No #blogtunes today! We've been watching the Olympics non-stop. Is anyone else obsessed with watching?! I haven't really gotten anything done this month, because I've been consumed with the festivities of athletics happening in Rio. Then I looked at my calendar, holy crap the month is almost over! Welcome back to reality. I have been debating writing this post, because I think some might find it offensive, but it is something I've been thinking on for awhile now. Even though we live in more "modern" times, I still think the pressure of being the "woman" is still very present. This is my topic of today. Err, this month.
In Childhood
I grew up in a middle class family, my parents were divorced and remarried when I was very young; it was all I knew. I grew up with strong women in my life, all of my grandmothers' went to college, my mom continued to expand her education beyond her Bachelor's when my sister and I were in middle school and my stepmother continued her education and received a Doctorate while I was in high school. I was surrounded by women who valued education.
That being said, we lived in a small town where my grandparents, mother and stepfather were "somebodies". Everyone knew who I was. All of my teachers knew my family, knew my sister, and therefore, they knew who I was. It wasn't until later that I realized how many times people would say, "Oh, you're so-and-so's daughter/granddaughter/sister." Still, that is how people recognize me in my home town. Very rarely do they actually know my name or what I do or have done with my life. My family had become the definition of my young life.You can imagine the amount of pressure there would have been. Knowing that everyone was watching you and expecting you to succeed; knowing that everyone knew your family on some level or another and a single screw-up would make it home to your parents ear before you could even get on the bus at the end of the day. So, when it came time to go to college, I couldn't wait for the freedom. To be somewhere where no one knew my family or who I was or had predetermined expectations for me. Talk about dreams come true. So I did have that self freedom. For almost an entire year.
Marriage
When women get married, there is the whole name changing thing. And I know what you're thinking, "you don't have to do that, it's completely optional"; truth. But how many of us do it anyway, almost all of us. It's a sign of unity, of love, and actually it makes it a ton easier when filing any type of paperwork. We are writing away part of our identity. For the past however many years we have had our father's or mother's name, a definition of who we belong to and now we are seemingly erasing that part of ourselves and replacing it with someone else's name.
So, besides the whole name thing, we are now being judged not only as ourselves and what we have accomplished, but how we come off to strangers that are our husbands co-workers and bosses. You ladies know what I'm saying. Going to a company party and having to make conversation with people you know nothing about and the only thing they are going on is how you look and what you do; getting yourself filed away as "so-and-so's wife" and now we have another group of people who think they know everything about you. Who knows, maybe men feel this way, too. But it still feels like women are held to this other level of showmanship that men aren't always exposed to.
Parenthood
Holy crap. As if we already weren't dealing with enough as it is, we decide to go ahead and procreate and give ourselves another title. Mom. By now, you no longer have a real name. You are so-and-so's wife and so-and-so's Mom. When your kids have friends, they will most likely call you Mrs. So-and-so, which will be devastating to hear and make you feel old, but it's not like they are going to call you by your actual name. This is a whole other loss of identity. At least before when you were only married you could still stand on your own, behind your job and successes, but being a parent is like getting a new job you've never trained for and have no impressive credentials for. So no matter how successful you are before you become a parent, your worth is now measured by the progression of your offspring.
Sucks, right? Especially as women, we have this extra amount of pressure because naturally we are in charge of the proper raising of this human being. Uh, who decided this? Like, I know we grew the thing and had to do all the work to bring it into this world (don't get me started on this one), but why are we therefore the one to be judged if our child turns out to be a bit of an asshole?
Point being, whatever success you have before you pop that kid out, consider it Book 1 of the series of your life. And everyone knows once book one is out of the way, we never really go back and read it again. It's old news. And I always thought, no big deal, you can have a family and work, too. Hell, all the women in my family had done it, so could I! So you go back to work. And almost instantly you get ambushed by these people who are like, "But you don't really have to work, do you? You and your husband don't both need a job, especially with daycare being so expensive. Don't you want to be at home with your kid?" What fresh hell is this?So, eventually I did end up staying home. Then you have the people saying, "What do you actually do all day? What are you going to do when they go to school? Don't you miss making your own money and living in the world of adults? This is a huge step down for women, we don't have to stay in the home anymore!" Yes, people have actually said all these things to me. So, no, it doesn't matter if you work or not, someone is always going to have something to say about your decisions as a woman. And you have to be willing to stand behind whatever decision it is you make. It's your life, it's your family, it's your everything.
So What Now
I have no idea! We are forever stuck within these labels as women, defined by who we were born to, who we marry and who we parent. It sucks! But we do it anyway, another thing we women have is endurance. We endure. It is as if whoever created us knew to weave that special gene into our very beings to prepare us for being women. "Here ya go, you'll need this."
The important thing to remember is you are still you. Under all these new labels, you are still you. Is it hard? Yeah. Whoever said it would be easy? What we can do now, is encourage our young women to be whatever they want to be. I know we already do this, but we always add a bit of pressure when we do it. Like, "You could be a doctor! Or an astronaut! You can be whatever you want!" Ok. Maybe she wants to be a dog walker, or a mechanic or a florist. Who knows! But maybe along the way we should remind them they will always be themselves and we will love whoever that is.Like I said, this is just my account of life growing up a female. I am not in a minority group, I never finished college, I went to a prestigious vocational school where I received my certification. Even going through that and getting a serious job as a female was difficult. We still very much live in a man's world. So I have very little to no experience with the glass ceiling, having a higher education (master's and/or doctorates) or being a minority, these all affect how we grow up as women. So if you are among this elite kick-ass group of women (which I have quite a few friends out there who fit the bill) and would like to write a continuation of this post as a guest blogger, I would be super stoked to visit with you about it.
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