ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the limits that shared-parenting norms can place on women’s autonomy over life decisions for themselves and for their children. In particular, it identifies the tensions between women’s autonomy and modern expectations of mother-caregivers who do not live with the fathers of their children. While the focus on opposite-sex parents reflects the historic dominance of such relationships in parenting disputes that receive legal attention, the norms discussed are also relevant to the increasing number of disputes between lesbian mothers and sperm donors. Feminist approaches to autonomy and to relationships are discussed first. The discourse then turns to the implications of normative shared parenting for mothers who either never had, or no longer have, a relationship-based motivation for facilitating the child’s relationship with the other parent. Finally, the concept of relational autonomy is used to suggest a way to shift the normative force of shared parenting.
