Happy International Women's Day!

It's fair to say that International Women's day now resonates deeply with me since it has come to pass that I have increased the world’s female population by three!

It’s wonderful being a mother to girls. However, as joyous as it can be, I am aware that the emotions they do and will have for me as their mother are on a continuous sliding scale, the extremes ranging from pure unadulterated hatred to Love, friendship and at a push admiration (stopping frequently at acute embarrassment, faint disgust and utter indifference) and that this scale will reach maximum momentum come the dreaded teenage years. I am also aware that my daughters path through life will encounter more challenges than that of their male counterparts, due to the inherent structural and cultural inequality still prevalent in our society.

With girls comes an extra responsibility to impress upon them they can do anything they want in life, including anything a man can do. You do this whilst, ironically, alerting them to the yawning chasms of inequality between the sexes. Such as, in some circumstances, a different level of pay for doing the same job as a man, being on an immediate back foot in the job market when you hit a certain ‘child bearing’ age and that trying to juggle a career with home keeping and being a mum is bloody hard as our archaic work structure pushes women to work in part time positions. This in turn means less money and less advancement in the workplace. Also it is a fact that the majority of domestic work in the house still falls on a women’s shoulders, meaning they return from work effectively to do another job which is exhausting and defeating and that, after all that, actually paying other people to bring up your children while you are at work costs so much that you are often left in negative equity (THE RED) by the end of the month. All incredibly encouraging to women who want to achieve. We are accused of wanting to ‘have it all’ an expression I absolutely loathe as it intonates that we women are a bunch of greedy bitches who should know their limits. The fact is we just ‘want it’ and what we want is a career and a family. It’s not frickin’ brain surgery! Oh and by the way only 1 in 20 neurosurgeons are women (a fact stolen off the interweb so its authenticity has not been verified)

And there is the other stuff. The ‘don’t dress like that or people will get the wrong impression stuff’. This will be tricky, the girls are not quite at that stage yet but how do you tell a child be anything you want to be and feel free to express yourself but don’t wear that skirt or those shoes because men may think you ‘are asking for it’. Or that yes, men CAN put it about but if you do, be prepared to be labelled a whore. The objectification of women and sexualisation of girls is prevalent everywhere, with no regulation. Women are still considered a free for all, a subject for comment, for pleasure, for derision. I fear for my girls and need them to be empowered to face the big bad world out there, and it is down to me to do that. I also need other mothers to educate their sons to no longer objectify women and to know that no means no.

Having said all that I have lots of hope that the future for my girls will have moved on and improved as rapidly as it has since the 70s when I was born. My mother is shocked at times at how different things are now and what I expect from my relationship and from my work. In her eyes I am going against the natural order of things as I expect childcare to be split 50 50 and get angry that the majority of the housework still falls on my shoulders. Yet here I am, on maternity leave for the third time. It was an unspoken fact that it would be me who would again take the career break, regardless of the fact my work has more potential for moving up the career ladder and earning more income compared to my husbands.

The discussion is out there but things will have to fundamentally change in the very structure and fabric of our society before women can seriously contend in the workplace and be taken seriously in all aspects of life. It might not happen in my lifetime or the girls but I hope they are part of the discussion and the solution so that it will happen, one day, one generation.