What's in a Name: Retrofit and How It Came to Be

Earlier this year, I had an idea.

My head was exploding with all the research I’d been doing about being a working mom.

My calendar was exploding with everything I needed to be doing.

My bookshelf was exploding with all the amazing books that came out recently about working motherhood, returning to work, managing a partnership at home with another parent, data-backed solutions for mothers, and even how women’s control of their pregnancies can save the world.

I was founding a business about supporting working mothers and creating a stronger pipeline for female leadership talent, and I couldn’t even get through all the pertinent books on the topic!

So, my idea was born to create a short, graphic book about the trials and tribulations — and opportunities— of modern working motherhood.

Something small, and bright, and easy to throw in your purse.

I started the book in January. I wanted to call it “The Working Mother’s Handbook,” modeled after the ridiculous guides for women in the 1940s and 1950s about being the best housewife they could be.

By mid-May, the book had morphed into more of a personal memoir about my own agonizing journey through mid-career pregnancy, then late-term miscarriage and secondary infertility to a surprise “rainbow baby,” and the happy but maddening juggle of two little kids and a big job. I started calling the book, “Torn,” to reflect my favorite draft cover design and my emotional state.

Then, in the mid-to-late-summer, came the big edit, the one that every book needs, the one that strengthens the story and hones the point and erases the fluff. The one that asks, “What’s best for my reader?” and then delivers.

In the big edit, I stripped some of the memoir and emotion in favor of harder-hitting data, more examples, and even more robust worksheets and templates.

That’s when I realized the book was no longer about my feelings of being torn. The heart of the book had shifted, so the title had to shift, too.

The book is about how the modern expectation of mothers in post-WWII culture is completely out of sync with systems of support from society, employers and the media. It’s about how three generations of women (Gen X, Millennials, and Gen Z) have been sold a promise that isn’t real. It’s about how fathers are not keeping up, and families are not able to keep the pace (let alone the peace).

If you don’t believe this pressure is real, see evidence from moms like Michelle Obama and Meghan Markle.

So, I recalibrated. What do you call it when something no longer functions the way it was designed, when something must be changed after-the-fact? What do you say when the way something is created and sold is not at all the way it functions in the real world? What do you call it when you have to adapt and morph just to fit the original idea?

The book is called Retrofit: The Modern Playbook for Working Moms, and it’s on sale now.