Wendy Wason

Reluctant Feminist

Wendy — Mon, 17 Jun 2013 13:19:27 +0000

A few years ago I would rather have admitted to being a Justin Bieber fan than a feminist. To me the term “feminist” was someone who banged on about “causes” and “campaigns” and looked a lot more like Germaine Greer than Angelina Jolie. They were feminists because they had to be right?
I am experiencing a shift. A pretty sharp shift. I am baffled and perplexed at the world we live in at the moment. The number one song in the UK charts right now is called “Blurred Lines” by Robin Thicke. If the title doesn’t grab you as a bit rapey then maybe the lyrics will: “I know you want it” and “I’ll give you something big enough to tear that ass in two” and also the very lovely “You the hottest bitch in the place”. Nice. What if I want to be the smartest bitch in the place? Or maybe not even a bitch? Since he has become a father, even Jay Z doesn’t use the word “bitch” anymore. He didn’t stop it when he became a “husband” but something dawned on him when he became a father so at least there is some progress.
I’ve not even started on the song’s video which features lots of models stomping about in flesh coloured G-strings while the fully clothed Robin Thicke and Pharrell Williams gawp, stroke and paw at them. In one shot, a girl is having her hair brushed by one of them. For all you guys saying: “Lighten up it’s just a bit of fun” then imagine that’s your teenage daughter dancing around naked in a room with two much older guys. Not only is the video horrific, the message it sends out is that this behaviour is acceptable. It’s not. It’s really not. It’s exploitation. I’m staggered the models agreed to it in the first place.
So that’s the “music bit” of what’s pissing me off about the way woman are treated. They made the song, made the video and then everyone validated it by sending it to number one – don’t get me wrong – I like the tune but everything else makes me want to sit my daughter down and explain to her how to keep herself safe, even if broadcasters don’t think it’s an issue.
There have been a few photos that have appeared on my Facebook timeline – mainly because of people complaining about them – but I’m shocked to see them. A girl lying at the bottom of stairs with the caption “You shouldn’t have got pregnant”. There were others but I’ll spare you. Alarming, as these photos were, what worried me more was the comments beneath them, ranging from “LOL” to more graphic responses.
How is this allowed to happen? When did boys start thinking this was funny? Has access to porn numbed their sensibilities so much that this is now funny? When I was at university, there was no way guys would be openly sexist like this. That violence against women isn’t seen as shocking really disturbs me.
One page on Facebook recently published a story about American soldiers raping prisoners in Iraq. They published photos of the rape taking place. A women’s rape was photographed and up online for everyone to see. As if she hadn’t suffered enough trauma, no one thought how utterly appalling this would be for her.
Reading the evidence about the Steubenville Rape in Ohio distressed me enormously. That young girl was taken round parties for six hours and no one stepped in. No one. As if what the boys were doing to her wasn’t bad enough, no one saw fit to stop it. Why? What is going on?
I was gutted to see Nigella Lawson being physically abused by her husband in the papers this weekend. She is an intelligent successful woman was being grabbed by her husband round the throat. She lost her mother, sister and first husband to cancer, has overcome that and still becomes a victim. If that’s what goes on in public, what on earth happens behind closed doors?
I’m not sure if there is a cultural shift where it’s ok to be demeaning to women or if it’s just easier to access now. What I do know is that it is completely unacceptable. Now I’m far from a reluctant feminist. I’m a strident one.

