Mother's Day forces us to reappraise the late stages at which we seek to have children, writes BREDA O'BRIEN
INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S Day and Mother’s Day fall very close to each other in Ireland, unlike the US, where Mother’s Day falls in early May. Mother’s Day originated in Britain as a day when people visited their “mother church” during Lent, and later became a day when servants were given a free day to visit their mothers.
On the other hand, International Women’s Day has impeccable socialist credentials. According to the United Nations, the Socialist Party of America first celebrated it in the US in 1909, although the first Russian “celebration” in 1917 was rather more spectacular. With two million Russian soldiers dead in the war, Russian women chose the last Sunday in February to strike for “bread and peace”. Political leaders opposed the timing, but the women streamed into the streets.
Four days later, the czar was forced to abdicate and the provisional government granted women the right to vote. Women’s Day then became a major tool of Soviet propaganda, part of a drive to get women into factories and out of the home.
Apparently, Israel makes a much bigger deal of Women’s Day and doesn’t even have Mother’s Day. Instead, there is Family Day, which celebrates parents and grandparents. It sounds rather sweet and non-commercial, with earnest kids in kindergarten making cards and gifts for family members.
In Ireland, we have to make do with less than full commitment to Women’s Day, and full-on commercialisation of Mother’s Day. And Irish women? We are hovering somewhere between the ideals of the two. Well, Irish middle-class women are, anyway. As recent research has shown, the more education you have, the more likely you are to delay both child-rearing and marriage.
Young middle-class women generally have no intention of settling down until at least 10 years out of college, with babies even further off in the timeline. In their 30s, many are then aghast to discover that Mother Nature is a contrary old biddy, and that their bodies do not produce babies to order. No one tells young women there is any reason to question this timeline based on a masculine model. No one tells them the hunger to have a child, for the majority, becomes more and more insistent the longer it is delayed.
Few are aware either of the stresses that in-vitro fertilisation (IVF) places on their bodies and their relationships, not to mention the low success rate. For women who have children later, even without the strain of IVF, endless juggling ensues. Research conducted recently by the ESRI pointed out that couples with one child experienced higher rates of breakdown. I am convinced that is because, with the first child, most women are still sure that they can manage to succeed on all levels.
Child, husband, home, career, appearance – women feel an enormous pressure to succeed. The Irish mammy of earlier generations might have been expert at inspiring guilt in hapless family members, but the Irish mum of today is an expert at piling the guilt on herself.
Few people are prepared for the shock of having an utterly dependent baby, and what it does to the easy-going, egalitarian, pal-cum-housemate-with-benefits arrangement you called marriage until the baby arrived. No one tells you either that the most wonderful experience in the world, that is, having a baby, can also send you round the twist if you don’t have good support.
Hilary Mantel, author of Wolf Hall, caused a furore recently when she suggested it would be far better for some women if they had babies much earlier. The headlines screamed that she had suggested girls should have babies at 14 but, in fact, she was speaking about herself. She never had children, due to an illness in her 20s. Not unnaturally, she looked back at her competent teenage self, and wondered, "What if?" She wasn't suggesting that all women have children earlier, just that it would suit some to have babies first and a career later.
However, the fact that it is somehow socially unacceptable for educated women to have babies in their early 20s may mean more heartbreak and stress than is necessary.
I had all four of my children in my 30s, but in highly unusual circumstances, in that my husband decided to work full-time in the home after the second was born. It is a shame it will never be anything except a minority option, either. Our children have benefited enormously, although I am the one who probably found it hardest to adjust.
I worried that having their dad at home would somehow mean their bond with me would be less. That fear proved unfounded, but sometimes I was just plain jealous of the amount of time the other five members of our family got to spend together.
I also discovered that many of the women who professed envy of my wonderful husband, were secretly sorry for me because I was the sole provider. Their fella might be slipping off to play golf on a Saturday when they could really do with a break, but he was paying the bills and providing them with a comfortable lifestyle – and even the possibility of time out from the workforce if things got too much.
It was, like much of modern Irish parenthood, more complicated than I had thought it would be while still in my feminist 20s. And yet, whingeing is a bit self-indulgent. Many of our mothers would have given a great deal for the choices that we now have, and in comparison to women in the developing world, we live in paradise.
Perhaps we need to give ourselves and other women a break and admit it is impossible to have it all. Most of us are just muddling along, hoping that we are not doing irreversible psychological damage to our hapless offspring, not to mention to ourselves.
By lowering our expectations of ourselves, it would also make it easier to demand more support from society, such as greater flexibility in workplaces, less social pressure to delay child-rearing, and more recognition of the value of caring work. Now, that would really make for a happy Mother’s Day.