In Sharon Olds, “My Son the Man”, Olds describes what is supposed to be one of the happiness day of her life as one of dread. Olds illustrates her son birth as him escaping one prison only to end up in another. Olds compares her son to Houdini who is a man that is trapped in a box and is forced to grant other people’s wishes, while never getting it his own. Olds continues by saying that when he son is a child she could try and shelter him by being able to “catch his weight”. But once he leaves her womb, there is only so much that she could do to protect him and keep him safe. Now that her son is born, she can already see the struggles that her son would have to face. Just growing up around with three brothers, I could only imagine some of the things that Olds is afraid of for her son. For example, he could be forced to always live behind a mask because society tells him to be a man means that he is never is to cry or show emotion. Becoming a mother, it is only natural for Olds to fear what the future holds for her bundle of joy.