Are 'Bad Moms' In?

You can spot them just about anywhere -- on the playground, in the store, at school.
They're helicopter parents, hovering over their children, scheduling almost their entire day.
But is there a point when good intentions go too far?
And has over-parenting become passe?
CNN's Carol Costello looks at the backlash over hyper-parenting.

Back in the day it was a cinch to know what a good mom was -- we had Donna Reed!
Reed embodied 1950's motherhood -- always there, wise and involved from afar, and exceedingly well-dressed.

Today it's difficult to define what exactly an "ideal mother is."
It's as if we've taken Donna Reed's image and put it on steroids.

Carl Honore wrote the book, "Under Pressure: Rescuing our Children from the Culture of Hyperparenting.
Honore says, "We've kind of professionalized parenting. There's a feeling now that on the frontline of child rearing, that raising a kid now is all or nothing.

For Melissa Chapman it was all or nothing. She says, "Monday was dance. Tuesday was art. Wednesday was piano, Thursday was gymnastics. We were also going to do Girl Scouts! At one point I signed up to be a Girl Scout leader! It was like, phboop. I should just shoot myself in the head."

She just didn't want to make any mistakes, and yet she still wondered whether she was a good mother.
And she's not alone.
So many mothers feel her pain -- blogs have started popping up -- rebelling against the notion moms had to be perfect to raise perfect children.

One blog is called, "Her Bad Mother: Bad is the New Good.
This loud and proud bad mother writes: "...I have left my children alone in the bathtub. I have spanked my daughter....I drink. I curse..."
So does this mean over-parenting is over?

Ayelet Waldman is the author of "Bad Mother." Waldman says, "I don't think it's over. We're not going to turn on the dime here, but I do think there's a backlash against over parenting."

And Waldman ought to know. In 2005 she was viciously, publicly attacked for writing in an essay that she loves her husband more than her children.

Waldman says, "O.K so, now fast forward now four years. And I publish this book called "Bad Mother" and the conversation and response is totally different. And I think in this weird way, the world has caught up to what I had been saying."

She could be right. Remember Melissa Chapman? She says she no longer over-schedules her kids. And she actually talks to her husband. And, guess what? She knows she's a good mom now.