Kate Hope Day
IF, THEN grew out of the life-altering experience of having my first child.
I started writing the book to try to understand the feeling of being split in two when you become a parent. I think of this in terms of time—the person you were before you had a child, the person you are after. But also in terms of space—how as a new mother you always want to be two or more places at once. For me the book started as a kind of postpartum fantasy that if there were two of me I could meet everyone’s needs, including my own.
But once I started writing, the broader theme of the book began to unfold--because everyone has thought about the “what ifs” of their life, how things could have gone a different way if they had made another choice, or if chance events had happened another way.
I started writing the book to try to understand the feeling of being split in two when you become a parent. I think of this in terms of time—the person you were before you had a child, the person you are after. But also in terms of space—how as a new mother you always want to be two or more places at once. For me the book started as a kind of postpartum fantasy that if there were two of me I could meet everyone’s needs, including my own.
But once I started writing, the broader theme of the book began to unfold--because everyone has thought about the “what ifs” of their life, how things could have gone a different way if they had made another choice, or if chance events had happened another way.
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