Hearts and Minds

I wasn’t going to post today. I’ve spent twelve hours in a lightless, airless institution and frankly the will to live, let alone to write, seemed to evaporate little by little with the passing of every hour. But then I came home and my husband had laid out, very neatly,  the magazines from the Sunday papers for me. So I smiled, and read and smiled some more and the cogs started turning.

The Sunday Times magazine has a regular feature called ‘Relative Values’ in which two family members talk about their differing perspectives on the relationship. This week it is a mother and daughter. 76 year old Elizabeth tells us about “ambition, maternal guilt, missed sports days and atrocious cooking.” It struck a chord with many of the issues that have cropped up on my baby blog in the first week of its life.

“I’d have gone mad if I’d stayed at home, and I think that would have been worse than not being there.”

Yes! I firmly believe that happy women make good mothers. One of my greatest fears is that becoming a parent will create a seething resentment towards my children and towards my husband because the role of motherhood will push me into a corner I’m not sure I’ll ever be ready to occupy. (I reiterate that I speak from an absolutely personal perspective and by no means think that the choice to be a stay at home mum is the wrong choice.)

My husband thinks this is a load of old tosh. He can’t conceive that I might one day wake up and realise I've accidentally become a suburban housewife.* He can't conceive that I'll ever live my life in a way that isn't essentially ruled by my own desires and needs. But isn’t that what we all think? That we’re somehow special? That it won’t happen to us? That we’ll forge a new way?  That we won't get bogged down by the weight of responsibility.

The fact is, in order for that all important ‘choice’ to be meaningful, women need men on board.  Dare I say it, that even our 21st Century society is deeply patriarchal and we do, indeed, still need men to ‘grant’ us our rights and freedoms, because they are still holding the cards. We need men who will be willing to share the household chores, to share the child caring roles, and men who won’t feel a petty emasculation in doing so. We need men who are also willing to fight our cause. We need men who are brave enough to call themselves feminists. We need men who are brave enough to recognise that they are nurturers too.

Today the coalition government announced their intention to carry out the Labour pledge of flexible maternity leave. For the first time, women will be able to transfer a proportion of their maternity leave to their partner (up to six months.) This is significant legislation and a step in the right direction. But a leap in mere law is not enough. I do wonder how much a change in the details of maternity leave will actually result in a change in the details of women’s lives.

This legislation will be rendered meaningless if the partners of women are not willing to give up work to stay at home with the baby.  This is a role men are told they can’t perform as well as women. A role they are told they shouldn’t perform if they truly value their masculinity. A role they fear they will be ridiculed for fulfilling. Parental leave is not just a matter of the statute book, it's a matter of culture.

I suspect the bigger battle still lies in winning the hearts and minds of men.

* To be absolutely fair to my husband, and I think I must, he has offered, when the time should come, to give up work to share the child rearing duties, either full or part time, depending on what we agree together. In intention at least, he really is a goodun.