Feminism and motherhood

Posted by Jenni Colwill on 3 September 2009 | 0 Comments

I have just spent a week with a wonderful 16-month-old baby. On arriving back home one of the first things I read was a blog article about whether or not you can be a feminist and still have maternal instincts. Both these events got me thinking about my time as a young mother.

Unlike mothers today, I had my children in my early twenties. The trend to have children later in life means that many mothers now are already grown up when they have their children.

Maybe I was a late-starter, but as a very young 21-year-old with a baby, the question of whether I had a philosophy about motherhood versus feminism just didn't exist for me. I was too busy growing up with my children.

Not only are young mothers now under the pressure to be perfect at everything they do (see below) they also are expected to have formed opinions about a whole lot of things that I never had to think about.

How hard is that?

So these are my thoughts on the motherhood/feminism discussion:

Thought #1: Our culture expects women to be beautiful, witty, intelligent, super-capable, successful at work and good mothers.

Therefore many women - mothers included - strive to achieve everything and often just end up feeling inadequate.

Thought #2: Our culture also tends to confuse good mothering with full-time mothering.

Regardless of this, and for different reasons, some women end up as full-time mothers and some balance good mothering with employment.

Thought #3: Very few women who are full-time mothers are rejecting feminism. They are just being full-time mothers.

Similarly, very few women who work when their children are young are acting out a feminist imperative.

Thought #4: Regardless of whether they are a full-time mothers or not, most women strive to be good mothers and still end up feeling inadequate - see above.

Conclusion: Feminism and mothering are not incompatible activities. In fact, the experience of mothering can stir the feminist spirit for many women.