Jennifer Egan Quotes

Sometimes it's a bizarre, fairly cold, and horrifying thing to be a parent.

I wasn't afraid of anything until I had a kid. Then I was terrified because immediately I could imagine a hundred ways in which I could not protect him.

A baby comes with such responsibility. Once you become a mother, you always have a guilt trip. You always try to do the best, but you feel you can always be better.

Once you have kids, horror movies become too horrible to watch because you imagine your own children in those situations, so you stop watching them.

Working parents bring a certain amount of guilt to their relationship with their children.

My greatest fear is that I'll fail my kids.

when your child is in trouble, the first thing you do is blame yourself.

Every parent has those moments where they look at their child and think, 'There's a demon in those eyes and no one can see it but me!'

I'm the father of two boys and two girls, so I'm more an emotional wreck than a mushball.

We all parent the best we can. Being human, we're ambivalent. We want perfection for our babies, but we also need sleep.

But, in fact, there is nothing that can bring you closer to fearlessness about everything else in the world than being a parent - because everyday fears - like not being approved of - pale by comparison to the fears you have about your children.

Kids are a great analogy. You want your kids to grow up, and you don't want your kids to grow up. You want your kids to become independent of you, but it's also a parent's worst nightmare: That they won't need you. It's like the real tragedy of parenting.

I still feel as if I weren't a good enough mother. I didn't break any rules.

We have three daughters, our own. And, of course, there's nothing more frightening than something bad happening to them. And also, the thought of our children turning bad in some ways is another frightening thought.

I expend far too much of my maternal energies on guilt and regret.

A Sunday school is a prison in which children do penance for the evil conscience of their parents.

I'm trying to avoid, you know, guilt, even though before the child is born, you're already thinking you're doing things wrong... Why do I think that will probably carry over until the day you die?

Until you go through with it yourself, you simply can't imagine it. But it is the transition of going back to work and the guilt of how much time you spend with your child that's hard. I worry about not getting back in time for bath-time. I am not a neurotic person at all, but every time the mobile rings, my stomach leaps.

I often feel very guilty because of the time that I spend outside of my home and the little time that sometimes I have for my kids.

A very painful part of being a parent is having really negative feelings about your children when you love them so much.

Like any mum, I fear some mysterious illness befalling my children.

I once blurted out that I found it impossible to bond with my son Winston because I was too tired. I mean how bloody awful does that sound? What a tosser!

Once you have kids, you think like a parent. You get a lot more protective.

Being a parent is not for the faint of heart. I may joke about knowing fear, but the fact is, the first time I ever knew real fear was the day Charlotte, my first child, was born. Suddenly there is someone in the world you care about more than anything.

That said, my kids are at home right now with my husband and I'm missing something important at my daughter's school which makes me feel sick inside. It's a lot of balance and a lot of really hard decision making.