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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To think that all those generations of women who battled for equality for women have actually achieved nothing!

601 replies

flixx · 02/12/2008 16:59

All that has changed is that women are now expected to go out and work and well as still being souly responsible for the vast majority of domestic stuff and childcare.

Womens lives aren't better or easier, infact they are now so complicated that half of us are so stressed and knackered we don't even remember who we are anymore.

The role of a mother is less valued by society than it has ever been when we all know that it truely is THE hardest job ever.

OP posts:
daftpunk · 05/12/2008 19:09

it's relevant because it normally is the woman that wants kid's, but (according to this thread) should then expect to leave them with the father while she goes of climbing kilimanjaro..

stillstanding · 05/12/2008 19:11

Fortunately DP has accounted for you in the 5% category, MT!

stillstanding · 05/12/2008 19:13

DP, wtf?!! You have lost me. I have had a glass of wine which could explain it but I strongly suspect that I will need a few more if I am to keep up with you ...

daftpunk · 05/12/2008 19:14

you wanna ride me with me dude you have to hold on tight!

zulubump · 05/12/2008 19:20

Just been trying to read through a lot of this thread and almost wish I hadn't now. Xenia you say some terrible things! How can you?!
On owning an island:
"This is what real women do who work hard and have proper careers rather than relying on men who make them clean and scrub for them etc."

"If you do all the cleaning and the work then you're an idito and should ensure you achieve an equitable balance of work and household chores at home"

Well, thanks sister so glad I know what a "real woman" is now. One who slags off other women who want to stay at home and look after the domestic side of things. I think some of your posts are some of the most sexist things I've read!

stillstanding · 05/12/2008 19:32

The problem, zulubump, is that you have Daftpunk on the one side saying that a woman's place is in the home and Xenia on the other saying that a woman has no worth unless she is in the market place and both are as ludicrous as each other.

Most people sensibly agree that you should be able to choose - and make your decision regardless of your sex - and that either way is valid and worthwhile.

Quattrocento · 05/12/2008 19:36

Am I allowed to whisper that in my RL experience my DH initiated the "shall we have children now?" discussion.

I agree with Wilfsell's point, which is also made by Kewcumber lower down the thread, which was stressing the importance of financial independence for women. There are many women who gave up their careers who regret having done so in later life.

As for school plays etc, I've been to every school play, concert, parents evening, hockey match, swimming match, tennis match, rugby match, and netball match that my DC have participated in. It was not easy.

Cathpot · 05/12/2008 19:49

Just a thought, but does anyone think whether the work life balance in recent years has changed or not in this country, we certainly seem to obsess about motherhood more than past generations did. This may be the mn bias but might it be something to do with the fact that many of us SAHMs had careers before children and were validated by those careers and now need to find the same validation in motherhood. Hence the threads (and I am so guilty) about what to feed them, how to discipline them, how to get them to poo (a personal obsession), how to stimulate them blaa blaa the minutiae of mothering is dissected on here over and over.

My MIL brought up 5 kids in a variety of windswept places in a sort of cheerful loving benign neglect . They all had an extremely boys own adventure childhood, and it is remarkable that they all survived, but I dont think she ever contemplated her own navel about how she was doing it. They are now functional adults with their own families and a good relationship with her. She would never have got into competitive mothering and certainly not posed 'AIBU to let preteen boys take a leaking canoe in the dark across a habour where the water temperature has a survival time of 3 minutes.' and so on.

She often says to me she thinks motherhood is more fraught now because 'we just didnt know about all these things' and also I suspect she (a very very bright woman who didnt work) never felt under pressure to prove that she was more than 'just a mum'. The only people Xenia or for that matter daftpunk have to answer to about their choices are their own children, we should be celebrating the fact that they both exist rather than slagging them off.

zulubump · 05/12/2008 19:54

Thanks stillstanding, calming down a bit now. Most people I know agree that mothers should do what suits them and their situation best.

I am feeling a bit confused over my own situation at the moment. I was always successful academically but have never found a career that I could feel devoted too. I've been the most happy since having a dd and being at home with her. I think I could be quite happy making the domestic scene my career, except, except I do miss doing adult tasks in adult company sometimes. And I would like to return to work one day and I worry how having a huge gap in my CV would look. So for this reason am looking for part-time work. But it is a tough call.

I think I felt that I was mis-sold the whole feminist dream of a sparkling career being so fulfilling. I think women do feel some pressure that they are letting the side down if they give up careers to be at home. It was something I struggled with for a while. It seems sad if women can't make this decision without being criticised by other women for it.

Bink · 05/12/2008 19:54

And I can say quite out loud that very early on (indeed a few too many years before he eventually became dh) dh did an unmistakable sound-out to see if I wanted children - the clear message being that if I didn't we weren't "going anywhere" as a relationship.

Poor dh - we have two, and I completely know, though he doesn't say anything any more, that at-least-three would have been his dream. It was me who decided two, 18 months apart as they are, would be it.

zulubump · 05/12/2008 20:00

Yes quite right Cathpot, a lot of us probably obsess over our roles more than is healthy instead of just getting on and doing what is right for us and our dcs.

