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"All
mothers are working mothers." -- Author Unknown
"Dear Mom -- You do so much for us during the year that our one “Take care of Mommy day” seems silly. But we do it anyway because we want you to know just how much we love you. This day is important because it gives us an excuse to thank you for the rest of the year when you take such good care of us." -- Eli, age 15
It's interesting that on Mothers Day, most families celebrate by giving Mom some time away from the kids. Not that I'm complaining -- we all need a break now and then to be inspired mothers. But we also all know that this one day of being "taken care of" does nothing to address the fact that most Moms still shoulder the lion's share of child-raising and home-making, even if they also have paid jobs.
The Mothers Day I'd really like to see would honor Moms by actually making their lives better, not just give them breakfast in bed and a break while Dad takes the kids on an outing. What would I like to see this Mothers Day?
- More recognition that having a child isn't just something parents work around, but a profound shift in our lives that makes everything else diminish in importance.
- Coupons from the kids that Mom can use for a "No-Bickering Car Ride," a "Complaint-free Dinner" or"One Week of Brushing Teeth without Being Reminded."
- A commitment to shared housework, so that everyone else in the family takes on some chore that otherwise would fall to Mom -- all year long!
- Admiration for the real, tough, invisible work of mothering: Responding with compassion to all the varieties of trying behavior that immature humans can exhibit.
- More acknowledgment in our society that it’s in everyone’s best interests to support families, because productive, responsible citizens only develop from kids whose emotional needs are met as they grow up.
- Paid sick leave for all working parents -- and the ability to take those days off if their kid is sick, without penalty.
- More job sharing, flex time, and other family-friendly workplace practices.
- An end to the "Mommy Wars," with the understanding that raising kids is the hardest work there is, that it's an art, not a science, that happy moms raise happy kids, that we all love our children and that we're all doing the best we can to meet their needs.
- An end to pitting kids' needs against moms' needs -- with Dads fully sharing the joys and burdens of "the second shift."
- Kids writing "Thank You, Mom" letters (dictated by the little ones) or making "Mommy & Me" booklets. Speaking from experience, these misspelled and illegible letters will be treasured more with each passing year and may end up framed around the time the kid graduates from high school.
Thank you for your commitment to being an inspired parent to your child. You inspire me.
Most senior citizens say they wished they had spent more time with their children, and that the years of child-raising, in retrospect, passed in the blink of any eye. Most fathers, and even more mothers, say that they want to spend more time with their children, especially in those tricky afterschool hours when kids could use supervision on their homework.
Not surprisingly, work is the most commonly cited obstacle to family
time. Fathers work outside the home an average of 51 hours weekly,
mothers 41 hours, and of course most people spend at least an
additional five hours per week commuting.
Having most parents
work is a new phenomenon in our culture. In 1950, 12 percent of mothers
worked. By 1980 this number had quadrupled to 47 percent, by 1997 the
number of working mothers had risen to 67%.
It is worth noting that during the same time period, the levels of
suicide and other mental health problems in children rose dramatically.
An astonishing 1 in 5 of our children seriously consider or actually
attempt suicide before age 19. Although there are many other factors in
play, could the rise in suicide and the rise in having both parents
working outside the home be related? It's certainly true that parents
who work outside the home fulltime when their children are young will
have a hard time meeting the developmental needs of those children.
We’re
asking kids today to handle a high pressure culture, not only with
little adult guidance, but without the internalized security and
capacity for connection that humans are meant to develop beginning as
babies. Too many kids grow up without even a name for their deep
loneliness, valuing possessions over people, disconnected from each
other and their responsibilities as citizens.
So what’s the
answer? Some people think we should send women back to the kitchen.
Feminists, in response, too often downplay the cost to kids of having
both parents work. But are we really so limited in our thinking that
these are the only two alternatives – shortchange kids or oppress
women?
Of course, the economics of most families increasingly
encourage or require both parents to work, whether in one or two parent
homes. And obviously, many women love working, treasure the
independence a paycheck gives them, and would not dream of staying home
with their children. They ask, not unreasonably, why men shouldn't be
asked to give up prime career years to stay home with toddlers.
