'Like a trap you can't escape': The women who regret being mothers

[IwantToRetire]

I'm not going to post any extracts from the article as better to read the whole content.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cvgkvge4rkmo

The women you know who regret : what are the main reasons?

I think in fairness, about the heated exchange above, that it's not so helpful for a woman who's never had children to come onto a thread about regretting having children and disagreeing so strongly with a mother's views ("Jesus, you make it sound like...").

In my experience, I have had phases where I've had regretful thoughts and they've passed. I think it's very rare for those thoughts never to pass and it's not "patronising" to have that opinion. Humans are generally elastic and adapt and can start to see the bright sides in our situations.

One or two of the examples in that article are about children with disabilities or the mum developing one. That's a separate thing that, in scientific parlance, hasn't been "controlled for" in this anecdotal study. Living with a disability or caring for someone with one is I imagine, really hard regardless of whether you're a mum, wife, sister, daughter. You can't extrapolate from that scenario to mums in general as it should also be compared with being "trapped" caring for a disabled spouse as well as mothering an able child to see which are more similar. That's how scientific studies work, anyway

I agree. I thought that poster went very strongly on a topic that, with respect, isn’t for them to lead on (and to be clear, that’s very different than saying isn’t for them to contribute too!). As a mum of two there is a lot to say about this topic, and it is a thoughtful place for the OP to pose the questions, but having the second poster talk so boldly about not having children (“thank my fucking stars…”), it can deter other posters who did make the choice to be a mother who may want a safe space to discuss their feelings, which they may not have had a chance to do so before. It’s a common issue whenever this topic comes up - it gets dominated by women who do end up sounding smug that they knew they would feel regret so never did it in the first place. That’s great for them, but that isn’t what’s trying to be discussed here

I agree wholeheartedly with this, sometimes it’s better to let a comment stand. To show a poster for what they are.

This is actually an article about how mothers feel not women that thank their lucky stars they didn’t become mothers.

I think in fairness, about the heated exchange above, that it's not so helpful for a woman who's never had children to come onto a thread about regretting having children and disagreeing so strongly with a mother's views ("Jesus, you make it sound like...").

That part of my of my comment was in direct response to VivienneMary’s post, but don’t come on to a discussion on the feminism forum and tell women what they should and shouldn’t talk about. And absolutely do not suggest that a mother’s views are not to be disagreed with

I may not be a mother but that doesn’t mean I haven’t thought long and hard about whether or not it was something I was going to do because it was something my partner wanted. I heard all the arguments about “You love them when they’re here!” or “Children just fit in with your life” or whatever. I saw the friends who absolutely loved their children and thought it was the most amazing thing they’d ever done.

I’d also seen friends admit that they regretted children. That it had changed their life in ways they didn’t want, that they were stuck with partners who’d suddenly forgotten the equality in their relationship (and their career having suffered meant they were financially dependent), that they found children tedious and unenjoyable (all of it, not just the “in the trenches” bit), or that they simply had not wanted children and had been pressured into it. And there was almost always no way out, although I do know a woman who left her husband and child and started a new life elsewhere, such was her desperation to get out.

I stand by my earlier comment that the downsides of motherhood - and the regret that can come with them - should be talked about more so that women can make an informed decision. It’s very interesting to see the “Brush it under the carpet, nothing to see here!” reaction that it garners when it is discussed, though. Why wouldn’t you accept that motherhood isn’t for all women? Does it tie into the idea that this is a woman’s calling? Or that motherhood is some kind of sainted position that shouldn’t be critiqued?

(And before anyone says “But this is MUMsnet!!”, there’s a whole Childfree Mumsnetters subforum.)

Oh for heaven’s sake. Is it too much to realise that someone could read the article and think “Yup, that would have been me”?

This is a feminist discussion forum. Why would you suggest that only mothers’ opinions are valid?

don’t come on to a discussion on the feminism forum and tell women what they should and shouldn’t talk about

Just pause for a moment and consider the irony of this, please. I haven't told you you "should" do anything. Reread your comments on the first page.

