Hi everyone, I’m stoked that you are here checking out Motherhood Uncensored! I set it up because since being pregnant and having a baby I have been amazed and horrified at the amount of nonsense that surrounds motherhood.
I guess I was naive. Feminist movements have made huge strides towards gender equality. We take mental health more seriously. We are more open minded to different ways of thinking. We have better data about health outcomes and interventions.
All that progress seems to fizzle out when it comes to motherhood.
We know that a high proportion of pregnancies end early, but we never talk about it. We know what giving birth is like but we gloss over it. We know how intense and frequent the bleakest moments of parenthood are but we desperately try to hide them. The upshot is, all of these experiences remain terrible surprises lying in wait for each generation of mothers to come.
By censoring ourselves we perpetuate the cycle.
Around 20% of women never have children and this has been true for many years but we continue to treat this normal and easily understandable choice as an oddity if not outright subversive.
I bet you’ve been judged for how you relate to motherhood. For not having kids, for having them at the wrong age, for not having enough of them. For breastfeeding for too long or not long enough. For returning to work or staying at home. For not treasuring every moment and feeling constantly grateful and blissful.
Worse, I bet you’ve judged yourself. Loads of us carry around guilt and trauma and a sense of not living up to expectations.
Those expectations are unachievable. We’ve been set up to fail and I think our silence sets up others to fail after us.
We need to stop self-censoring. We need to call out the nonsense we see, and tell people the stuff that we were never told. We need to make more space for people to acknowledge the huge diversity there is in how we think about motherhood.
That’s why I, with the help of some lovely friends, have set up Motherhood Uncensored. We’re going to be gathering and promoting honest stories that challenge stereotypes and break taboos about how people relate to motherhood. It’s not just for mothers and not just for women- unrealistic expectations about motherhood are bad for everyone. The charity is just launching now, and our plan is to share people’s stories as widely as we can to help break some of these dangerous taboos. If you’re interested in helping, we’re interested in hearing from you! We’re open to any format, length and style and no previous writing or podcasting experience is necessary (we have people on hand to help if needed).
Please do reach out if you are interested in supporting in any way at all.
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