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From: peterr@utcsrgv.UUCP (Peter Rowley)
Newsgroups: net.women
Subject: Full-time mothering, cont'd
Message-ID: <5139@utcsrgv.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 9-Sep-84 15:53:45 EDT
Article-I.D.: utcsrgv.5139
Posted: Sun Sep  9 15:53:45 1984
Date-Received: Sun, 9-Sep-84 16:14:07 EDT
Organization: CSRI, University of Toronto
Lines: 52

Sophie Quigley rightly pointed out that I missed an important aspect of
mothering:  what the mother does when her children have left the nest.
Indeed, full-time mothering is not a life-long career and it was an
oversight not to delve further into the problems encountered when it ends.
Two problems have been alluded to:  coming to terms with the end personally,
and having others come to terms with it.

With respect to the first, I have first hand evidence.  My mother intended
to go into the work force, in a new job, after undergoing graduate training
for it.  She embarked on this armed with a BSc. and some teaching and lab
experience.  Unfortunately, personal considerations intervened and the plans
had to be scrapped.  She has since expressed herself through some volunteer
work, travel, and fitness classes.  She made this adaptation without benefit
of continuing part-time work during motherhood;  while such work would have
eased the transition, it doesn't appear absolutely necessary, at least for
her.  On the other hand, I think it would have made her happier while she
was a full-time mother.

Sophie, has, I believe, an excessively pessimistic view of the second
problem:
>[Mothering] is considered a non-job and ... women who stay at home to
>raise children are assumed to be, in many people's minds, and certainly in 
>their future employer's minds, "doing nothing".  When it comes to going back
>on the job market, mothering skills are usually never considered as valuable
>skills; on the contrary, mothers who try to get back on the job market after
>a few years of absence to raise children often have to face the attitude that
>their choice of motherhood as a first career is not a sign of great 
>skillfullness but rather a sign of stupidity: "obviously she can't really be 
>very intelligent, why else would she choose to stay home and raise children?".
Agreed, choosing motherhood as a first career is dangerous (and this is wrong).
Getting a degree first (degrees do not tend to depreciate) or establishing
oneself in a job before becoming a mother seems wise.  But I have seen no
evidence whatsoever of the attitude expressed in the last sentence.  I agree
that mothering is undervalued, but not to the point where it becomes a stigma.

It should also be noted that mothers with grown-up children offer important
advantages to employers:   a rather low chance of leaving for maternity
reasons and, more importantly, a great deal of experience in "emotional
labour"-- the suppression of one's own feelings in order to take care of
someone else.  This is invaluable in service occupations.  Indeed, the "youth
is all" mentality stills pervades service industries, but even this is
changing as society's demographics change.

While I don't think it can assume all the blame, one can certainly state that
some of the undervaluing of motherhood is due to the feminist movement.  This
is certainly the feeling of the woman which I based my first article on.  It
is thus heartening that Germaine Greer is helping to adjust the balance by
extolling the value of mothering.

peter rowley,  University of Toronto Department of C.S., Ontario Canada M5S 1A4
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