FWIW I wouldn't go on the child free board that you mention and say "thank fuck I'm not child free".
I wouldn't go on a thread about, say, navigating relationships as a lesbian and say "Thank fuck I'm not a lesbian, I don't have to worry about this".
I also wouldn't use phrases like "sure, some women love motherhood, others..." when I'm not a mother.

You're bulldozing this dialogue with your swearing and empathic pronouncements and drowning out the voices of mothers trying to talk about their experiences. I'm not saying you "shouldn't". Do what you like. But I'm legitimately reacting to it and you're saying "don't". You're saying "do not suggest xyz".

No one is telling you what to do. My comment was so mild. You're telling me what i should and shouldn’t say

Edit for spag

It is definitely a topic that’s difficult to discuss.
I would say, from my own experience, the disparagement of mums is pretty constant in certain spheres. It is de rigeur for upper middle class mums in the academy and academic-adjacent circles to disdain motherhood, to express regret / loathing / a feeling of being trapped and the meaninglessness of it all. Grace Lavery’s “leaky tits and school runs” comes to mind – that is exactly how the pick-me girls talk about motherhood. I have no patience for it at all. I’ve had a hiatus from Mumsnet and perhaps I’ll regret immediately jumping into such a controversial topic but coming back to it I think it does feel a relief to get a break from the “mums who love being mums only do so because their brains have shrunk” nonsense that’s out there. I can’t think of any topic where it would be acceptable to post @MarieDeGournay 's sort of “X shrinks your brain” research, even the fact that there’s a whole BBC story on a matched cohort study of 127 women that couldn’t even manage to find 127 controls (doesn’t exactly shout “rigour”). Honestly, disparagement of mums is constant, it’s a relief to get away from it, and I get that it must be incredibly difficult for women who truly do regret becoming mums but I guess they kind of end up being pawns in the rhetoric of “silly dim women who love being mums” because women who deeply regret motherhood and find it empty of meaning are held up as the ideal of how any woman of non-shedded, big (manly?) brain would be.

Emphatic not empathic haha my misspelling turned out the opposite of what I meant...!

I think it’s like many things, it is what you make it.

Like regretting aging, it’s a pointless exercise.

The woman in the article does that, sets her boundaries and finds a way through to enjoy the parts of motherhood she can.

One of my children is disabled and will never leave the family home. Sure it’s not what I expected but I choose to see the good in the situation - the joy a cuddle brings to my son’s face, his incredible sense of humour and how it brings me and my DH together to support our son.

Therapy might help and acknowledging the regret but I don’t know that holding it with you as regret, talking about it and dwelling in it, would make it any better for anyone.

Yes. We don't have a particular word for the particular subcategory of misogyny that is disdain for mothers (or I don't know the word for it) but it is endemic.

People looking down on mothers getting stuck in. People scorning the trappings. Phrases like "looking mumsy". Modern psychoanalysis blaming one's mother for everything.

Modern society seems to applaud us if we manage to disguise the fact we're mums - say, in the workplace, or socially, or physically getting "your body back". All of these things must contribute to regretful thoughts.

@LilyYeCarveSuns , I think you're being unfair on MariedeGournay.

I understand feeling concerned about the article, due to your experiences of being patronised. And ofc there's sadly, as we know, a long history of mothers being patronised as less intelligent by sexist men and women too..

But I don't think Marie was saying that the brain pruning thing means mothers become less intelligent, and I don't think that's what the study was saying either.

This article doesn't seem sexist to me. We mustn't assume any article talking about brain changes post-pregnancy is saying it makes women less intelligent

Key Quotes :

But a recent study - the largest to date - indicates that pregnancy has a profound structural impact on brains and offers new clues into the neurological changes in mums‑to‑be.

It suggests that grey matter - the nerve-rich part of the brain involved in processing information, emotions and empathy - decreases by an average of nearly 5% during pregnancy.

But rather than being a cause for concern, these changes may be beneficial when it comes to caring for newborns, say scientists working on the project in Spain.

One of the dozens of women, now a new mum, who took part in the study told us she welcomed the findings and was "tired of pregnant women being infantilised".

"Rather than becoming dumber, we are becoming more specialised for the job," said Tania Esparza.

The greater the changes in the brain, the more likely women were to say they were relating to, and bonding well, with their babies - the team of scientists found.

