--- title: "Princeton Mom" is On the Prowl: 6 Facts About Susan Patton description: Susan Patton, whose book urges women to prioritize their personal lives over their careers, is herself recently divorced and has had 'many boyfriends,' though she's not ruling out settling down if she finds the right guy canonical: https://time.com/21746/princeton-mom-susan-patton-boyfriends/ author: Charlotte Alter article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2014-03-12T20:02:28.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T08:55:00.153Z og:title: "Princeton Mom" Susan Patton is On The Prowl: 6 Things We Learned From This Profile og:description: Susan Patton, whose book urges women to prioritize their personal lives over their careers, is herself recently divorced and has had 'many boyfriends,' though she's not ruling out settling down if she finds the right guy og:url: https://time.com/21746/princeton-mom-susan-patton-boyfriends/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltdd8680fde7b46278/69868520810bbb8e25c9070d/477855077.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 3000 og:image:height: 1688 og:image:alt: Today - Season 63 og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: "Princeton Mom" Susan Patton is On The Prowl: 6 Things We Learned From This Profile twitter:description: Susan Patton, whose book urges women to prioritize their personal lives over their careers, is herself recently divorced and has had 'many boyfriends,' though she's not ruling out settling down if she finds the right guy twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltdd8680fde7b46278/69868520810bbb8e25c9070d/477855077.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Princeton Mom is on the Prowl, and 6 Other Things We Learned About Susan Patton > Sponsored content. 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It is a free newsletter available at time.com/newsletters. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-worth-2026q3/newsletters?i=a91d480c-9726-4c19-9722-f2bbb9f170b7&cr=time-nl-worth-2026q3-v1)  by [Charlotte Alter](https://time.com/author/charlotte-alter/)  ## Charlotte Alter Senior Correspondent Mar 12, 2014 8:02 PM UTC  TODAY -- Pictured: Susan Patton appears on NBC News' "Today" show -- (Photo by: Peter Kramer/NBC/NBC NewsWire) TODAY -- Pictured: Susan Patton appears on NBC News' "Today" show -- (Photo by: Peter Kramer/NBC/NBC NewsWire) NBC NewsWire—NBCU Photo Bank via Getty Images  by [Charlotte Alter](https://time.com/author/charlotte-alter/)  ## Charlotte Alter Senior Correspondent Mar 12, 2014 8:02 PM UTC BREAKING NEWS: Because Princeton Mom’s son is married, there is a woman out there who actually has Princton Mom for a mother-in-law. But that’s just one of many juicy tidbits in Maureen O’Connor’s excellent profile of Susan Patton in [New York Magazine](http://nymag.com/thecut/2014/03/home-with-princeton-mom.html?mid=twitter%5Fnymag). Patton’s book _Marry Smart_ is an extension of her much-maligned letter to Princeton women, whom she calls “the daughters I never had,” advising them to prioritize their personal lives over their professional lives so that they don’t end up alone and barren. Here’s some of what we learned from the piece: 1) Like many Princeton grads, Susan Patton is obsessed with tigers and the color orange and her home reflects that: --- > “” --- 2) She’s recently divorced from her sons’ father (who “went to a college of almost no name recognition,” natch) and is on the prowl for hot, Princeton-educated men. She has “many boyfriends,” including two who went to Princeton, and said that now that she’s not looking to find the father of her children, she can just date guys who are “fun, funny, entertaining, sexy.” Not that she’s ruling out marriage– if she tied the knot again, she’d try to do it in the Princeton chapel. “How fabulous would that be? With orange roses.” 3) Imee Marcos (offspring of Filipino dictator Ferdinand Marcos and his shoe-enthusiast wife Imelda) was her college BFF. Caroline Kennedy is her “imaginary” BFF. 4) She was raised in the Bronx by traditional Jewish parents who were Holocaust survivors (her mother survived Auschwitz, her father Bergen-Belsen), and she had to declare herself and emancipated minor to apply to college. Here, she actually sounds kind of feminist: --- > “” --- 5) She’s got some pretty adorable views on date rape, which she calls “mistake sex:” --- > “” --- 6) She regrets not finding a husband when she was a nubile young Princetonian: --- > “” --- And here’s Patton’s advice to women who are career oriented: “You’ve been so invested in your professional super-stardom that you took your eye off the ball. You have no husband and no children, but the ship has already sailed! It’s too late. 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