Motherhood

By Ramtin Arablouei,

Rund Abdelfatah, Cristina Kim, Julie Caine, Casey Miner, Anya Steinberg, Lawrence Wu, Devin Katayama, Irene Noguchi, Nic Neves

Published May 1, 2025 at 9:04 AM EDT

Baby bonuses, childless cat ladies: the rhetoric around motherhood is politically charged right now. And the fantasy of an ideal mother remains powerful, even as real-life parents struggle to reconcile its demands. Today on the show, three myths of motherhood, and the people who have fought to break them down. This episode originally ran in 2023 as The Labor of Love.

Guests:

Chelsea Conaboy, health and science journalist, and the author of Mother Brain: How Neuroscience is Rewriting the Story of Parenthood.

Premilla Nadasen, professor of history at Barnard College and author of Care: The Highest Stage of Capitalism.

Gwendolyn Fowler, doctoral student at Rutgers University focusing on the women of the Welfare Rights Movement.

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Ramtin Arablouei

Ramtin Arablouei is co-host and co-producer of NPR's podcast Throughline, a show that explores history through creative, immersive storytelling designed to reintroduce history to new audiences.

See stories by Ramtin Arablouei

Rund Abdelfatah

Rund Abdelfatah is the co-host and producer of Throughline, a podcast that explores the history of current events. In that role, she's responsible for all aspects of the podcast's production, including development of episode concepts, interviewing guests, and sound design.

See stories by Rund Abdelfatah

Cristina Kim

Cristina Kim is a reporter/producer for Throughline.

Julie Caine

Julie Caine is senior editor for NPR's Throughline. An award-winning editor, reporter and audio producer, Caine's heart is in her ears. She led podcasting and on-demand audio at KQED in San Francisco, overseeing strategy, new show development and a vibrant podcast portfolio, including The Bay, Truth Be Told and Rightnowish. She helped found Jetty Studios, an international podcast unit for the Al Jazeera Media Network, where she launched Closer Than They Appear and Game of Our Lives, and developed The Take. She's a founding producer and editor on The Stoop and The Specialist podcasts, and was managing producer for Crosscurrents at KALW Public Radio, a springboard for shows like 99% Invisible, Snap Judgment, The Intersection, and Kamau Right Now. She believes deeply in Grace Paley's maxim that you must be a story listener to be a storyteller.

Casey Miner

Casey Miner is an award-winning narrative audio editor, producer and writer who's worked with NPR, Wondery, Reveal, The Stoop, Slate, Pop-Up Magazine and Mother Jones, among many others. Projects she's worked on have been recognized by the Peabody Awards, the Emmy Awards, the National Association of Black Journalists and the Society of Professional Journalists. She created and hosted The Specialist, a podcast about work we don't think about and the people who do it, and is a co-founder of the Editors Collective, a group of narrative audio editors working to diversify the field and build networks and career paths for new editors. [Copyright 2024 NPR]

Anya Steinberg

Lawrence Wu

Devin Katayama

Devin Katayama is a Senior Producer for NPR's Throughline podcast. He was formerly Editor of Talent and Development for KQED, where he created equitable opportunities for interns and newsroom staff. Prior to that, he hosted The Bay and American Suburb podcasts. While an education reporter with WFPL, Katayama won WBUR's 2014 Daniel Schorr award and a regional RTNDA Edward R. Murrow Award for his documentary "At Risk." Katayama has also received numerous local awards from the Associated Press and the Society of Professional Journalists. He earned his master's in journalism from Columbia College Chicago, and a bachelor's in English creative writing from CUNY Hunter College. Katayama is based in Vallejo, California – the 707.

Irene Noguchi

Irene Noguchi is the Executive Producer leading NPR's Enterprise Storytelling Unit, which includes the talented teams creating podcasts Rough Translation, Invisibilia and Embedded, as well as Sunday episodes of Up First in collaboration with Morning Edition and longform narrative collaborations across public media. She brings a rich background of public radio, digital media and experience covering news and launching new podcasts.

Nic Neves

Nic M. Neves (he/him) is a production assistant with NPRs Enterprise Storytelling Unit. He's in all odd ends of production, from tracking down the perfect voice actor to composing just the right song for a moment in a story. Neves is an alum of the Salt Institute for Documentary Studies at the Maine College of Art & Design. Before that, he studied science, psychology and music at Brandeis University. When he's not crafting an audio story, he's either making music and coffee in his dark cave of an apartment or haunting his local jazz club in Brooklyn, NY.