A new book on mothers details how caring work is as underrated as ever by Irish society, writes BREDA O'BRIEN
ALTHOUGH VICTORIA White was arts editor of this newspaper, I never knew her in that incarnation. I first met her at the school gate, as her eldest son and my second daughter were in the same class for a few years.
Victoria has just written a book about motherhood, with the attention-grabbing title, Mother Ireland – Why Ireland hates Motherhood. Not a title I would have chosen. A better subtitle might have been a quote from the end of the first chapter, where she describes “the story of how the welfare of mothers and their children is left, in this society, at this time, to the hazards of fortune”.
It is a passionate, persuasive book, which draws heavily on her own experience of life following the three unwritten rules for middle-class women, and how she gradually realised how hollow they are. The three rules were: don’t, for the love of God, get pregnant. If you must get pregnant, sort your career out first. Don’t let the babies interfere in any way with your career.
Victoria is in her 40s, but the rules are exactly the same for teenage girls today, with a couple of addenda. Somewhere between or overlapping with, “don’t, for the love of God, get pregnant” and “sort your career out first”, comes “make sure that you travel a lot”, and “choose a job that earns a lot of dosh”.
Nobody is telling girls that it is not that simple. Victoria tries to fill that gap. She says things that should be obvious, such as that while mothering is one of the most demanding jobs in the world, it is also one of the most rewarding.
We have become too embarrassed to talk about falling in love with our babies, and how endlessly fascinating they become. We don’t talk about the wrench of grief having to return to work with a small baby at home, and the endless compromises it involves.
White is too smart not to realise that while she may have become “transgressive” by having four children, including a set of twins, in rapid succession, and choosing to work at home, she will have set herself firmly outside the pale by having the temerity not just to choose this path, but writing a book full of research that justifies that decision.
She is already familiar with being dismissed, such as an experience on a radio show where she was introduced as a journalist, not as a mother, because her presence in the studio could not be justified unless she had a “role”. The discussion that night? Childcare.
Sure, what would a mother have to contribute to a childcare debate? Particularly a mother who decided to put a career on indefinite hold because she thought she could care for her children better than anyone she could pay to do it?
She is also aware that the snipers will point to her comfortable, middle-class existence, with a husband who earns more than enough to keep them, although the job security may be questionable. (Her husband is the Minister for Communications, Eamon Ryan.)
The most offended will be the women who feel she has permanently left the ranks of the “sisterhood” by suggesting it is right and good that women should want to be with their children more than they might want to be in dark offices for long, frustrating hours.
In Mother Ireland, White concentrates on lack of value placed on caring work, on the way in which birth is managed in this country, our low levels of breastfeeding, and the way in which the childcare debate is shaped by the needs of the market and the dominance of Thatcherite economic ideas.
White attempted to have a home birth with her last child, but fell victim to the mantra of “active management of labour”, which in short, declares that no labour can last longer than 12 hours. Once declared to be in labour, a cascade of interventions follow if you do not follow a timetable written by a man, Prof Kieran O’Driscoll.
He was a highly regarded obstetrician, but sadly, neither the mothers nor the babies read the textbook, so umpteen women have had their labour speeded up and ended up feeling powerless, incompetent or having Caesareans as a result. Victoria escaped with “just” having a horrifically painful birth.
Next Wednesday, from 11am to 3pm, mothers and fathers will be holding a peaceful protest outside the Dáil because the Government is introducing the Nurses And Midwives Bill 2010 that will make it virtually impossible to have a home birth with an independent midwife.
I had three happy home births. Under the criteria set out in the new Bill, my experienced and wonderful midwife would be threatened with 30 years in jail, one 10-year term for each baby, for accepting me as a client.
My first birth was a Caesarean, an appalling experience that still makes me shudder every time I pass the hospital. The Caesarean would disqualify me from ever having a home birth. Ironically, that dreadful experience in a hospital would make it impossible for me to choose to give birth anywhere else.
The way in which birth is “managed” and women’s voices are not listened to reflects a central thesis of White’s book – that there is a fear of women, and in particular mothers, deep at the heart of Irish culture. What might be called the first wave of feminism unwittingly enforced that fear by insisting women must have the same lives and careers as men.
While White may have burnt her bridges with the “right-thinking” brigade because of this important book, far, far more women will agree with her, including women like myself, who chose a very different path. I chose to work at two jobs so my husband could parent full-time.
The patronising disbelief that greeted our decision reinforced for me just how undervalued caring work is – and Irish society is poorer as a result.