These might be positive changes when it comes to caring for newborns, says Prof Susana Carmona, director of the NeuroMaternal, external laboratory at the Gregorio Marañón Health Research Institute in Madrid.

"
Watch on iPlayer
This could represent the brain "rewiring" or remodelling its architecture to "prime it for motherhood", says Carmona, co-lead of the study along with Prof Oscar Vilarroya.

"I like to use the metaphor of pruning a tree," she says. "Some of the branches are cut to make it grow more efficiently."

Pregnancy changes many organs in the body - the mum's heart can grow bigger, the capacity of her lungs can increase - and so it makes sense pregnancy can change the brain too, Carmona says.

We should not just focus on potential memory deficit, she says. "New mums learn a whole set of new skills."

While the pregnant women lost an average of nearly 5% of their grey matter, it then partially returned - although not fully - by six months after giving birth. In contrast, the amount of grey matter in the women who were not pregnant stayed quite steady.

There will be a small amount of fluctuation in every person's grey matter over time, but these results with a dip of nearly 5% are unexpected, Carmona says.

One of the areas of grey matter with the most pronounced and persistent changes was the so-called default mode network - which is involved in self-perception, empathy and altruism.

Line graph showing average grey matter volume change during pregnancy. Three lines compare pregnant women, non‑pregnant women, and same‑sex partners from pre‑pregnancy through 18 weeks, 34 weeks, one month after birth, and six months after birth. Pregnant women show a marked decrease in grey matter volume to about –5% by 34 weeks, then a partial recovery by six months after birth. Non‑pregnant women and same‑sex partners show only small fluctuations around 0%.
The transformation could be down to the pruning of nerve networks, and changes to blood vessels and cells that support nerves, says Carmona, and could represent the brain rewiring in a positive way.

It has long been argued there is a similar phenomenon seen in adolescence as the brain matures from childhood to adulthood, she says.

A number of studies in teens have suggested a pattern of grey matter thinning through adolescence with a "refining or pruning" of nerve networks as brains mature.

There are also decades of animal research that reveal pregnancy is a time of profound brain alteration for several mammals, adds Carmona.

matter shown in the brain scans

This study did not look specifically at changes in women's memory functions during pregnancy, but, in 2016, Carmona's team carried out a small study of 25 pregnant women and saw no significant change - although evidence from other studies is mixed.

And she says some women do feel more forgetful and she doesn't want to diminish women's varied experiences.

"I was excited by the idea that I could meet a new, different version of myself."

She says it is time to rethink how we are treating mothers.

"They are undergoing tremendous transformation, and we need to approach them as someone who is coming outside of a cocoon and becoming something different."

Speaking on BBC Radio 4’s Women’s Hour, author and journalist Lucy Jones, said: “It’s a really exciting time for this emerging science of matresence and patresence - the science of the transition to motherhood and fatherhood.

“It speaks to an area of life which has been very under acknowledged, under explored and under written.”

Yes I saw this article yesterday and read it then. It’s been reported before that a fair number of mothers (and fathers) regret becoming parents. This is unsurprising as regretting a choice applies to all choices we make in life. No one goes through life without some regret for some choices. Motherhood is no different.

The stakes are higher because the decision to become a mother lasts for the rest of your life unlike the decision to marry or adopt a cat.

I wish that such regret would not come with the burden of guilt that these women clearly carried with them. The stigma of not being able to express regret over children means it gets all bottled up and yes I do think that can then contribute to poor mental health at any point after childbirth. It’s an extra psychic burden to feel that cycle of I live my child(ren) but I regret having them and I’m mourning the life I could or should have had.

As far as myself personally, I wanted my children and I didn’t/don’t regret having them. But then, I already knew how much work it took because I raised two of my younger siblings as a teenager. Most mothers haven’t experienced a mother type role until they become mothers so it’s a shock.

I think there was a shift culturally with one of the waves of feminism (I never know which is which), where it was thought that if we celebrate motherhood too much then we'd be fuelling the expectation that all women ought to become mothers.

I think it's about 80% of UK women become a mother in their lifetime and that actually hasn't declined with the falling birth rate. But the way popular culture is, it almost feels like one's making a wild and stupid choice to become a mother. You're throwing your freedom away, is the message.

