'Pushing presents'

It's not payment[confuse], it's gratitude. I don't think my birthday present is a payment for being alive....it's part of the celebration and making me feel special.

Not sure if anyone has asked yet - if it is called a "push present" - do you only get it if you push?

I think it's the expectation of a gift that makes it seem odd, whether it's the husband expecting to reward his wife, or the wife expecting payment. But then, if you have spent your life surrounded by people who think that's a normal time to give/receive a gift then you're maybe not thinking of it in those terms - like wukter's DH who did it because he thought that's the usual thing to do. The motivation then is just "it's what you do" rather than having analysed what it might be taken to represent and being happy with that concept. I give DH a Valentine's card because it's "what you do", not because that date has any real significance for us or because I agree with some notion about romantic love needing to be highlighted on set dates. It's separate from doing nice things together spontaneously, but both have their place.

Obviously it's nice to get presents, but I hate hate hate threads where people ask who got a present, what did you get, should I get one, etc.

You just had a baby. I feel like you should be a bit too distracted to be interested in any sparkly earrings right now.

Marketing? Really? I got the eternity ring after baby 2 because we both nearly died and my DH wanted us around for an eternity.

Why shouldn't women receive a gift?

I just don't understand this (and sounds like a wonderful marketing campaign to me!!). Its just another pressure to do 'the right thing', well, I'd sooner dp didn't bother in that case (we don't do valentines day in our house either....)

FFs perhaps if we stopped calling it a push present, that might help.......eeeeewwwww.

It's weird that some people think a baby is commodified [sic] if they receive a post birth gift..how ugly. I thought I got a present for sacrificing more of my time and life to carry our baby and so DH was redressing the balance.

Well, I carried our babies, delivered them and my DH was grateful, so I got an eternity ring, a cotton bouquet of flowers and pjs. I also had major surgery.

It's not patronising at all, what a ridiculous notion.

lasts, not last's. The shame.

Not really- the timing for an eternity ring was never set in stone (excuse pun) although the concept goes back to the Egyptians.

It was actually de Beers who popularised them as a first baby gift.

They also formalised the cost of an engagement ring with "A month's salary that last's forever" and repopularised solitaire engagement rings with "One diamond for every woman you love"

Isn't it traditioanl to buy an eternity ring to celebrate the birth of the firth born child ?

I got one when DD was born.

Let me try to analyse why.

DH thought it was the done thing. He wouldn't have wanted me to be the only woman in the ward/circle of friends whose husband was thoughtless enough not to The Right Thing.

It's OUR money, not his. And those long draggy months where I drank no wine, smoked no cigs, ate no fancy cheese etc saved up a bit of money - my disposable cash - so I had thought that I'd like something timeless as a memento.

I felt like a woman, not a girl any more. Beady strings from the market stalls were
alright for a youngster but grown up women are a bit more sophisticated than that.

I was fucking sore and weepy and wanted to be spoilt a bit.

So in our case, no it wasn't antifeminist. But then we didn't call it a push present either

But a sparkly gift... it says princess to me

It has the sting of pedestal about it

It's not the baby you're comoditising. If anything it's the experience of childbirth. Now some women may find that childbirth was extremely empowering and a treat in itself. I am not one of those women. It was blardy awful.

Now gimme my present

sorry, stopped typing there, suddenly.

Not much sleep, you see...

Fair enough: that's not what you meant. I'm happy.

I think my probl

"It's still a lovely baby"

Just... my entire point was that babies cannot and should not be commodified by offering an expensive gift for pushing them out. My point was not that some babies don't deserve gifts

Oh that's not what I meant at all ! Sorry if my English has regressed so much that you thought I meant having a child with difficulties would change the gift and make it seem gauche I'm quite offended that you think the opposite of what I meant, but again, I'll just have to put it down to the fact I'm not as articulate as I'd like to be these days.

I was taking the thread from madwomanintheattic, who wondered whether her baby would qualify for a gift, and commenting on the notion that a 'push present' has the connotations of the baby being a commodity of sorts.
But a baby isn't a commodity, is it. And never is this more obvious than when a child is born with problems. Birth and life cannot be commodified; a price or value can't be put on a baby.
I'm having problems articulating why exactly I'm uncomfortable with the notion of offering jewelry for pushing out a child. What I know for sure is I did not mean what you thought I did.

I'm very, very uncomfortable with the idea of a push present

but I'm even more uncomfortable with your idea that having a child with difficulties would change a gift or make it seem 'gauche'.

It's still a lovely baby. It's still something to be celebrated.

yes.. what if the child is born with problems. wouldn't a piece of jewelry seem irrelevant, even gauche and out of place.
OTOH, I agree with SSM that birth is often trivialised by men. Childbirth is an enormous accomplishment, and that should definitely be acknowledged by the father-- but he doesn't have to put a price on it

sakura, mm. i'd be a bit worried that the chap doing the buying of an expensive gift wasn't intending to do any nurturing or childcare/ rearing lol, sort of discharging his responsibilities to do with the offspring - and would always have the 'well, i bought you that x/y/z' as a comeback if the woman dared to mention the obvious inequalities. i'm also worried that a woman who demands an expensive item of jewellery isn't really taking the whole thing as a joint enterprise - doesn't bode well for the next ten years.

i've never heard of the term 'pushing present' though... dh was just as knackered as i was every time, i think, i'm not sure it crossed his mind that i'd be wanting paying for my endeavours. our baby, our future, our life-changing event, our commencement of sleepless nights and nappy changing... my present? weird. (but i did enjoy the blue cheese and vino when it appeared)

the more i think about it, the more it creeps me out. speaking as someone who has a child that suffered brain damage due to birth hypoxia, would i not have qualified for a gift, as i didn't deliver a perfect specimen? (of course i would have had the first two 'gifts' to fall back on, to remind me that if i tried hard enough, i could manage to get it right...) yick. i'm quite glad that dh didn't start that little tradition tbh.

Flowers would be nice as well, but that sort of goes in the nurturing box