Motherhood has brought me many joys and insights, but the new perspective it granted me on the role I had inadvertently played in young women’s lives for the 2 decades I spent in the modeling industry was downright sobering. – Carre Otis
I didn’t really inhabit myself until I was in my 30s. And motherhood is an epic event. You can’t help but be altered by it – and it is important to be. – Anne-Marie Duff
Take motherhood: nobody ever thought of putting it on a moral pedestal until some brash feminists pointed out, about a century ago, that the pay is lousy and the career ladder nonexistent. – Barbara Ehrenreich
Is there nothing the prodigiously talented Ann Patchett can’t do? She’s channeled the world of opera, Boston politics, magic, unwed motherhood, and race relations, creating scenarios so indelible, you swear they are right outside your door. – Caroline Leavitt
I didn’t have my first child until I was 40. I actually learned about motherhood from management. – Carol Bartz
I stand fearlessly for small dogs, the American Flag, motherhood and the Bible. That’s why people love me. – Art Linkletter
Motherhood is wonderful, but it’s also hard work. It’s the logistics more than anything. You discover you have reserves of energy you didn’t know you had. – Deborah Mailman
Motherhood is nitty and gritty and brutal and wonderful, but everything I read is about the wonderful parts. Sometimes, you’re really in the trenches! – Constance Marie
I feel awful for women who are trying to raise kids on their own, with zero income and no fathers present – that’s single motherhood. – Natascha McElhone
Conservatives were sure that if you eliminated welfare for single moms, it would eliminate – or at lease greatly reduce – single motherhood. So in 1996 we had welfare reform. Did not change the trend in the least. Soon half of all babies will be born out of wedlock. – Gail Collins
Motherhood runs its own way and is measured with another watch that, unfortunately, we can’t control. – Monica Cruz
The way Hollywood portrays mothers – you’re either all good and saint-like, or you’re all bad. And I think the real honesty of motherhood is not given a voice in movies. I miss that as an audience member. – Ellen Barkin
For millions of girls around the world, motherhood comes too early. Those who bear children as adolescents suffer higher maternal mortality and morbidity rates, and their children are more likely to die in infancy. – Esther Duflo
Literature gives us a window into other people’s experiences in other places, in other times, so I thought it would be really interesting to investigate how different people had written about motherhood, and childhood. – Natalie Merchant
I’m a way bigger worrier than I ever was before I had kids. And, you know, the stress and anxiety that can go along with motherhood, I have had to battle that. – Natalie Maines
I’ve approached so many things in my life with such intensity that I want to approach motherhood with dedication and focus. – Drew Barrymore
That’s what motherhood is: you’re working; you’re doing 25 different jobs, and you’re not getting paid. – Melissa Peterman
So, I guess motherhood and the threat of not being able to pay my rent inspired me to be a novelist. But as far as what inspired me to be a writer, it’s the stories. It sounds very cliched, but the stories rise up and demand to be told. They always have done, long before I became a writer. – Gayle Forman
My old boyfriend, Warren Beatty, used to say I was a late developer,’ she reflects. ‘He was right. It took me 50 years to find motherhood and unconditional love.’ – Diane Keaton
Motherhood changed me because it is so fundamental what you’re doing for another person. And you are able to do even though it takes a lot. – Meg Ryan
I quite liked having a baby – I think I won’t put it more strongly than that. But I had no intention of allowing motherhood to disrupt my work as an archeologist. – Mary Leakey
Pregnancy and motherhood are the most beautiful and significantly life-altering events that I have ever experienced. – Elisabeth Hasselbeck
There’s a feeling sometimes in motherhood that you’re alone in what you’re going through, and none of us are alone. We’re all going through the same thing. – Nia Vardalos
And (cue music swell) motherhood turned out to be the most meaningful thing I’ve ever done with my life. Really. – Nia Vardalos
Beguiling voices in the world cry out for ‘alternative lifestyles’ for women. They maintain that some women are better suited for careers than for marriage and motherhood. – Ezra Taft Benson