Maybe it's all part of older-women misogyny too, as younger women haven't become mothers yet, and once you become one, you don't feel young any more.

There's an important reason it's taboo to express regret over children: it is extremely painful to know your mother regrets having you.

I agree women who do regret need support, but the taboo isn't just therr for sexist reasons

Women who regret motherhood/find it constricting aren't necessarily being 'pick-me girls'- at least some of the regret seems to come less from the kids themselves, and more from societal effects, unsupportive partners,,work difficulties etc. We know those things exist due to sexism, and that they CAN make motherhood restricting. That doesn't mean it's inherently restricting etc.

I agree that too often discussions of the difficulties/regret etc take a nasty turn, though, and I'm sorry you've experienced that. .

What men do is part of the problem. Having a child is something you do with a man (other than in very rare occasions). It would be interesting to read how many of the women feeling trapped had a child with not a good father. Then we would be able to talk about how much and how often what men do is relevant here.

@Carla786
But I don't think Marie was saying that the brain pruning thing means mothers become less intelligent, and I don't think that's what the study was saying either.

Yes, I agree. I read this study too with a skeptical raptor eye. Grey matter volume isn’t a proxy for intelligence or cognitive ability or executive functioning. Yes it affects all that, but we have grey matter way beyond what is needed for daily functioning and decision making. So the loss of grey matter is not to be read as negative.

Secondly, the researchers mapped that the female brain undergoes changes “re-wiring” to prepare for motherhood. They mentioned the human brain undergoes a similar process during puberty, preparing a child for adulthood.

This tracks with psychological studies as women do feel differently and think differently from how they were before during the transition to and into motherhood.

That is what confidentiality between you and a therapist is for. The sexism comes in when a usually male therapist decides expressing regret means you are a danger to your children.

That’s why women are afraid to speak up.

Thanks @Kingdomofsleep for thoughtful and sensitive posts on this issue.

I don’t regret becoming a mother because I really do love them and I have an eye for the long haul if you like. I know I will want family around me as I enter my autumnal years (I’m probably already in them!)

But having two very young children has been very gruelling and for me not enjoyable at all. That isn’t meant to sound disparaging about those who do love it but I am constantly faced with nonsense about ‘when I am in my 90s I will revisit this’ and sepia photos of a woman with toddlers and babies around her. If I get to my 90s and I am confronted with a two year old screaming inconsolably because she wanted to wear a top she had as a six month old and no longer fits, I’ll be pissed off in the extreme: it is bad enough experiencing it once but not a second time!

Honestly, my regret is having two. I don’t know if I can honestly call it regret as if an angel from god visited me now and asked if I wanted to return one, I couldn’t, but if I’d never met them, but knew how having two would be, I don’t know if I’d make the same choice.

I see...yes, in therapy that's different. And certainly therapists deciding that makes someone automatically dangerous would be very wrong.

She also cautions against buying too readily into the "village" idea that everyone will pitch in. "The message we get generally is, 'We'll all be here to mind the baby' - but people often aren't - it's your baby and you'll be responsible for them," she says.

I don't regret having my kids - but the above quotes from the article were definitely resonant for me. We've had almost no help from anyone and it's been bloody hard. My DM is the only one who's provided any practical support to us as parents and she lives 100 miles away. There are many people now for whom there is no village at all - and that goes double for anyone with a disabled DC or one with SEN. There's no help, there's no respite, it's just relentless.

I think you can't keep a feeling like that a secret between you and your therapist. Children are sensitive and they know.

Where we can break down the taboo is by helping children (including adult children) understand that your mother's feelings about having you don't define you.

I'm thinking of my mum for eg. (I'm taking her out for lunch later). She had me and my sister as a single mum and was in a continual state of overwhelm, and my DSIS had additioal needs. When I went to boarding school it was clearly a huge relief to her to have one less kid to worry about. I actually didn't take that personally because if I'd been someone else, a boy, whatever, she'd have felt the same, so it wasn't personal. She did her best really.

She was so open about her regrets! When my DSIS turned 20 and still very much had the additional needs my mum used to say "what have I done to deserve this, if I'd done a murder I'd be out of prison by now." !!