The language of motherhood

I have a bad habit of clicking on posts like this that show up in my feed from people I don't particularly hang out with, and it does nothing but get me riled up. This one really got my goat, though, perhaps because for the past few months I've been struggling with the language that people use when they talk about motherhood. The author writes this commentary from the starting point that our culture looks down on those who have children. Let's put aside arguments about proof (she has none), or logic (none here, either), or the religious views she touts (a can of worms for another day), or the quality of the writing (I'm pretty good at reading comprehension, but this article doesn't just flow poorly, it reads like an RC car at the hands of a two year old), and just look at the language.

Motherhood, she claims, "isn't a hobby, it's a calling." She implies that society sees motherhood as a "rock-bottom job". (emphasis added) There's a lot of conflict for me in how people refer to parenting. Women (and men) who choose to stay at home frequently identify their career as that of a homemaker, or stay-at-home parent. I get that. Referring to parenting as a career is a way of getting other people to take your choice to stay home seriously. Feminists in the 80s considered it the height of womanhood to do it all: career, family, & personal lives. Now there seems to be a strange dichotomy among women, though. Women who stay home feel judged for not working, but women who choose to go to work get judged in a different way. I feel very strongly that women (and men) shouldn't be judged for choosing to stay home with their children, and yet referring to it as a job makes it sound as if I'm not doing mine. I love being at home with Atticus, but I'm excited about returning to the classroom this fall. And yet: when I spoke of my decision to other women at my school, several of them said the same thing to me: "If you can stay home with him, why won't you?"

If women who choose to stay home shouldn't have to justify their decision to the masses, why should I have to justify my decision to work? Atticus will be just as well off in child care as at home with me (which research continues to support), I love my job, and I don't see motherhood as my career. Being a mother is who I am, it's part of my life, it's not what I do.

How's your flatulence?

There have been a variety of responses to our announcement, all wonderful and quite a few funny.

There have been the typical ones: Congratulations! When are you due? How do you feel?
The I'm-not-sure-what-I'm-supposed-to-ask ones: Wow, really? On purpose? Um...when do you find out the sex?
And the funny ones: You two are gonna be the weirdest, best parents! Can I be Krampus?

And then there was this: How's your flatulence?

Some guys from back home were in town for a conference and I'll be honest, I was a little worried about what we'd have to talk about. One guy was really more Austin's friend; the other we'd just met. So we're out at an ACL after party with the Monsters of Folk and it turns out that their specialty is obstetrics in biomedical engineering.

Here we are, out at this classic Austin music venue, hearing this great music and enjoying one another's company, and suddenly it becomes painfully obvious that what we had most in common was my uterus. I have never heard the word uterus so many times in one evening.

"You know, the reason labor takes so long is to prevent tearing in the blah blah medical jargon blah..." "You got sick once? Did your doctor talk to you about this medicine? Because in all actuality ..medical jargon jarg jarg jarg..." "You know in the sixties these crazy OB/Gyns got a patent for the idea of putting pregnant women in a centrifuge and spinning the baby out. It wouldn't work, because it would cause a prolapsed uterus, a prolapsed bladder, and tear the cervix..." and my personal favorite, "H0w's your flatulence?"

The drunker they got, the more they discussed my uterus and pregnancy in general. Here we are, hanging out at a concert and then a lovely rooftop bar with these nice, smart boys whose actual research was interesting, and I'm afraid to say anything for fear they'll just KEEP TALKING ABOUT MY UTERUS!

Thank God I have a sense of humor, or I would have never made it through the night.

Occupado!

I saw Tadpole Jones move! The doctor was doing an ultrasound and poking around in there and the baby was wiggling around, all, "Hey! I'm in here! Occupado!!"

Now I'm enjoying a thoroughly craved root beer float and feeling all satisfied that my baby can move. What an accomplishment! I'm so proud!

Dearest son or daughter,

On this occasion of you passing 0.5" in length, I feel it is appropriate to congratulate you. You are well on your way to developing functioning appendages and looking, overall, much less reptilian.

With love from your father,
Austin

That's right, folks!

We're gonna be parents! Don't we look competent?