Gekko – you’re missing the point. This is not a discussion about who has the hardest life, or a “feel sorry for me” moan, obviously my life is not hard compared to probably most people in the world. I am ecstatic about being a mother and, while still considering myself a feminist, am throwing myself into being a full-time mother with gusto. I consider myself very lucky that I have a supportive husband who is happy for me to raise our kids and complete my PhD at the same time.

This is a discussion about identity, how it changes and how that effects your life. Regardless of your lifestyle, having a baby changes your identity dramatically in ways that you are not aware of until you actually become a mother. To be aware of this and reflect on it helps us to understand what’s going on and to live with the changes. Becoming a mother doesn’t “interfere” with your lifestyle – it changes it completely. There are some aspects of this change that you revel in, some that you find hard and others that come as a shock.

Re the discussion about family friendly facilities – I currently live in Tokyo, and the facilities here for families are amazing. My local department store has a very comfortable feeding room (comfy chairs, feeding pillows, microwave etc) and a huge change room, as well as a sitting room for parents. It’s really fantastic, and most big shopping centres are the same. I have no car here, and getting around on public transport with a pram is pretty easy and stress-free. It is so much better than what I see when I come home to Sydney. It seems incongruous that Japan is still very much a patriarchal society and yet these facilities used mostly by women are so much better.

(btw – Eno – thanks for your insightful comment re giving birth to a new person and needing to get to know that person – that’s a really positive way to look at it)

Allison (or is it Cristy?), a few points in response.

1. Perhaps my post was oblique, but the point I was trying to make is that you discuss the changing nature of identity when becoming a mother. However, your discussion is contextualised through the lens of feminism and how pregnancy somehow exposes you to sexism (?). To the untrained eye, the implication is that the changes brought about by pregnancy are a 'bad' thing.
2. You pathologise pregnancy as if it were a medical condition with your long discussion of how horrible you feel (ok, technically it is a medical condition to be pregnant, but then, the process of eating can also be characterised in medical terms, as can anything we do with the body).
3. You suggest that society devalues motherhood. Yet this attitude was largely institutionalised by feminists. Motherhood was seen by second wave feminism as some sort of subjugation to patriarchy.
4. Most importantly, at the end of the day, so what if your 'identity' changes? My point (again, obliquely) was that many people have their 'identity' changed every day, through decisions that are out of their control, yet they don't spend their life wringing their hands about it.

Firstly, a hearty congratulations to all on this forum who are pregnant.

Secondly, surely more expensive child care hurts both men and women. Whether patriarchy or excesses of feminism are at fault, the sooner this society values a woman’s right to choose whether to be a childless careerist, working mother, or stay at home mother, the better.

Thirdly, to every woman who wants a career I say go ahead, be my guest. Take it. You can have it. I'll give you my job. Honestly, I'll introduce you to my boss. She's really great. I understand that for the first period of a baby's life it should spend most time with the mother, but after that, if you like, I'll take care of things at home. I love kids. I love cooking. As long as you don't mind a bit of mess. I’m not saying looking after kids isn’t hard. It’s far more demanding than my job. (And I am not suggesting that a male’s lot is harder than a woman’s. If a bloke tells you that, if he could, he’d do the pregnancy, birth, and breast-feeding for you, he’s lying.)

But ask most guys with a career why they have one you’d get an overwhelming response- to support my family (either single or double income families,) or to save to have one. When a man becomes a father his identity changes along with his partner, and the weight of responsibility upon him increases forever. I think Allison is incorrect in suggesting that men’s “autonomous hopes and dreams are rarely taken away from them just because they chose to breed.”

I'm a musician. I have a band, and the required casual job that goes with it. I would love nothing more than to play music all my days and, if possible, make a living from it- who cares if I have to live frugally. But I know when I get married and have kids, I will be expected to get a real job (or at least teach a bit of piano.)

From where do such expectations arise?

Dozer, that's a great point about fathers. I was talking with my dad just the other day and he said that I don't understand the pressure that (good) fathers feel to provide for their partners and children.

Rivez_Alvarez, I apologise, 'it' was actually a typo. I meant to say 'they'. However, I'd like to ask if you've ever been pregnant. If you haven't, I fail to see how you can label Cristy's personal feelings as 'nonsense' given that she's the one whose body and life is changing.

“I was talking with my dad just the other day and he said that I don't understand the pressure that (good) fathers feel to provide for their partners and children.”

Not that I consider the event unique at all, but this is one of the saddest lines I’ve read for a while. I wondered what your response may have been to your dad, and your reasons for having to qualify fatherhood in the way that you did. Call me cynical, but I doubt you would do so for motherhood – in your world, abortion is a brave motherly virtue; fathers are somewhat less than coincidental.

This would explain your dad’s need to make such a point. No?

audrey, good comments.

I've been pondering the article and trying to see if I've misunderstood it but so far I don't think so.

The author has an important topic, the experience of pregnancy. Something I will never experience. She starts into issues of the feelings and perceptions of identity and what that means to her, all good stuff. She expresses some concern about the mixed messages about the value placed on motherhood.

Unfortunately to get some parts of her message she seems to feel the need to dismiss mens experience as fathers. No need for her to write about that experience or defend it but there no need to suggest that our experiences as fathers don't also come as a mixed bag of joy and cost.

The author in a number of places seems to suggest that men have it much easier when it comes to being parents. I started countering those points and decided it read like a whine and that's not what I wanted.

Simply put my life has gone through an ongoing series of changes since I found out that my then wife was pregnant. Some good, some not so good. Much of what the author writes about men is plainly wrong for those of us who take fatherhood seriously.

All parents who take the role seriously will find lifes opportunities and options in differing places to the ones which were there before parenthood became part of our lives. It's one of the joys and curses of being grown up.

Spend some time pondering it so that you understand what is happening but don't assume that sombody elses experience is less impacting because their road is different.

R0bert