Labels for Not Being a Mother

Today as we celebrate Mother’s Day in many countries I would like to highlight that not only women who are mothers are label in society. Also, women who decide not to be a mother or can’t are labelled.

Society has labelled women as individuals who have less power, are passive, and are submissive. The moment we don’t rule under these categories we are consider as rebellious, rare, selfish, undesirable, bad, modern, and liberal females, which is consider a gender rebellion because as subjects we oppose with will and conscience all that is assigned to us.

Since I am a rebel and tired of these labels, I would like to share with you the experiences of my girlfriends and myself regarding not being a mother.

• Since I am not sure if I want to be a mother or not, people constantly ask: When are you going to have a child? Remember the train is going to leave you. 
• Why don’t you want to be a mother? Don’t you like children? 
• Can you have children?  Who has a reproductive problem you or your partner?
• It’s hard to believe that you don’t have children and that you don’t miss having them.
• You will regret it when you are old. Who will take care of you when you are older? 
• You don’t understand mother issues because you are not one.
• You don’t love children, thus you are a bad and selfish woman. 
• I have a very religious aunt that said: I am praying for you to have a child. 
• You are not a complete woman because you are not a mother.
• After having two miscarriages, all the comments I got were pitiful, like don’t give up, have faith. It is terrible because they don’t have an idea regarding how hard the post-miscarriage process can be. Not once have I heard you can always adopt or life is good without a child’.
• A friend once told me: you are unnatural because you don’t have a child. 
• If you are from a “third world country” and you are not a mother it is more than rare, since the stereotype is that most women have a lot of children.
• Years ago, I visited a radiologist before my surgery, because I had a myoma in my womb, so when he saw my medical record, he asked: Are you a nun?

During my conversation with friends, we realized and coincided with four things. First, all the stupid questions and statements mentioned above are asked to us never to the men. Second, as we grow so do our answers and reactions. Third, unfortunately, most of these questions or statements come from women. Fourth, we need to speak more about these labels.

The next time you think about saying something inappropriate to a woman who is not a mother remember to think twice and ask yourself, would you like someone to tell you a statement like the above?

Photo by Erol Ahmed on Unsplash