Click over to LiteraryMama.com where movie critic and San Franciscan Caroline Grant writes about viewing "The Motherhood Manifesto" at a house party, one of many happening throughout the country. Her report's worth reading in full, so follow the link. Instead, here's a taste from one of the comments.

Crossposted at Everyday Mom In The Truth Behind the Mommy Wars I wrote about how the US is one of five nations world-wide that do not supply paid family leave to parents of new babies. We're in the doghouse, it turns out, with Leshotho, Liberia, Swaziland and Papua New Guinea. Here's a nice link to a recent article in USA Today . It's based on a recent Harvard report, and has a link to the report itself.

Two days after Christmas, my neighbor Jill* called me, crying. Her husband had threatened her. She said verbal abuse had been going on for awhile, but now the threats had escalated. Jill had talked to a counselor and was planning to go to the shelter where they’d help her move out of state and go into hiding. She asked me to take her child for the day so she could pack before her husband got home from a business trip. Truth is, I hardly know Jill. Our children have had one playdate together and that’s it. I knew nothing about her family or her marital crisis. Jill apologized for “dumping” this on me, explaining that she didn’t have friends or family in the area, and that the only other person she called for help wasn’t home. Not wanting to walk into the middle of a dangerous domestic situation, I first made sure her husband was out of town and wouldn’t return until the next day. Then I agreed to come over and take her child until the evening. I brought the child back to my house, made breakfast and let the kids play. Later we went to the mall and I made them a picnic which we ate in the park. It was an ordinary, even boring day, which Jill’s kid loved. There was a normalcy about it which the child seemed to crave. When Jill came to pick her child up, the kid didn’t want to leave. I get it. I wouldn’t want to go back into that situation either. I gave Jill a hug and told her to keep herself and her child safe and I wished her the best of luck on her journey.

Have you needed to take time off for family responsibilities? Did you have paid leave? What happenned? Do tell! *After you submit your comments on the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) via e-mail to the Department of Labor (e-mail: whdcomments@dol.gov ), please share your comments, and personal stories, here. To share your comments and stories, just click the blog title above, or the "Read full post" link below. Then scroll down to the end of the comments/blog text to "Post a Comment."