Today's more liberal brands of feminism are trying to convince us that they are not anti-family; that "being a wife and mother is an option like any other for today's women", and therefore, as they cheerfully point out, a woman can be a wife and mother, or a doctor, or a scientist, or an engineer – and all of these options are equally valid, and equally worth of protection by those who are concerned about women's rights and liberation.
The problem? Most women will want to get married and have children – even those who have ambitious professionalism drilled into their heads from a young age. The desire to be a wife, mother and homemaker is so overwhelmingly strong that no modern waves can stamp it out of women.
What we have been, tragically, sold, is the myth that we can delay marriage and motherhood for as long as we want, and juggle it with any type of career.
Of course, this kind of thinking led to a tragedy for an entire generation of women, who remain single after they realized – too late – that they should have boarded the train earlier.
Others are struggling with fertility treatments, clinging onto the slim hope of ever having a child. We have way too many celebrated stories in the press about women who became mothers well past their 40-th birthday, and too few presentations of how often fertility treatments actually fail for older women, statistically speaking.
I'm not saying that marrying late, never marrying or never having children is something that didn't happen in the past. Surely, there was always a small number of older singles. But in the past decades, it has become commonplace, too commonplace – women are told to get busy chasing degrees and careers, to do things that are "worthwhile"… which, coincidentally, are not the things that we are wired to be truly happy and content with.
The result is that we are always in an inner conflict, always anxious as to whether we are truly doing what we are supposed to be doing, wondering whether we are spending enough time with our husbands and children vs. professional "investments". Whether we won't come to regret, in a few years, the choices we made.
I have noticed that the attitude of men and women towards work is drastically different, in the more educated/ambitious circles. Men usually talk about good jobs with good prospects that will enable them to take care of their families. Women talk much more often about doing something "interesting", about fulfillment and personal growth.
Some say, "I would love to stay home now that my children are little, but I must think about my future." Future – translated as the years when the children are older, when supposedly being a homemaker is not justified. I'd rephrase and say, "I need to stay home now, because I must think about my future."
What do I want to have in my future? Heaps of student debt? A blur of years I struggle through, exhausted? Or happy, well-adjusted children who are used to the comforting presence of their mother at home?
I have heard 30-year-old women debating about whether they should dedicate their next five years to doing a PhD, or to having and raising another child. They fully realize that later, whatever they choose, it might be too late for the other option.
Whenever I have the chance, I say, "you will never regret the time you spend mothering your children."
I don't think I can ever refer to myself as a "professional" homemaker, because my desire to have a good family and an orderly, peaceful home is so much more than the wish to have a career. It's simply the deepest desire of my heart. author unknown
Blessings, Glenys
Isaiah 3:11-13 Woe unto the wicked! it shall be ill with him: for the reward of his hands shall be given him. As for my people, children are their oppressors, and women rule over them. O my people, they which lead thee cause thee to err, and destroy the way of thy paths. The LORD standeth up to plead, and standeth to judge the people.
