Just A Mother
International Women’s Day is supposed to celebrate the movement for women’s rights yet Roisin Harkin, felt somewhat flat on March 8th this year. First published in our bi-annual, printed newsletter, here she explores what being a ‘stay-at-home mum’ can feel like in a society in which we’ve been promised that we ‘can have it all’.
On International Women’s Day, I found myself adrift. After getting the children ready, dropping them to school, attending my eldest son’s first school Mass post-covid, then scurrying around completing a number of jobs whilst my youngest two sons were in nursery for a few hours; the post office, the dressmakers, the local shop for the bits for dinner, I felt a gnawing feeling in the pit of my stomach. Every so often I’d scan my Instagram or Facebook feeds. International Women’s Day! Let’s celebrate all the hard-working, successful women in our lives! Post after post of women in different states of success-play, on the corporate scene, running their own business, ‘hustling’, being a ‘Boss b*&%h’. Generally earning money. But there was a distinct lack of representation of one huge demographic of womanhood. Mothers, and more particularly, stay-at-home mothers.
I felt unable to contribute to the social media onslaught. Stumped for something to say, which, as those who know me will tell you, is a rare occurrence. But on International Women’s Day, as a woman, as a mother, I felt translucent. I’m ‘just’ a mother, you see. With each scroll I’d feel the familiar wave of guilt I’d felt since I’d made the decision three years previously to put my career on hold to dedicate my time to raising my children. With the arrival of my third child I could no longer be both the mother or career woman I wanted to be. So I chose to focus exclusively on the former. A quick realisation dawned on me before the first month’s missed paycheque even registered: Modern society has instilled an inherent undervaluation of Mothers in all of us. So undervalued have we become in society that I felt unable to stand with those other women on IWD, because as I understand it, my life choice and lack of a financially-recompensed career means society views me as lesser than what a modern woman should strive to be.
“Modern society has instilled an inherent undervaluation of Mothers in all of us.”
I increasingly feel that women, and more specifically mothers, have been sold the lie that we ‘can have it all’. That sweeping modernist statement can cop a lot of the blame for the state we find ourselves in. We strive for equality, but in an intrinsically unequal world, we are suffering by pushing square pegs in the round holes that society has carved for us. What women really want to have, if we spoke the language of truth, is choice without judgment. A right to choose whether to work, stay at home, or manage both, and for all these choices to be without stigma attached.
Just recently, while out with friends for an evening, we struck up conversation in the bar with some other women we had just met. Naturally, the conversation swung around to careers. When asked what I did for a living, I responded that I was a stay-at-home mum. My friend, a successful career-woman, was quick to caveat my response with ‘but she had a high-flying career before’ — as if justifying my position in the world, as if to be a stay-at-home mother isn’t respectable enough in its own right.
“I’ve been rendered voiceless upon my career abandonment.”
My dear friend, of course, had nothing but good intentions with her comment. But still, those comments ring in my ears. And what I could have countered with remains stuck in my throat; for a moment it’s like I’ve been rendered voiceless upon my career abandonment.
As women with children we fight a continuing battle to meet career goals, be devoted mothers, thoughtful partners, caring friends. We are only human and can only give so much. We can be seen as too driven for putting our careers first, or seen as unambitious for putting our children first. We are running to a standstill whatever we choose, held back by our own preconceptions of what life for a modern woman should look like. If I speak honestly, I’m much happier in my life now than I was when I was presenting quarterly updates to management teams. I wish that being a stay-at-home mother could be respected as being fulfilling for some women, and respected for where it is not. Of course, I absolutely do believe that women can have it all. But not in this society of ours. Things need to change within all of us before that can be achievable for all of us.