide us, so we just set off in the direction that made the most sense and did adjustments along the way.

Some of us went all-in for education and career, others opted out of the career path to be stay-at-home moms. Still others tried to alternate career and kids, or do the juggling act of doing it all at the same time.

Understand that from about age 25 to 50 you are going to feel guilty.

As I watch the younger generation of women wrestle with Great Mommy Debate, I think it is worth taking a step back to acknowledge the reason there are so many voices -- often attacking each other -- is because there are so many options. What do women do when they're not sure about their choices? Agonize! Feel Guilty! And, if all else fails, criticize others!

I speak to a lot of women's groups and even if I'm billed to talk about foreign policy, I end up, like Sheryl Sandberg, taking questions about that career/family/fulfillment balance.

My advice?

First, understand that from about age 25 to 50 you are going to feel guilty. If you haven't gotten married or had children, you'll feel guilty that you've missed out on the most important things of life. If you've gone from career girl to stay-at-home mom, you'll feel guilty that you've given up. If you drop your kids off at daycare on the way to work, you'll feel guilty that you're a bad mother. And if you have to leave the office early to rush a sick child to the doctor, you'll feel guilty that you're a slacker.

But guess what, ladies? Feeling guilty for 25 years isn't nearly as bad as feeling frustrated or unfilled or helpless or dependent for an entire lifetime, as so many women have for generations. Guilt is the price you pay for options.

Second, understand that every woman in America is in on the juggling act. If she's in her twenties she's thinking about how she will juggle it all when it's her turn. If she's in her thirties or forties, she's doing the juggling. And if she's in her fifties and sixties, she's watching her daughters and daughters-in-laws juggle.

Third, understand that there is no one, right way to do this. What works for Sheryl Sandberg, or Hillary Clinton, or June Cleaver doesn't necessarily work for you. You've got to find your own way, and you've got lots of options to choose from. Just don't expect to put your head on the pillow every night and think, "Wow, what a great day I've had in my well-balanced life!" Expect to feel exhausted and guilty that the day just wasn't long enough to get it all done.

What has worked for me is to live my life in chapters. I've had the education-and-career chapter, then the wife-and-stay-at-home mom chapter, and now the career-again chapter. Along the way I've been blessed with a husband I adore, children and grandchildren I treasure, a brilliant education and careers that have let me make a difference. Not every chapter in my book has had them all these elements. But when all the chapters are finished, and I close the book, I will have had them all. And when, I will lay my head down for the last time, I'll smile and say, "Wow, what a great and balanced life I've had."

Kathleen Troia "K.T." McFarland is a Fox News National Security Analyst and host of FoxNews.com's "DefCon 3." She is a Distinguished Adviser to the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies and served in national security posts in the Nixon, Ford and Reagan administrations. She wrote Secretary of Defense Weinberger’s November 1984 "Principles of War Speech" which laid out the Weinberger Doctrine. Be sure to watch "K.T." every Wednesday at 1 p.m. ET on FoxNews.com's "

K.T. McFarland

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Sheryl Sandberg's 'Lean In' Philosophy Raises Eyebrows – And for Good Reason

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Sheryl Sandberg's misguided message

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Sheryl Sandberg's misguided message

Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg gets around. She runs a multi-billion dollar company; she gives high profile speaking engagements; and now she’s a first-time author. Her new book, “Lean In: Women, Work and the Will to Lead” is a spin-off of Sandberg’s infamous TED talk, where she encouraged women to put their careers front and center and let the rest of life fall into place.

For her own accomplishments, Sandberg has been ranked one of the 50 “Most Powerful Women in Business” by Fortune magazine, one of the “Women to Watch” by The Wall Street Journal, one of “the world’s 100 most powerful women” by Forbes, one of the 50 “Most Influential Jews” by the Jerusalem Post, and one of the “25 Most Influential People on the Web” by Business Week.

But Ms. Sandberg is best known for something else altogether: her crusade against gender imbalance at work and at home. Sandberg believes women are penalized at work due to gender stereotypes and are unduly burdened at home. This is the reason there are so few women at the top, she says. The only way to achieve equality is for men and women to live identical lives.

Given that most women want a balanced life, shouldn’t they benefit from advice that will allow them to achieve their goal?

And Sandberg’s going to show us how. As the mother of two young children, Sandberg prides herself on having a “50-50” marriage: one in which both parents share equally in all breadwinning and all childcare. But what does this mean in real life? It means both parents leave their homes each morning and return each evening—and pay other people (i.e. less educated women) to do the bulk of the parenting work for them.

That’s fine if you’re the Sandbergs and can afford Mary Poppins. Most cannot.

But the greater problem with Sandberg’s proposal is that it dismisses maternal desire. That women can run companies and outwork the hardest working of men is not in question. What is in question is this: Do they want to?

Increasingly, the answer is no. According to the most recent data from the Pew Research Center, the opinions of mothers who’ve chosen to stay home—a highly educated group, I might add—have changed dramatically. Today, a mere 16 percent say they’d like to work full-time outside the home, down from 24 percent who felt that way in 1997.

Moreover, nearly half of all full-time moms say not working at all outside the home is the ideal situation. In 1997, 39 percent felt this way. Even mothers who do work full-time and year-round wish they didn’t! Only twenty-one percent of employed mothers say full-time work is “ideal.”

There’s simply no question that part-time work has become the number one choice of most women with children—both here and abroad. Part-time is defined as anything under 35 hours (though it includes mothers who work as little as one day a week), and people who work fewer than 35 hours a week do not become CEOs.

Given that most women want a balanced life, shouldn’t they benefit from advice that will allow them to achieve their goal? That’s not what Sheryl Sandberg offers.

Sandberg encourages women to pattern their lives after hers. But the only way to *be* Sheryl Sandberg is not only to be fabulously wealthy but to be comfortable being away from one’s home and children all day, every day. And that’s not what most women want.
It’s not what kids want either.

Anne-Marie Slaughter, former director of policy planning for the U.S. State Department and dean of Princeton's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, hit that nerve last summer in The Atlantic. In her article, “Why Women Still Can’t Have It All,” Slaughter said she could no longer deny that her sons need her. She conceded that the “feminist beliefs” by which she’d built her entire career “were shifting under my feet.” So she quit her big Washington  job, where she worked with powerhouses such as Hillary Clinton, and went back to being a professor so she could be more available to her children.

Sheryl Sandberg is not this candid. The closest she's come to discussing her personal life is when she admitted it’s difficult to leave a toddler who’s pulling on your leg, begging you to stay with him, as you walk out the door each morning. But for Sandberg, that’s where the conversation ends. For most women, that’s where the conversation begins.

Sheryl Sandberg’s message—that women should not “lean back” in their careers to accommodate their desire for motherhood—is a terrible one. A woman’s life has seasons, and mapping it out by incorporating everything women want—work and family—is both prudent and smart.

Sandberg is right about one thing. Women who do "lean back" at work in order to make room for the rest of life probably won’t get the corner office. What she doesn’t appreciate is that they just don’t care.

Suzanne Venker is a vice president at the The Center for Marriage Policy and has written extensively about politics, parenting, and the influence of feminism on American society. Her latest book, "How to Choose a Husband and Make Peace with Marriage," is now available at Amazon. Also available is her new Kindle Single, "The War on Men." For more on Suzanne, visit www.suzannevenker.com and www.howtochooseahusband.com.

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