A Short Rant

My mother-in-law loves to shop and our family has been the beneficiary of her generosity over the years (and since I hate to shop, this is a particularly wonderful gift). She essentially clothes our children, and occasionally I actually have to request that she not go overboard, and remind her that our toddler has an attic filled with boxes of hand-me-downs, and does not need brand new ... well, anything.
This spring, I requested shorts for the two eldest children. And before we knew it, a parcel had landed on our porch. The kids dug in, and discovered piles of clothes, something for everyone; but they assumed all of the "girlie" shorts were for our younger daughter. When I went to take a look, I saw why: the shorts were short. My eldest daughter is not short. In short, the clothes that were meant for her were inappropriate. I do not think my mother-in-law has the slightest intention of turning her seven-year-old granddaughter into a sex symbol--in fact, I'm positive that's not the case. My guess is that those very short shorts were what she found available in the stores, for girls. For boys, shorts continue to be made of comfortable material cut into practical lengths.
My daughter was mildly perplexed: why were the shorts so short? She couldn't wear them to school (which has a finger-length rule), and they weren't much use for playing soccer and doing running club anyway. So, she's been wearing her (one pair) of soccer shorts instead. I just went upstairs and dug through her older brother's drawer and found some shorts that would fit her, too.
And I thought to myself: what is this about? What is the message being sent to girls and not to boys? Here's my reading: girls are (sexual) objects to be decorated, and not active participants. How can you play soccer in teeny-tiny shorts? You can't, really. And you won't look sexy playing soccer anyway, so why would you want to play?
How can we empower our daughters to make decisions that honour their bodies, their aspirations, their desires, their sense of freedom and play, if we are dressing them in clothes that subtly undermine those powerful and positive messages.
I'm not suggesting there's a clothing company conspiracy; the clothing simply reflects what our culture accepts, or even requests, perhaps without even thinking about it. Let's think about it. I'm going to ask my mother-in-law to shop for shorts in the boys' section--for my daughters. Free play for all!

Ah ... Maternal and Infant Health, Such a Simple Subject, No?

So, while I was away, Stephen Harper, the prime minister of Canada, thought he'd appeal to women (he apparently doesn't poll well with us as a group), and to this end (or am I being too cynical?), he proposed an initiative to improve maternal and infant health in developing nations. His initiative, while laudable, has one gaping hole: it does not include funding or support for family planning; most specifically, of course, for abortion. As I said to my husband, imagine if we had no access to family planning--how many kids would we have??? (We have four, full stop). Blessedly fertile, without family planning--in our case, condoms and now a vasectomy--I would be pregnant non-stop, and not only would my own health suffer, but so would the health of our children.

Spacing out children and deciding how many one can reasonably care for is critical to both maternal and infant health: in fact, it's critical to the health of a family, and communities, and society generally. To survive and to thrive, infants and children need parents who have the resources to protect and nurture them. Not to mention that a woman who is constantly pregnant has the story of her life written for her: and the plot-line revolves around constant, repetitive, menial labour; and, often, early death.

Blue Milk is an awesome blog about mothering and feminism, and I discovered this piece on abortion and motherhood. About pregnancy, she writes: "... this state of being is a devouring one, and ... it is vital that it not be experienced unwillingly by a woman."

That's the crux of the matter, for me. Carrying an unwanted pregnancy is like being trapped in the body. There is a tendency to judge women who accidentally become pregnant, but I've no interest in moralizing. Let us observe that some women carrying unwanted pregnancies are already mothers. Some have more children than they can care for. And some are willing to go to desperate measures to prevent their bodies from carrying another pregnancy to term. A recent article by Geoffrey York in the Globe and Mail detailed the dangers and prevalence of abortion "clinics" in African countries where abortion is illegal. Guess what--it happens whether or not it is legally available. This shouldn't be news. Speaking as someone who has carried four children to term, it's entirely understandable. Had I not wanted to be carrying those children, the state of pregnancy would have been terrifying, overwhelming, devastating.

To imagine that you can craft a policy focused on maternal and infant health and leave out family planning, contraception, and, yes, as a last resort, abortion, is to imagine a world in which every pregnant woman is pregnant willingly. In other words, the policy could only be crafted in a fantastical vacuum; and though it might shock Mr. Harper to hear this, not all mothers idealize motherhood. In the messy and complicated human world in which we actually live, I, as a mother, accept that not all pregnant women are willingly pregnant. And, as a mother, having with love and excitement and gratitude borne my babies, I can imagine how desperate I would feel trapped in that other reality. Denying legal access to abortion does not deny access to abortion; it sends desperate women underground--including women who are already mothers.

Politics of Breastfeeding

I haven't been here in awhile. Somehow, my brain stopped looking for feminist/mom-related news stories over the winter. But I came back for a visit, after lunch today, and thought I'd like to check in more often.

Here's a link to an article on the politics of breastfeeding by Hannah Rosen, published in the The Atlantic, and suggested by a reader (whose comment I only saw today ... apparently the comment settings on this blog needed tweaking; consider them tweaked).

The article is controversial; but I did not respond quite like I'd anticipated. The article argues against "lactivists" and the popular medical advice given to women that breast is best. (Note: I do actually believe that breast is best). Ms. Rosen is a breastfeeding mother of three who began to investigate her own ambivalence about breastfeeding when her third child was newly born: and she walked right into a minefield that pits mothers against mothers.

Now, despite being a breastfeeding mother of four, I find sympathy with her argument. I chose breastfeeding because I wanted to breastfeed. I took a lot of pleasure from the experience. If my husband had been the one with the breasts, I would have been devastated. Lactating was an extremely powerful experience in my life. But I recognize that this is not the case for every woman. And I also recognize that breastfeeding is a major time-sucker (literally!). Because babies breastfeed through the night, I spent a good portion of my breastfeeding days sleep-deprived. My husband was pretty tired, too; we shared the night-time burden in the early infant days--I would nurse, and he would change the diaper or fetch the baby, if the baby had moved on to sleeping in another room. But I was the one whose body was working to make the milk. I was the one with the non-negotiable job--and it never felt like a sacrifice to me.

Neither did pregnancy. Definitely not birth. Those were formative life experiences that brought me strength. But, as my fourth child ends his nursing career, slowly, and I end my career as a lactating woman (and I've done the math--I've breastfed babies for a total of SEVEN YEARS), I get that other perspective: that desire to share the burden of childcare more fairly between partners. Breastfeeding can factor into that inequity.

Here's one more thought, though. Rather than wishing our bodies were different, is there some way to recognize and incorporate the realities of our bodies into the world of work and life? Only women can bear children. Only women can lactate. Whether you see this is a burden and a sacrifice, or a privilege and a joy, or perhaps as both, depends on a whole lot of factors, and may even change from day to day, or child to child. Breastfeeding out of obligation and with a strong sense of sacrifice may not be the best for you or your child. Still, it's always easier to make choices when there is plenty of support for the harder choices; support, not pressure; and I don't think we have the balance yet.

In the final paragraph of her article, Ms. Rosen tries to analyze why, despite wanting to quit, she hasn't given up breastfeeding entirely: "Breast-feeding does not belong in the realm of facts and hard numbers; it is much too intimate and elemental. It contains all of my awe about motherhood, and also my ambivalence."

I like that. How well I relate to that honest take on motherhood: awe and ambivalence.