While my mother might loathe the term "Tiger Mother," as far as labels go, I like it. My husband and I started strategizing how to raise our kids -- by Chua's definition -- Chinese.

Why is being a mother so hard? And why do we all harbor such emotionally corrosive fears that we aren't doing it right?

At the end of our journey, when we look back, the currency of achievement will no longer buy us solace. The greater accomplishment will be to over the years have built a foundation of family, friendship, altruism, kindness, compassion and love.

Giving our children freedom doesn't inevitably lead to failure, nor does it inevitably lead to abduction. We can still set our children down the right path, but first, we must unleash them.

Mother, fathers, you decide -- power and control over another to boost your ego, or connection and closeness built upon encouragement and respect? I suggest the later.

This storyline is no longer about a Chinese-American mother and her parenting style. This narrative has exposed a raw nerve about the current zeitgeist of parenting and how best to raise our children in 21st-century America.