AIBU - Mother’s Day for ‘women who have chosen not to be mothers’

[Hedgehoggin]

Scrolling through Instagram this morning and I’ve seen some Mother’s Day content - AIBU to think that ‘women who have chosen not to be mothers’ being celebrated on Mother’s Day is just bonkers?

I don’t have children, my choice. This day isn’t for me and I don’t want or need it to be for me. It’s for mothers, all kinds of mothers!

ODFOD

What next - Mother's Day for girls who aren't yet old enough to be mums? Totally irrational. If you aren't a mum, then Mother's Day is not for you. There's International Woman's Day, though - that's for all women.

I honestly think this is the most selfless act a woman can do their are so many shit mums out there that we should apparently be celebrating just because they birthed a child. How many 1000s of mums have children in care, how many 1000s are in prison, how many have murdered their own children, how many are addicts, how many put men first. But apparently these should all be celebrated because their mothers and people who choose not to have children have no clue. Im not saying women who don't have children should necessarily be celebrated on mother's day but not everything is so black and white like some on here think. Id rather celebrate your friend for being an amazing selfless human being then some so called mother's.

For clarity - I think it’s ridiculous that women who have chosen not to have children should celebrate Mother’s Day, unless in relation to mothers in their lives. Child free women don’t have kids. They chose not to.

What part of its not always a choice do you not get multiple posters have explained this to you and you keep repeating it

Again, as many others have pointed out. That image is for awareness, not celebration. Not all women who choose not to have kids have done so because they just dont want kids. Nobody is suggesting that women who have chosen not to have kids should be celebrated on mother's day.

I wouldn’t class that as “child free” though. If you would have had children but health reasons meant you decided not to it’s not the same as simply not wanting and not having children. The same with deciding not to pursue fertility treatments or similar hard decisions. I’m guessing that someone who is usually anti children/mothers has been very vocal about “their choice not being respected”, not fair that Mother’s Day leaves them out etc. These types are found in all walks of life and ruin things for the ordinary people who make a life choice and then just get on with things rather than banging on about it at every turn.

It is not actually mums who celebrate Mother's Day though... it is their children.
Everyone on the planet has a mum.

I agree it’s like saying all women are some kind of mother by default even if they have chosen “not to be” mothers . So stupid . It’s insulting to women and patronising I think

I don’t have kids, I never wanted them. I actively avoid Mother’s Day and don’t want to be brought into it.

it may as well just be called women’s day not Mother’s Day if every single category of woman is included in relation to their reproductive choices.

After my twins were born and sadly died in the NICU in 2023, before they passed, I ended up chatting to the midwives over the course of the week I was there. I was on a ward where you go if your baby/babies died at birth but also women who had serious gynae surgeries or women who had cancer with or after pregnancy. Basically a baby free ward.

There were women on that ward who after serious illness or a pregnancy that ended early but resulted in no future children due to health reasons had no choice but to decide not to have children but wanted them so much.

Its not as black and white as you make it out to be and they deserve a bit of compassion today too.

I dont care as much for the memes going out for mothers day, tbh I find today quite hard but I just wanted to highlight the reasons women who choose not to be mothers can be far more complex than we realise.

I've just seen a similar meme and the third image along was a muscley man in a pink apron captioned "the dad moms".

Even Mother's Day must include men.

If it’s not a choice, they shouldn’t have picked the word chosen. Because you can only have, and I quote, “chosen” if there was indeed a choice. That’s literally the point of this thread.

I didn’t choose to be a woman. I chose to not have children. HTH.

So what word should they pick exactly? Something can be a heartbreaking "choice" when it's not what you would choose for yourself if circumstances were different, which is what people have already explained much more eloquently upthread. You'd have to be obtuse to not understand that people can choose to not have children for reasons that don't feel like you have much of a choice, but nevertheless to the rest of the world you don't have children by choice. Likewise many women who have children wouldn't necessarily say they had them by choice, for their own complex reasons. I can't understand why simply thinking of people where mothers day could be difficult for any number of reasons would get people to riled up.

PP said it wasn’t a choice, and so those people wouldn’t be covered by the category of “chosen not to be mothers” anyway.

I saw another graphic that said “who didn’t have a choice but don’t have children”. That would’ve been better.

I’m allowed to resent the implication I’m missing something from my life because I chose not to have children. It garners enough questions throughout the year without a suggestion that I should also be centred on Mothers Day (which also dilutes the celebration of actual mothers, which is also really sad).

We can have a day that celebrates a subsection of people without everyone else insisting it should be about them too.

I agree.

I don't really care one way or the other about posts like the nine categories cited above, being a voluntarily child-free person whose mother is long dead; but unlike most festivals that are religious in origin, I do find that Mothers'/Mother's Day is very exclusive. You might invite your Hindu neighbours for Christmas drinks, or your Muslim friends might invite you to come and break the Ramadan fast with them, but no-one ever invites you to come too when they're taking Mum to the pub for lunch, unless you're close family.
I'd like to see a Childless Orphans' Day (ideally when the weather is a bit nicer than a blustery day in March), when for example small children could be banned from pubs for the day; garden centres could lay on transport so that elderly customers don't have to rely on a bossy, middle-aged daughter to take them there; even attractions that are marketed for "families" could have adults-only days, instead of being suspicious of people who don't want to go with one or more children in tow.

Right, so, seems like you're the one being nasty Fair enough!

I think you should be glad that it doesn't say trans mums or something like that. Was once a father is now a mum or some BS.

I don't think that on their birthday, a person should be reminded that for some people, this individual's birthday might be a sad day, and therefore they shouldn't just celebrate their birthday, they should also take time to think of others who might be sad. If someone is close enough to a person, then they should remember that without a reminder, and otherwise it doesn't matter.

Let people just have a nice day that's all about them.

You just don't understand

So it’s okay for me to feel patronised so long as we’re being inclusive to the point of defeating the object?

I don’t think you understand.

This was my take on it too. It’s acknowledging those who would like to be mothers but may have decided it’s better not to for either their own health or the health of any future children