--- description: The subjects on this week’s TIME cover aren’t models in pose. Jamie Lynne Grumet, photographed by Martin Schoeller with her 3-year-old son, is a mother... title: Behind the Cover: Are You Mom Enough? image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltf846d07685ed58c7/6986a638e8524bed18604fde/attachment-parenting-01.jpg?branch=production&width=1920&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  * [World](/section/world/) ## World Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close * [LightBox](/tag/time-section-lightbox/) ## LightBox Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close # Behind the Cover: Are You Mom Enough? by [Feifei Sun](/author/feifei-sun/) ## Feifei Sun Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close May 10, 2012 7:40 PM CUT  Martin Schoeller photographed four mothers who subscribe to attachment parenting for this week's cover of TIME. Martin Schoeller photographed four mothers who subscribe to attachment parenting for this week's cover of TIME.TIME by [Feifei Sun](/author/feifei-sun/) ## Feifei Sun Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close May 10, 2012 7:40 PM CUT The subjects on this week’s TIME cover aren’t models in pose. Jamie Lynne Grumet, photographed by Martin Schoeller with her 3-year-old son, is a mother from Los Angeles who subscribes to attachment parenting, the subject of staff writer Kate Pickert’s cover story. Attachment parenting has been on the rise over the past two decades, since the publication of _The Baby Book_ by Dr. Bill Sears and his wife Martha in 1992\. Its three main tenets are extended breast-feeding, co-sleeping and “baby wearing,” in which infants are physically attached to their parents by slings.  Visual references of mother and child, at the cover shoot. TIME In one day, Schoeller photographed four families from across the country who practice this method of motherhood. Using religious images of the Madonna and Child as reference, Schoeller captured each mother breast-feeding her child or children. “When you think of breast-feeding, you think of mothers holding their children, which was impossible with some of these older kids,” Schoeller says. “I liked the idea of having the kids standing up to underline the point that this was an uncommon situation.” The four mothers photographed by Schoeller were all familiar with _The Baby Book_ but said they had adopted the parenting philosophy for their own reasons. For Grumet, the decision was a natural extension of how she had been raised; she was the daughter of attached parents, and her older sister practices the method as well. “I grew up this way and never thought about raising my kids differently,” she says. --- ### More from TIME --- While pregnant, Dionna Ford, who lives in Kansas City, Mo., watched a video of a British woman breast-feeding her 7-year-old daughter. Ford thought she could never do the same — until she discovered how difficult it was to wean her son off breast milk. “After six months, I decided I’d wait until he turned 1,” she says. “But after my baby turned a year old, he was still a baby — not talking, barely walking — and I wondered why I’d stop now.” Capturing various attached parents — and their reasons for attachment parenting — was Schoeller’s biggest goal for the sitting. “It was important to show that there’s no stereotypical look for a mom who practices this kind of parenting,” Schoeller says. **MORE:** [Cover Story: The Man Who Remade Motherhood](http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,2114427,00.html?pcd=pw-lb "undefined")  Martin Schoeller photographed four mothers who subscribe to attachment parenting for this week's cover of TIME. TIME  Jamie Lynne Grumet of Los Angeles and her son, age 3\. "I don't consider breast-feeding immodest at all. I'm not shy about doing it in public." Martin Schoeller for TIME  Dionna Ford of Kansas City, Mo., and her children, ages 4 years and 5 months. "It's so funny that the women who ask breast-feeding parents to cover up wouldn't write to Victoria's Secret to ask them to take down their ads." Martin Schoeller for TIME  Jessica Cary of Brooklyn and her daughter, age 3\. "I don't think about when I'll stop. For us, it's a life philosophy." Martin Schoeller for TIME  Melinda Larson of Long Island, N.Y., and her children, ages 6, 4, 2 1/2 and 9 months. "The philosophy resonated with us, and it felt comfortable. Other forms of parenting felt like I wasn't in my own skin." Martin Schoeller for TIME  Visual references of mother and child, at the cover shoot. 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Others depict those caught up in situations not of their own choosing. But occasionally, a regular person wanders unwittingly into the red border, because his or her life and the news briefly overlap. Such was the case in 2012 when Jamie Lynne Grumet and her son Aram appeared next to the question ARE YOU MOM ENOUGH.","thumbnailUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/g1qy3UGk/poster.jpg?width=720","uploadDate":"2023-02-28T11:30:00.000Z","contentUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/g1qy3UGk.m3u8","embedUrl":"https://time.com/3450144/behind-the-cover-are-you-mom-enough/","duration":"PT2M36S","potentialAction":{"@type":"SeekToAction","target":"https://time.com/3450144/behind-the-cover-are-you-mom-enough/?jw_start={seek_to_second_number}","startOffset-input":"required name=seek_to_second_number"}}] ```