Feminist Friday: things I am not proud of

I was almost relieved when the Bat turned out to be a girl. Not because of any particular quality that I believe girls have, but because I think this way I have a better idea of how to be a feminist parent. I know some of what she'll encounter as she grows up to be a woman (assuming she does turn out to be a woman, which is a whole other post), and it breaks my heart - but at least I know. And while there's not always much social support for teaching girls that they can be and do whatever they want, I believe there's even less support for teaching boys the same thing. For all that we've achieved, we still idolise the traditionally masculine end of the behavioural spectrum and treat the traditionally feminine as second-best (that goes within the feminist community, too. I've never felt so dismissed by some other feminists than since I became an at-home mother).

It's more socially accepted for a little girl to wear rugged trousers and climb trees than it is for a little boy to wear dresses and play with Barbie. In the last couple of months I've decided that I probably do want another baby in the future, and it pains me to realise that if my next child were a boy, I'd feel odd about putting him in some of the Bat's hand-me-down clothes. She has plenty of stuff from the boys' section and plenty from the girls', and I have no qualms about that whatsoever. I feel like I'm offering her more freedom. But when I think of my hypothetical future son looking through his baby photos and seeing himself in pink and frills, an irrational part of me feels that instead of offering him equal freedom of choice, I'd be imposing something on him. If he chose those things for himself when he was older, I'd be delighted, but I feel inhibited from putting him in them before he's able to decide. Because masculinity is the default, right? And for a man to deviate from that is not currently seen as just another personal choice, but rather a statement. I worry that he'd look back and feel that I crossed boundaries in some way, forced him into an identity that he didn't want, even though I've no earthly way of knowing what his identity and presentation would ultimately prove to be. I hate that I think like this. I hate even more the real possibility that I might be right.

I see boys learning that there is only one way to be, that they are not free to choose to be "unmanly" (whatever that even means), that such a choice is so extreme that their whole identity must be at stake before they even think of going there. I see them learning lessons about sexuality that scare the hell out of me - learning that as a guy they must always want sex and that missing an opportunity to get laid is weak and shameful, even if it means pestering a woman who really doesn't want to be pestered (or worse). I don't know where it comes from or how to counter it effectively - and given my unexpected qualms about baby clothes, for god's sake, I don't even know how much of it would unintentionally come from me.

Don't get me wrong, if I ever have a son then I'll be over the moon and love him to pieces, and I'll raise him according to my ideals. But the task is still a little scarier for me to contemplate.


See everyone else's Feminist Friday posts over at Transatlantic Blonde.

On being a pro-choice mum

Trigger warning - this is a post on abortion from the pro-choice perspective. There's also detail about pregnancy and birth.

(I've written this - slightly later than I meant to! - for the theme-free Feminist Friday over at http://transatlanticblonde.blogspot.com/. Obviously the opinions here are all my own.)

My baby was really, really wanted. I was dead lucky and fell pregnant in our third month of trying, which is pretty quick. Right from the start, I thought of the wee zygote as my baby. It had a dozen different nicknames before we even had the first ultrasound. I loved my baby. I cherished every somersault and every prod to my internal organs (for the first six months or so, anyway). I sang to it before it even had ears. It was the beginning of our relationship, and it was right and happy and good. For us.

My strong loving feelings during my pregnancy were perfectly valid and natural. That doesn't make them some kind of objective truth that can be applied to all women and all pregnancies. If a woman doesn't think of her own embryo or foetus as a baby, that's entirely her prerogative. My emotions about my pregnancy are completely irrelevant to anyone else. If you don't want to have a baby, if you don't picture yourself holding a child and caring for it and picking the lint out from between its ickle toesy-wosies, then naturally you might not feel emotionally attached to a bunch of dividing cells. That little peanut-with-legs is only a baby if you think it is, and you don't get to make that decision about any peanut but your own. Women run the whole gamut of emotions when it comes to pregnancy, whether they're planning to terminate or go full-term. My own feelings are not universal and there's no reason they should be.

For me, pregnancy and birth were wonderful but terrifying. If you didn't want to be a mother at the end of it all, I can only imagine what a headfuck it would be. It's a big deal. It changes you and your body in ways that you can't always predict. In the last six weeks of my pregnancy, I had bad SPD. My pelvic joint got too loose, which was incredibly painful and meant I needed crutches to walk. It improved as soon as the Bat was born, but it's only in the last month or so - over a year after the birth - that I've been able to walk two or more miles without pain. Some women don't recover to the extent that I have, and I'm at risk for earlier and greater pelvic problems in subsequent pregnancies. We're not 'just' talking about saggy skin and a few stretch marks here (though adjusting to sudden physical changes can be bloody difficult, and a good self-image is not frivolous or unnecessary). Some people have severe tears. Some people lose continence to various degrees. And let's not forget that even an 'easy' birth usually means a lot of pain and a lot of strangers doing stuff to your private bits. It's commendable to go full-term and let someone else give the baby a loving home - you'll make an adoptive family very happy - but it's hardly a straightforward option. Should unwilling women have to risk all those problems when it's still early enough to avoid them, just because I happen to like babies? Hell no.

Women matter. Women's thoughts and feelings matter. Women's physical autonomy matters. My emotional response is not a moral imperative, and it doesn't justify forcing anyone through the danger and trauma of an unwanted pregnancy.