And my sister's dh is currently the one saying "lets start a family"

stillstanding · 05/12/2008 20:19

Bink/QC, of course, please do shout it loud! I was obviously being very simplistic indeed in calling it the "shall we have children now?" discussion when I suppose I really meant something more about who "controls" the decision (terribly put, I know).

I am sure that you and your DPs came to the decision to have children together but I also suspect that you would have had the casting vote for all the usual, obvious reasons (as is appropriate, of course).

Certainly DH and I had discussions long before we were married about children and it would have been a dealbreaker for either of us if the other wasn't keen. But - in my case and in the case of most of the women I know - it was the woman who either initiated the discussion or who controlled when it happened in terms of when she was ready, it was appropriate in her career's life etc.

But we digress. I am making massive, sweeping generalisations which - imo - are completely irrelevant: Both parents decide to have a baby, they are both responsible for it and both are allowed to go to Kilimanjaro as and when appropriate.

Cathpot · 05/12/2008 21:07

My husband would like me to point out he wasnt neglected.... I meant it in the nicest possible way. The woman breastfed them all, baked her own bread and incidently only started wearing a bra (or needing to) at 60. My bosom aspires mournfully to her bosom. She was in all ways uberSAHM she just never thought about herself in those terms.....

When it comes to the baby decision, quite drunk one xmas I out of nowhere for both of us brought it up, he foolishly decided it might be fun. 4 years and two kids later we are still adjusting but luckily still happy. It was my idea but i dont think I had anymoe idea of what it would mean than he did.

daftpunk · 05/12/2008 21:17

just caught up with the latest on here;

cathpot your earlier post was brilliant, and yes, it's great that women today have the choice to be a daftpunk or a xenia...we should be congratulating and supporting each other.

Judy1234 · 05/12/2008 21:26

My depends amongst what type of women you mix. A certain sort of man marries around 30 and wants children within 2 years. The career woman he's with may not want them so soon and he then pressures her so I'm not so sure it is always women choosing to have children. If the woman works until she goes into labour and returns after 2 weeks holiday as I did, by choice, then it doesn't really have more impact on a woman than a man except that you get the lovely bit of breastfeeding and the incredible process of being pregnant and giving birth which is a wonderful thing that men are denied.

Quattrocento · 05/12/2008 21:33

Why is going to Kilimanjaro the hallmark of a career woman btw? Is this some rite of passage of which I was previously unaware? It's most odd because I have in fact been to Kilimanjaro.

WilfsElf · 05/12/2008 21:35

I have never been to Kilimanjaro. I have been to me, though.

daftpunk · 05/12/2008 21:39

really? why doesn't that suprise me...you know of course that i've never been, and it's highly unlikely that i ever will go.

blueshoes · 05/12/2008 21:50

Xenia: " A certain sort of man marries around 30 and wants children within 2 years." Hey, that would be my dh!

Cathpot · 05/12/2008 23:42

2 weeks? dear god Xenia how the hell did you do that.
Really? I mean really?? I am not in any way speaking about maternal bonds, I am talking about the leaking ponderous mass I was 2 weeks after birth. With the second child I didnt even pretend to leave the sofa or get dressed until at least week 3. I genuinely could no more have shoehorned my post birth self into a sharp suit and gone out and talked sense to well dressed people than flown to the moon. I dribbled milk, I had slept no more than 2 hours in a row at that point. My husband now thinks you are an elaborate hoax or possible cyborg; multimillionaire island owning woman who is perkily back at work after 2 weeks?
I am, agog.

Quattrocento · 05/12/2008 23:46

Oh it is possible honestly. I know someone who did a conference call in the delivery room after giving birth. S'true.

I went to a few meetings during my maternity leaves. There was a lot of leakage to control though ...

ScottishMummy · 05/12/2008 23:53

postnatal i lived in pj for weeks i tell ya before i slapped on clinique.looked like i fell out a bin

certainly no work related stuff,too sleep deprived and ga-ga with whole thing

MrsSeanBean · 06/12/2008 09:11

Hi Daftpunk

OP - I couldn't agree more. Back to the 50s I say. Deck thee with Cath Kidston and get baking.

stillstanding · 06/12/2008 09:50

QC, I know someone who did a conference call in the delivery room too!

I'm not sure anyone in our firm necessarily respected her for it tho and for myself I always thought it terribly sad.

Going back to work after 2 weeks is one thing but just giving birth and having this brand new life in front of you and then going on a concall? A great deal of perspective has been lost imo.

daftpunk · 06/12/2008 10:08

hi mrs sgb

i love cath kidston, but i don't really want to go back to the 50's.....although it might not be a bad thing?

was the benefits system means tested in those days? because it sucks now.

i haven't worked since having my children, but i've never taken a penny in benefits (apart from child benefit)...i am sick of my hard working dh's tax money going to support lazy bone idle losers.