Interview With Elizabeth Atalay

Interview With Elizabeth Atalay

Where in the world do you live? And, are you from there?

I live in Rhode Island, U.S.A, and though I have lived in New York & Maryland, and traveled the  world in between, I ended up settling down only an hour from where I grew up in Massachusetts.

What language(s) do you speak?  

English, and Spanish at about the level of a five year old.

When did you first become a mother?

I had my first baby when I was 32, which is young compared to my own mother who had her first child at 43.

Are you a stay-at-home mom or do you work outside the home? 

I am a stay at home mother, which I had always wanted to be. Having grown up a latch key kid with a working mother, I had always idealized my neighbor who stayed home with her kids, baked cookies and sewed clothes for them. (not that I can sew) (more…)

Elizabeth Atalay

Elizabeth Atalay is a Digital Media Producer, Managing Editor at World Moms Network, and a Social Media Manager. She was a 2015 United Nations Foundation Social Good Fellow, and traveled to Ethiopia as an International Reporting Project New Media Fellow to report on newborn health in 2014. On her personal blog, Documama.org, she uses digital media as a new medium for her background as a documentarian. After having worked on Feature Films and Television series for FOX, NBC, MGM, Columbia Pictures, Warner Brothers, 20th Century Fox, and Castle Rock Pictures, she studied documentary filmmaking and anthropology earning a Masters degree in Media Studies from The New School in New York. Since becoming a Digital Media Producer she has worked on social media campaigns for non-profits such as Save The Children, WaterAid, ONE.org, UNICEF, United Nations Foundation, Edesia, World Pulse, American Heart Association, and The Gates Foundation. Her writing has also been featured on ONE.org, Johnson & Johnson’s BabyCenter.com, EnoughProject.org, GaviAlliance.org, and Worldmomsnetwork.com. Elizabeth has traveled to 70 countries around the world, most recently to Haiti with Artisan Business Network to visit artisans in partnership with Macy’s Heart of Haiti line, which provides sustainable income to Haitian artisans. Elizabeth lives in New England with her husband and four children.

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ILLINOIS, USA:  What’s Work Got to Do with It?

ILLINOIS, USA: What’s Work Got to Do with It?

The Caretaker’s Dilemma: Where am I needed most?

The world (particularly here in the USA)  is full of “working moms,” and yet we regard ourselves and others with emotion, anxiety and something bordering on distrust.

If you’re a working mom (or if you are married to one) you know what I mean. You’re chatting with another mom at the park, and while your kids (and her kids) climb up the slides, the conversation turns personal. She tells you that she’s watched her kids climb the slide for the last six hours and in turn, you tell her that you saw patients (or graded papers, or drove to a client, or filled orders) for the last six hours.

And though at this moment both sets of kids feel the same sense of security married to freedom, both of you feel like maybe the activities that comprise your everyday conflict with your children’s needs.

Which brings us back to why we work in the first place, really…Not to give our kids more stuff, but to give them more of what they need: experiences, education, food and shelter. And, when the time comes to buy stuff (which, for most of us with kids happens quite a bit, actually) we like to have the means to make a choice about what we bring into our home. (more…)

Jill Barth

Jill Barth lives in Illinois with her husband and three kids. She reminds you to breathe. She is a freelance writer and consultant. Also, she is the green content Team Leader and columnist at elephantjournal.com and reads fiction for Delmarva Review. Jill's writing can be found on her blog, Small Things Honored.

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