By their innocence and goodness, by their boundless capacity for forgiveness, and by the sheer power of their faith and hope, children redeem their parents, bringing out their best selves.

My dad woke up at 5:30 every morning - every single day - and drove an hour-and-a-half to work. My mom was constantly working odd jobs, whether it was at Sizzler or babysitting. I didn't realize how hard they worked. Most kids rarely do. But they were building something for us.

My husband's a pediatrician, so he and I talk about parenting all the time. You can't raise children who have more shame resilience than you do.

Ammu loved her children (of course), but their wide-eyed vulnerability and their willingness to love people who didn't really love them exasperated her and sometimes made her want to hurt them-- just as an education, a precaution.

A Mother's love is something that no one can explain, It is made of deep devotion and of sacrifice and pain, It is endless and unselfish and enduring come what may For nothing can destroy it or take that love away

My parents raised me and my siblings in an armor of advice, an ocean of alarm bells so someone wouldn't steal the breath from our lungs, so that they wouldn't make a memory of this skin.