It doesn't help that parents who stay home with children are
increasingly devalued and isolated, as well as penalized when they
re-enter the work force. Not only is this less than optimal for both
the children and their at-home parent, the result is that many parents
choose to let others raise their children so they can continue to work
outside the home.
Our society needs productive, responsible adult citizens, and those
adults only develop from kids whose emotional needs are met as they
grow. Both women and men deserve good jobs, balanced lives, and the
joys of raising children IF that is what they want.
The
answer is obvious, and has already been pioneered by every other
"advanced" industrial nation -- because it ends up working better for
their societies! The world of work needs to become more family friendly
so that both men and women can work part time while their children are
young, and share the demands and the rewards of that second shift.
The
only way I see for young parents to swing this is with legislative
initiatives such as Paid parental leave, Public Pre-K, Health care for
those in part time jobs, Tax incentives for companies offering job
sharing and flex-time, and Restoring the family friendly Tax code
provisions this country had in the 1950s. (In the 1950s the tax
structure supported families with one wage earner, and it was still
possible to buy a house on one income.)
Until then, if we're all working, who is nurturing and teaching our kids?
Let's be honest about babies and toddlers. They need us.
Developmentally, they need the concentrated loving attention of a
permanent attachment figure who adores them. (Which by definition
excludes paid caregivers.)
Women in our culture are given a terrible, unfair choice: either meet
our children’s needs or meet our own. Excuse me, but why aren’t men
faced with this choice?
Every few months another article shows up in the press about motherhood, usually focusing on the split between the women who choose their own careers versus those who choose to stay home with their children, or to work part time, thus limiting their ultimate professional prospects. While some of these articles claim that children who have fulltime working parents are better off, the subtext of most of them is that kids with both parents working fulltime are somewhat gypped, and women must choose either themselves or their children.
Most women, feminists or not, want more from life than motherhood. Most of us have to work for economic reasons. And the economic cost to women of being mothers is huge. We love our children, but we need to work economically, and if we are lucky enough to have a good job, we love the other rewards: self actualization, respect, good colleagues, intellectual stimulation, pride in making a positive contribution.
So we maintain that it is fine for kids if both parents work, maybe
even positive. We minimize any potential damage to children of parents
working. We participate in our culture’s devaluation of child raising.
I love my work. I don’t want to give up my professional
aspirations, or my commitment to use my skills to help transform our
world into a better place. I am a feminist. The idea of sending women
back to the 1950s to stay home and raise kids full-time makes me almost
physically ill. Not that child-raising isn’t as rewarding, and as
challenging as the work world – I have found it to be equally so – but
Betty Friedan was right that for many women in our culture, full time
child-raising becomes full-time house management, which is devalued by
our culture. And what a waste of the brain power that our society
desperately needs!
But in addition to being a
feminist, I am also a psychologist, and a mother. For me, research
and experience clearly indicate that children need the continuity of
care by parents at home in their early years, and substantial parental
involvement – the kind that precludes full time employment for both
parents -- for many years. So where does that leave us?
Choosing between ourselves and our children? What kind of choice is that?
If feminism’s goal is to advance the lot of women, the next wave of feminism must confront the organization of work and childraising in our culture that traps us in such impossible choices. And the next wave of feminism must confront the sexism that assumes women will continue to make the sacrifice of raising everyone’s children.
In making these shifts, the next wave of feminism will need to stop participating in the cultural devaluation of child-raising by defending paid care for babies as "just as good" as parental care.
Children deserve parents. Women deserve the same professional opportunities as men. The answer seems pretty obvious. Men and women need to share the childraising.
But that’s just the tip of the iceberg. The larger need is to change the way work is organized in this culture. Fulltime jobs requiring a minimum of 40 hours per week plus commute and lunch, and leadership positions that require 60 to 80 hours per week don't leave enough room for family, for either men or women.
We also need family-friendly economic policies, including tax code provisions and health care, to allow us to get by on less than two fulltime paychecks.
But why should society shoulder the economic burden of helping families? It is, after all, a personal choice to have children. Because society benefits by raising healthy children who become productive members of society. But that's another blog..

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