Eberstadt, Mary.

Home-alone America : Why today's kids are overmedicated, overweight, and more troubled than ever before / Why today's kids are overmedicated, overweight, and more troubled than ever before. Home-alone America: Hidden toll of day care, behavioral drugs, and other parent substitutes. Hidden toll of day care, behavioral drugs, and other parent substitutes. Mary Eberstadt. - New York : Sentinel, 2005, 2004. - xxii, 218 p. ; 22 cm.

"The Library of Congress has cataloged the hardcover edition as follows... Home-alone America : the hidden toll of day care, behavioral drugs, and other parent substitutes / Mary Everstadt"-- T.p. verso.

Includes bibliographical references (p. 199-208) and index.

The real trouble with day care -- The furious child problem -- Why Dick and Jane are fat -- The mental health catastrophe -- Wonder drugs and double standards -- "Ozzie and Harriet, come back!" : the primal scream of teenage music -- The ravages of "responsible" teenage sex -- Specialty boarding schools, tough love or ultimate outsourcing? -- Conclusion: Beyond the blame game.

The author reopens the politically incorrect question of just how much children need their parents, especially their mothers. She contends that absent parents--and children who feel like just another chore to be outsourced--are the common denominator of recent epidemics among young people, including obesity, STDs, behavioral problems such as attention deficit disorder, and the use of psychiatric medication in even very young children; and asks whether this trend has already reached a tipping point in American society.

ISBN: 1595230157 (pbk.) 1595230041 (hc.)

Subjects--Topical Terms:
Children of working mothers--United States.
Parenting--United States.
Parental deprivation--United States.