21st Century Motherhood: Navigating Work, Family, and the Struggle to Have it All

Abstract

This dissertation examines the experiences of first-time mothers’ transition to motherhood in the 21st century United States. Based on interviews with 46 first-time mothers, as well as eight practitioners who work with new mothers, I explore women’s experiences of the transition to motherhood. The research questions I answer are: (1) How do women in the 21st century navigate the transition to motherhood? (2) What broader social issues are visible in individual women’s troubles as they become mothers? and (3) What factors may exacerbate or mediate these troubles? These questions are addressed in three distinct papers which explore, in turn, institutional (policy), interactional (technology), and cultural (ideology) factors impacting women’s transition to motherhood.

In the first article, I explore how, in the absence of a federally mandated parental leave policy, American women’s occupational group shapes their access to parental leave. I find that disparities in access to formal benefits, including job security and paid or unpaid time off, are exacerbated by inequitable access to informal benefits, such as flexible hours and accommodations offered by “understanding” bosses. Further, these differences are reinforced by women’s ability to leverage cultural capital and knowledge to access (or fail to access) these informal benefits.

In the second article, I explore how women use social media and technology across the transition to motherhood. I find that while technology can fill a necessary gap—helping women stay more connected to social, cultural and material resources—paradoxically, it can also exacerbate some of the challenges of early motherhood, by heightening anxiety, fear and insecurities of new mothers. I conclude that, despite technology’s potential to extend social support and connectedness for first-time mothers, it may also create a new source of invisible labor for women, such as the need to manage and curate not only her own online presence but also that of her baby. Women who opt out of social networking sites also opt out of the social support they stand to gain from them.

In the third article, I examine how cultural scripts may exacerbate the transition to first-time motherhood. While the transition to motherhood can be difficult for many women, not all participants in my sample found it equally disruptive of their lives. Specifically, those women who had prior experience with children were often better prepared not only experientially but also with narratives to combat oppressive, dominant ideologies about motherhood. In contrast, new mothers with more limited experience with infants frequently turned to expert advice or social networking to learn how to mother, but often struggled with incompatibilities between their expectations and reality, which could result in a particularly disruptive and isolating transition.

In each of these studies, I explore how structural factors such as occupational group, social support and cultural scripts about motherhood shape the very personal and individual experience of the transition to motherhood. Through highlighting the strengths and challenges facing new mothers, I hope to push us to more critical conversations about how we as a society can support women who bear children.