I’m at that age.
You know. THE age.
The age where it seems like everyone around me is having babies.
I’m also married. So that means that as everyone around me is having babies, everyone else around me is asking me when I’m going to start having babies.
At least I’m not at the age where people start tsk, tsking me and telling me that I’m not getting any younger. But still, the pressure is starting to build, as it has for just about every married woman I know.
I love seeing all the beautiful babies around me. I love their sweet chubby faces and their teensy little fingernails. I swoon every time I see gummy smiles pop up in my Facebook feed, and my heart leaps with joy whenever I see another status update that announces a pregnancy or birth. It’s an amazing time. People I know as friends, fellow writers, classmates, even my brother – they’re parents now. They’re, like, grownups and stuff. And they’re facing these new challenges none of us ever considered before, like finding a balance between career and family and personal time.
This seems a struggle especially for my female friends, who were raised in a, for lack of a better term, post-feminism world, where we are expected to have successful careers, vibrant social lives, and raise children – all at the same time. We call it “Having it All.”
So, Internet, here’s my question:
Can women really have it all? Is there such a thing? Are we just defining it wrong? Or is having it all a false promise?
Really, that’s four questions.
I look forward to comments! And I promise to share my thoughts on the subject too 😉
Good post. I’m going to link your blog to mine, http://millicentmouse.wordpress.com.
can you tell me what you feel first
I don’t have an answer, I wish I did – but I’m working on it. I hope someone else posts it so I don’t have to go through the struggle of feelinng sad and guilty at the thought of passing my child off to strangers so that I can go to work to pay them….
bleh, yeh i hear that so often from my friends…its not good when society says to a woman “you want equality, then that means doing more than a man and being grateful for it”
i dont think anyone has any answers to this until societies view changes but maybe instead of doing everything (or feeling like you have a responsibility to ensure everything is done to your standards) then re assess the priorities and put effort into the top ones and little effort into the lower ones
sometimes we are our own biggest critics and we alone set a high bar for ourselves which others see and then demand that you follow
leaving your child with strangers while you are forced into work is a tragedy for any mother and i dont know how to ease that pain…except for empathising with you
As a 60-year-old male I know that I’m not the one to answer the question, but, and I know it’s a cliché, it’s not about “having everything” or having anything, it’s about being. It’s not about what society or your friends expect of you. If you measure your worth simply by comparing your life to other people, you will never be happy! Be a good person. Do your work (whatever it is) well. Be loving, honest and forgiving in all your relationships. Take time to talk to God and time to listen to the response. (And don’t take yourself, and life, too seriously!) You are beautiful, inside and outside, and we love you very much.
I struggle with this every day, and I think it depends on how you define “having it all.” As a working mother I feel guilty both at home and at work. At home because I do work part of the time there, and work always seems to invade home life (e.g. last night I was up until almost 11:30 pm working). Work is always there, and I have to decide between my child and my work. I feel like I should be spending more time playing with her instead of letting her go off on her own so I can just get the work done. I feel guilty when I am at the office mainly because it is kind of a sanctuary. I can get stuff done without having to worry about a toddler constantly at my elbow. I don’t, however, feel guilty about leaving her. When she isn’t with me she is with either my husband or my mom, and I know that I am incredibly lucky to have that support system so I don’t have to leave her with strangers. But something has to give when you have a career and a family. In my case I don’t get enough “me time.” Because of that I don’t feel like I do actually have it all. Yes, for the most part I feel like I am fulfilling my duties with my job and my child, but I am not really doing anything for myself.
Thanks for all the replies! To me, the ability for women to have it all is almost a false promise — one thing or another is going to suffer when you stretch yourself thin. And really, who’s to say what having it all means from person to person? For me, having it all is setting priorities and living by those priorities, making sure to have realistic expectations, and not beating yourself up when “perfection” is not attained. At the end, having it all comes from the inside, taking care of what’s most important, and accepting when we can’t do it all.
Now if only it was easy to act on this theory!
I know exactly what you mean about baby “stress” – people ask the most personal questions that are really none of their business – they don’t realize how hurtful they’re acting.
So to answer your questions – no, we can’t have it all. It’s not possible without a support system in place that most people don’t have. Something has to give, and it’s usually us. I do think it’s a false promise – and a social expectation that just as unrealistic as air-brushed models on magazine covers.
I love reading the responses and I agree that having it all isn’t possible without a really great support system and a community to fall back on. My parents can only handle having had a baby late in life because of the community they live in and the family that are a stone’s throw away to help out in a pinch.
I can only hope to have something like that if/when that time comes..