Why I Won’t Shut Up About Motherhood (Even If It Annoys You)

“Whatever you do, don’t have kids,” my mother sighed at the end of a long day.

It’s funny what stays in one’s mind forever.

That exhausted expression that she most likely forgot as soon as she said it… became a banner in my mind. Without meaning to, I chiselled the words into my subconsciousness.

“Whatever you do, don’t have kids.”

My mother was my mentor, my guide. Why would I not take these words to heart?

I felt, in that moment, that she had whispered the answer to life. I absorbed it as an act of love, a secret code that would free me from the hell of mundane existence.

It became part of my personality; I would be a perpetual child. I would escape the horrific, monotonous traps of life. I would be smarter than all the simpler women who came before me. I was special, you see. Different.

And even though I’d absorbed it on one level as an act of love, on a deeper level, I was being told by the person who created me that I had not been worth the harrowing effort.

This, I think, was one of the unintended consequences of second-wave feminism: many children of that time grew up believing they were part of some patriarchal conspiracy that ruined women’s lives. I’m not saying that’s what feminists intended to pass on, but it did have that impact on my generation.

Even though I had no desire for children or motherhood, I spent most of my twenties trying to settle down, as many women do. It’s our nature to look for a good, solid, as-a-rock partner. Even though I claimed I wanted to be career-focused, I wasn’t. I was a hopeless romantic on an epic search, devastated again and again when men didn’t shape up, pretending afterward that I didn’t really need them anyway. Who needs men? I lived in a mixed message that messed with my mind, a mind I tried to drown with binge drinking and “having fun.”

So when I was finally blessed with a husband beyond my wildest expectations, I accepted the idea of becoming a mother. Any woman would be mad not to go on such an adventure with a man like that. But I was terrified. I was thirty-five and had not developed a single skill in motherhood or homemaking. I remember my mother saying, “Oh, you’ll be terrible at that.” She didn’t mean it harshly; she just didn’t place homemaking high on the list of female achievements.

Still, I was hurt. And scared. There was an entire world of female life I felt I could never excel in. Yet I didn’t take too much offence because I didn’t value the role either. If she’d told me, “You’d be a terrible lawyer,” or “You can’t lead,” I’d have been furious. But being terrible at domestic work? That almost made me feel interesting and above the drudgery.

And that is how the modern world views the homemaker: drudgery and domestic work.

So you can imagine my surprise when I became a mother and longed to care for my family. You can imagine the shock in realising that this was an entire world of art I’d never known existed, creating life and then colouring it with your specific brush strokes, your vision, your full human heart.

Now, after much mental and emotional excavation—undoing the unintended (and intended) brainwashing of modern feminism. I’m expecting my second child at the cusp of my 42nd birthday.

I’m beyond grateful that I’ve been blessed with this second child just in time. I feel complete. But I know many childfree/less women find my enthusiasm nauseating. They genuinely cannot understand why I won’t stop speaking about this.

The reason is: unless we do, many women will miss this experience in the epic misunderstanding that’s taking place.

Many women do not have the maternal instinct. I certainly didn’t. I had no call, no yearning. Many men don’t have it either. We’ve believed people will simply “choose their path” and it will all work out—but it doesn’t.

By 2030, it’s predicted that half of Western women of reproductive age will be childless. When I picture these women, I see myself, and I want to scream to the past me—and to future women—“No, no, what are you doing… this is the way.”

I want to highlight my art, my family, my path, the same way modern feminists freely praise the bliss of having no responsibility. Sarah Silverman gets laughs and applause for saying she avoided motherhood because she just wants to do whatever she wants whenever she feels like it. That Bart-Simpson attitude is now considered acceptable for grown middle-aged women. Instead of guiding men out of the Peter Pan complex toward responsibility, the natural growing-up process is breaking down for both sexes.

Before modern technology, men and women were forced into adulthood and parenthood. Now it’s optional—and many are opting out. Planned Parenthood has given people the ability to choose when they start a family…but many never start. Our biological drive isn’t as strong and as smart as we thought. When people used to talk about the biological clock, I imagined a literal clock that I could hit snooze on ,and then one day it would break, and I would be free from the trap of truth

When a mother posts homemade bread for breakfast, the career-driven mum feels threatened. Yet society insists we mothers should admire women like childfree Sarah Silverman—or female Prime Ministers like Jacinda Ardern—as examples of where “real power” and freedom lie.

Recently, Jerry Seinfeld was asked how becoming a parent changed him. He said (paraphrased): “What was it like before you were born and entered your body? How was that experience for you?”

Parenthood is indescribable, which is all the more reason to try to describe it. From the outside, it looks like drudgery and diapers, when for 99.9% of parents, it’s beyond their wildest hopes—unconditional love.

I’ve shared these thoughts on social media and received pushback from childfree/less people. A friend wrote to me:

“I completely understand what you’re saying. I used to make a six-figure salary, and at 27 I asked to get my tubes tied. Ten years later, I was a stay-at-home mother of two and had never been happier.”

I hear this all the time.

Traditionally, older adults urged younger people to settle down and have children. They didn’t do it out of spite—but out of love. Their children had been miracles, and they wished the same gift for the next generation: parenthood, wisdom, growth.

So I will keep speaking about the beauty of motherhood… even if it annoys you.

I almost missed this most obvious and natural miracle. I am grateful I had the luxury to explore work and hobbies that interested me.

But in a few hours, I’ll pick up my son from school. I’ll watch professional parents stepping out of their cars, dropping whatever career hat they wore all week, running toward their children and squeezing them like they’d been apart for years.

I’ll watch them bask in the beauty of that connection—seconds before I run to my son, and everything else melts away.

When I was pregnant with my first child, I was riddled with anxiety, unsure why anyone would do this. My mother was confused—why wasn’t I glowing?

“But you told me never to have children,” I said.

She looked horrified. She must have said it in a moment of stress. It hadn’t been what her life had meant to say. The message in her heart had been lost.

The communication had been crossed.

Despite what modern feminists think of women like me who speak openly about the miracle of motherhood…

I love women.

I do not want the message in my heart to be missed.

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