Breathe
By Mónica Hernández
In my case, it started with mistrust: a group of women exposing the discrimination they have faced because they are not mothers. After hearing some confessions, beauty salon style, that space where women have always been sororas, I focused on my particular case. I was a non-mother for many, many years and the cause was unknown, despite treatments, one more invasive and devastating than the last. Infertility is one of the main causes of why there are so many non-mothers. But it is not the only one.
As Jack the Ripper would say, let's take it one step at a time. What is a non-mother? Put into little balls and sticks, a woman who does not have children, who does not dedicate a part -large high, wide and deep- to the raising of human beings. So there are involuntary non-mothers, as many as there are voluntary ones.
Among the non-voluntary ones, most of them are due to infertility. This was my particular case for many years, because when I finally wanted to become a mother, it took more than ten years for it to happen, in a "natural" way because I had already abandoned the treatments, much later than they abandoned me. Here I realize, to top it off, infertility is a feminine noun and therefore, she is capricious, unpredictable and fickle, which is a nicer word for fickle. There are women who are infertile for life, others are or suffer from it for an indefinite and erratic period of time, because it can appear and disappear without warning, because infertility has no word of honor. I was and am a mother of years, or as I like to say, in drama mode, "geriatric first-time mother". I could not quite get used to the idea that I would not be a mother when I was already pregnant. I had not yet adapted to breastfeeding when the symptoms of peri-menopause began. My sister, to give another example, was "infertile" between one daughter and her second, who are four years apart. But these examples of non-mothers are due to infertility that in my case and in the case of many, ended up resolving and we became yes-mothers, abandoning the status of non-mothers.
But there is the other collective, that of the voluntary non-mothers. Yes, that increasingly notorious group of women who made the conscious decision not to reproduce, not to beget or raise human children (I make the clarification because there are those who talk about puppies and kittens, but let's not be silly: no matter how much you love your pet, they are not your children, even if they give you the same work as a child, in exchange for the greatest unconditional love that exists. I know because all my life I have had dogs and they are a very important part of my family). Many non-mothers are marked from childhood: the one who never cooed over plastic babies, the one with a bad temper, the one who hated the kitchen and womanly chores like cleaning, sewing and ironing, the one who went out partying every weekend, the one who had more boyfriends than the Yellow Section... and a long etcetera. My favorite one is the one they used to hang on me: I was a talkative woman and that way "nobody would love me". Because women, besides being submissive and obedient, we have to be quiet, if only "to look prettier".
Why does the pressure to be a mother that is exerted on women, and with particular viciousness, come from other women? No mothers! Not all of us were born for parenting. What's more, children should come with instructions for handling radioactive material, which is exactly what I felt when they handed me my "bendi" when I left the hospital. What is one supposed to do with a child? What makes a mother? I'm not talking about biology, because giving birth to a child doesn't make you a mother, it doesn't give you a status and it doesn't give you a graduation diploma. First, because there are other mothers, those who did not beget their children in the womb (for whatever reason), but in their hearts: those who adopted children born from other wombs. Secondly, there are those mothers who give birth to a child to whom they do not dedicate their time or care, those who did give birth but who do not act as mothers. Perhaps many of them were mothers against their will... but that is another story.
So where does the obligation for a woman to become a mother come from? Why the pressure, the pity, the condescension for all women who are not mothers? A woman is a whole woman, whether she becomes a mother or not. That is where a woman's power lies: in deciding what and how to do with her body. In choosing what not to do with it, including fathering and giving birth to a child, let alone raising it. Parenting is true motherhood, not childbirth. So what is the problem between one group and the other? Is it envy? Those who raise children want the freedom of those who don't and not all those who don't have children miss the chains of those who do. Whoever said that women are complicated was right.
For food for thought, I leave you with the most talked-about case worldwide, that of actress Jennifer Aniston: beautiful, talented, "good" (in the sense of being very well-built), immensely rich, nice... and childless. She has been labeled selfish for not wanting to sacrifice her career to have children. She has been accused of being wayward and superficial for dedicating herself to taking care of her sculpted body, for staying young, active and attractive at the age of 54. From the "temple" of motherhood she is looked down upon for not belonging, for not being a "whole" woman. Because she lacked being a mother. Aniston confessed that she was not a mother because her body refused, despite everything she tried. Ellen DeGeneres is "allowed" to be a non-mother because she came out as gay many years ago and did not go the surrogate route, like so many others who do want to raise children but not give birth to them. Gloria Trevi is criticized for being a mother, but a "bad mother"... Who has the "madrómetro" and decides that non-mothers are not complete women in one piece? Or who is more of a mother or less of a mother? Let's respect everyone regardless of their decision, voluntary or not, to be non-mothers. Let's have so much mother.
The opinions expressed are the responsibility of the authors and are absolutely independent of the position and editorial line of Opinion 51.
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