Happy To Help: Adventures of a People Pleaser

Wilson, cohost of the podcast What Fresh Hell: Laughing in the Face of Motherhood, unravels the invisible workload of women caregivers in her second essay collection (after When Did I Get Like This??). As the oldest of six children, Wilson felt that caregiving came naturally to her. She carried that torch through her days as a Catholic schoolgirl, then as a student at Yale, as an actor in Los Angeles and New York City, and now as the mother of three children. Wilson’s 18 serious yet humorous essays concentrate on the pandemic days, but there are references to her middle-school diary entries and to her thoughts when, more recently, each of her children encountered serious medical issues, including seizure disorders, migraines, and long-term COVID. In the standout essay “Do What Matters,” Wilson argues that electronic planning systems and calendars only make more work for caregivers who believe productivity is bliss.