Women subsumed into their children

I have to say as well, i think people read far too much into this facebook bollocks

okay, I see. I think i misunderstood! I was thinking of when it's confused with paid employment though as it annoys me (and I do work ) but I personally feel society doesn't appreciate the role of caring enough, whether that be for your children or otherwise

I think if you find yourself saying you are "just a ..." about anything it shows you up against some bad attitudes in society, otherwise you wouldn't feel the need to use the "just" word. So, I'm saying it's not just you

Don't feel bad about having said it, just think what it says about society ...
You don't have to "take those attitudes on board" yourself.

Sounds like you just wanted to escape from some attention, that while pleasant in some ways, was getting a bit much ?

owl of course it's wrong to dientify as being just a mother...what was the woman before she had DC? Non-existant?

And how many men do we know who would identify as just a father?

It is incorrect - no body is 'just' anything we are a sum of many parts and that should be celebrated.

I recall years ago when ds1 was still a tiny baby - we took a walk over to Greenwich Market and as DH was with me I went for a browse on the stalls - I was minding my own business when a bloke came over and spoke to me asking if I was an artist and basically chatting me up - I remember it as it was probably the first male attention (not from my partner) in over a year if not longer - I was mortified and scuttled off after blurting "I am just a mother" - I felt a total fool afterwards and wondered why I was hiding behind that identity as if it provided some protection from being flirted with? I am not just a mother, I am a sister, a daughter, a 'lover', a music lover etc etc. I have had various jobs and will work again that will not define me either - why be defined by one aspect of yourself?

Is there anything wrong with being 'just' a Mother?

its dp as well, we arent married :)

well as i said i have a private email so if friends wish they can contact me on that, but people rarely use that one despite having that addy as well, they just use the family one. relatives, friends etc if i want a private chat i may pm via fb but its simply not an issue to me or my friends who have ways of contacting me privately if they choose to do so.

I currently have a Mug as avatar on FB and a cople of forums and a picture of a plant on Twitter (broadbean) - it is not because my identity is subsumed to plants and tea ... I make aesthetic choices and regularly change my id pictures. In four years I have used 72 profile pics on FB and only 8 of those have included my offspring. Some have been random - a tree that looked nice, a rainbow, a leaf, others have been amusing and some relating to music/ cultural preferences. Also of course my own face has been used as well but I always feel a bit weird about selecting pictures of my self that I like as it feels a bit posed and fake 'this is my best angle' sort of thing.

I agree it is very unhealthy to totally submerge yourself into parenthood totally losing your own identity in the process. I post plenty of none child related updates as I am still a regular gig goer and am in process of planning a book group. I have a large no of child free FB friends and we talk about a range of subjects. Practicing benign neglect where possible is my parenting style and making sure my children understand my life is not run for their convenience alone.

Didn't stop my offspring trailing round after me in the holidays chanting "I'm booorreed" of course!

5mad I would assume that any email I sent you would be read by your husband and adjust the content accordingly.

Xenia I agree with your middle paragraph. Wanna start a spin off thread?

In that case, based on my current ravelry and twitter avatar, I'm slave to a tiny heart shaped strawberry.

oh are joint email accounts not ok now then?

we have a joint one, we just set it up like that when we changed braodband providers, i also have my own one but most of the time use the joint one, ditto dp. its just not a big deal, you can clearly see before you open an email who it is for and everything to do with the children i e clubs, school etc all goes to the family email account and its easy that its all there and accessible to both of us.

dp gets work emails sent there as well, i could read them if i liked but i dont as i am not that interested i will just tell him he has an email, ditto my emails dp could read them if he liked but he doesnt. if i want something to be properly private i will use my own seperate email addy but that is few and far between. its just a non issue, we set it up like that as it was convenient for us and it works. if it was a problem we would change it, but its not. its just [email protected]

Ignoring the...Less charming aspects of your post, Xenia that is truly breathtaking and I am very envious!

The island looks really beautiful, if I were you I'd get a jetty, a motor boat and some wooden retreats built a.s.a.p, just think of the the money.........

You don't earn your money for your social skills do you Xenia?

wickerman - Your post included the words "I don't believe you ..."

have to say, that is rather the way it came across. I find it really annoying when people tell me they don't believe me as I'm a pretty honest person, and always try to write from my own experience of life.

Just because I'm on here, it doesn't mean that I'd know how to set up my own email account. As I said I did ask DH to adapt ours to include both our names. That suits us fine as a family.

*amillion

I'm envious aminniol..Sounds like you're surrounded my enlightened people! :)

I'm 20 FFS, I think about my infertility a lot (why I originally joined this site, to lurk in TTC and Infertility to hear stories and prepare myself for 'what may be') but I'll repeat, I'm 20! I can't believe how many people/nurses/ex boyfriends, Hell, even 'friends' come out with shocking comments. Some of them downright disgusting that I refuse to repeat.

Should also have said there was an equal number of men and women,and I never in the years that I was there,ever heard a comment said behind the woman's back to the contrary.

Thats awful Lurking.Sad about your fertililty issues,and sad about the comments you had.
The person I knew who was childless by choice,regularly brought the subject up,but none of her work colleagues were remotely bothered.We all felt it was absolutely her personal choice.

I completely agree that women who only have an email address in their partner's name is much more annoying than FB pics of children. But again, not my business and I would not read too much in to that either.

I don't know about that amillion. Childless women are very much judged, especially if they're childless by choice.

I'm only 20, I will face fertility issues and I've already had gut wrenching comments made to me. I do think it is a society thing, otherwise why would I be getting cruel comments while lying in a hospital bed for pain relief; comments brought up of their own volition that weren't actually related to the medical treatment I was receiving at the time?

scottishmummy,from what I can remember you have 1 child,and no that is not then difficult to be a mum.And because you have called yourself scottishmummy,and you talked about fertility,my guess is you were unable to have more children,and that is sad.But that does not make you,or any other women who have fertility problems any less of a woman.
I would hope no woman or man would think that.I have certainly never heard it,so perhaps it is more what the actual woman thinks,rather than what society as a whole is really thinking.