Motherhood is not some miracle - it's just biology, baby!
We still see women as falling short of their potential if they haven't become mothers, writes Niamh Horan
Niamh Horan ·
This is how the world of consumerism works: it takes something that has become difficult to attain and fetishises it to make money.
It happened to our waistlines: as obesity rates double, the diet industry has grown to become worth €220bn globally. It happened to 'wellness': anxiety disorders in First World countries have risen by 1,200pc since the 1980s and, in the same period, the global wellness market has grown to over €3 trillion.
And now it's happening to motherhood.
As one in six couples struggle to conceive, the mother and baby industry has transformed from a world of dull and unglamorous necessities (nappies, training potties and dribbling bibs) to a glistening offering of designer must-haves.
Look around you: the lowly pushchair has become a status symbol. Mothercare sells pushchairs with sheepskin linings, Silver Cross has a royal baby carriage with a polished chrome chassis, while everyone from Versace to Fendi are competing with Bugaboo, which begs the question - since when did the middle classes start spending €1,000 on a pram?
I recently passed a stroller under spotlights on a revolving platform. The kind used to sell luxury cars. 'Madness!' I thought... until Aston Martin released its own €3,000 version complete with aluminium alloy wheels and a leather seat.
Designer baby changing bags promoted in the pages of Vogue, vibrating rockers, luxury kids clothes from Marc Jacob and Stella McCartney - and, of course, women's bodies have become part of the persuasion as the world takes on an unhealthy obsession with the age-old act.
Yummy mummies take classes for a yoga flat stomach, a blogger called Alexa Jean Brown has gained 2m followers with her mother and baby downward-facing doggy stretches and the heavily pregnant Pilates pose has become the latest boast on Instagram. It's as if pregnancy has become some kind of weird competitive sport. And women, more than anyone, seem to be behind it.
But then we should have seen it coming. When Beyonce stepped out at last year's Grammys at eight months pregnant wearing a giant golden halo and performing some sort of bizarre Earth Mother- routine in homage to a fertility goddess, women everywhere praised her as a driving force in 21st century feminism.
This was supposedly the ultimate female icon fighting the patriarchy through pop culture. Yet all I saw was a modern-day version of the same old image that hung on the walls of my church and school - the picture that accompanied the tiresome yarn about the Virgin Mary and her 'divine selection' to become a mother.
We need to stop kidding ourselves that the pressure and expectations on women to fulfil their role as mothers has changed in any way in the last 30 years. We may work hard, earn our own wage and stand on our own two feet, but people still see a woman who has not become a mother as somehow falling short of her 'full potential'. The only difference between this generation and our mothers is what they heard in their 20s, we now hear in our 30s. It has just shifted 10 years down the road.
As a single woman, I have nothing against children. At the same time, I don't count them on my list of priorities, or depend on the idea of becoming a mom to make me happy.
It's a nice concept, but it soon disappears any time I have lunch with a friend whose entire meal revolves around trying to get a few spoonfuls into a child's mouth. It's hard work.
I don't feel the pressure of a maternal drive kicking in. But what I listen to from the people around me kills the spirit.
I find the constant questioning and probing exhausting. So I can only imagine what it's like for women who are genuinely longing or trying to conceive without a result.
I also don't think these expectations are allowing women fair time and breathing space to decide if it's what they really want for themselves.
I heard of a couple whose entire family turned up with balloons hidden in the car boot when, a few months after getting married, they had merely invited them over for dinner.
It's probably impossible for this generation to change societal expectations - especially when a lot of it is driven by our own sex - but I do feel more women need to start listening to their own voice.
It might help to keep in mind that giving birth is not an incredible feat.
Since the beginning of time, humans have been doing it without much thought, education or skill.
It has nothing to do with worthiness. It takes no nobility, no forward planning.
It does not make a relationship better, bring you closer to the meaning of life or infer you with some kind of special value over a woman who hasn't had children.
If having a child is something you want, then follow your heart - but don't puff your chest out with pride because of it. The real achievement is in the rearing.