The Art of Undermining

Wendy — Mon, 06 May 2013 12:55:46 +0000

I was in a shop recently trying on a dress when a male shop assistant came over to see if I needed any help. I was deliberating over whether or not to buy a yellow lace dress and was doing that thing we do when we swish about, checking it from the back, then the front, then the back again. He came over and offered some words of advice. These were: “Yellow is such a difficult colour to wear”. That was it for me. I wasn’t buying it. He wasn’t overtly negative but obviously I’m not up to wearing yellow. Bizarre I know that the opinion of someone I don’t know, have never met and will probably will never see again, had an impact of me but there you go. It did. It was not a particularly smart move for a salesman. If he’d wanted to be helpful and make a sale I’d have probably gone for; “We also have that in green or red” or maybe even “You look amazing in yellow”. I’m not sure if I’m more annoyed at his stupidity or his honesty.
Once you have noticed something, you see it everywhere. The press are really unkind with their undermining. I’m not talking about the obvious outrage when an individual has done something wrong. I’m talking about the insidious undermining when you get to the end of a news story and for some reason you can’t explain; you don’t like the woman in the story. When you re-read said story there are lots of things implied but not explained.
This came to my attention during the reporting of Justin Lee Collins trial. Justin Lee Collins was found guilty of harassment of his ex-girlfriend – Anna Larke – and through the course of the trial we heard horrible stories of his systematic domestic abuse of her. He still maintains that he is not a violent person even though he didn’t appeal after the verdict. What bothered me through this trial was that the pictures they used of Lee Collins were those of him looking sombre in a suit going to court but the pictures the papers used of Anna were lifted from Facebook – her in a bikini, her in a low-cut top, her in tiny shorts. Anna was also photographed in her court outfit but those photos weren’t used. The sneaky suggestion seemed to be that she was a woman of loose morals. I don’t understand why. After facing the humiliation of all her personal, intimate details of her sexual relationship with Lee Collins becoming public, she seemed to be on trial too.
The message sent out by the law was a pretty clear one too. Given that Anna Larke had lived through an abusive relationship followed by harassment, they sentenced Lee Collins to 140 hours of community service and £3,500 in court costs. £3,500? He probably gets that for a voice-over. Despite being found guilty Lee Collins still denies the charge. Stars think they can get away with anything. Always have always will, but that’s for another blog.
I’m really concerned about how the press report women. It’s not all women. They like the odd one. In today’s Daily Mail, Jessica Alba is shown with her daughter in a buggy she was “lovingly being pushed around in”. I’m not entirely sure how you can “lovingly push” a child in a buggy but there you go. Jessica Alba has it nailed.
The newspapers aren’t as fond of Victoria Beckham though. Whenever a picture of her appears she is scowling and so is baby Harper but they manage to find heaps of photos of baby Harper giggling with her Daddy. Is this because David Beckham is an amazing daddy who Harper loves to be with and she doesn’t like her mum? I doubt it. I think it’s more to do with the person choosing the photos than with Victoria Beckham’s parenting skills.
Likewise poor pregnant Kim Kardashian. Pregnancy is quite a tough time for any girl. I don’t care what you’ve done in the past or how you make your money. If you’re growing a human, you deserve to be given a break, not confronted with a picture of yourself alongside a killer whale with unflattering comments about your weight-gain. The woman is pregnant and supposed to put on weight. That’s not even subtle under-mining. That’s just horrible.
I worry that the press are making it ok to undermine women. I might even go out and get that yellow dress. Yellow can’t be that hard to wear.

Old and we don’t care.

Wendy — Fri, 01 Feb 2013 06:14:10 +0000

Ok.
Family change about right now.
We are in LA.
The kids are with us which is fantastic whilst we run around to meetings, but the downtime is fairly interesting.
As Londoners, we get up and take the kids to school, then slowly wind into our day.
This doesn’t happen in LA. You wake up (super-early) and run into your day.We had the kids playing in the park before their tutors arrived at 9. We’d never do that in London.
For some readson waking up in the sunshine makes it easier to be a little generous.

This morning I woke up to my other half’s voice. The kids are still dealing with jet-lag and they’d woken up at a silly time and wanted to watch a film.
The house we are staying in has no cable or tv but does have a wide selection of vhs videos. The videos work very well on the tv video in our LA house.
Our kids have never heard of videos.

I chuckled this morning as Mr Wendy was explaining things.
“What do you mean “the big brick thing*” wont go in” *VHS video
*childs tiny voice* “I’m scared to force it and break it”
“Force it! Force It! It’s from the 80′s”

The came my favourite line: “Kids. When I was your age this was all we had……ad infintum”

Cut to tonight.

One of the VHS the kids had found was Grease. We watched it for ages. We watched it until excessive comments about my childhood watching this sent them to bed.
Result or disaster?
I don’t know. I’m old and I don’t care.

Lets Start With Us Shall We?

Wendy — Mon, 03 Dec 2012 10:59:08 +0000

Today I was sent another email asking to help “stamp out bullying”. I’ve had a few of these and they are all from valid worthy causes. Bullying is a horrible thing to happen to anyone. Most of us have experienced some kind of bullying. At school I had a few months of it and can still vividly remember that distressing, sick feeling when the bully was approaching and how shaken I felt after an incident. It seems so far away now but it is remarkable how huge the feelings of despondency are. I kept my mouth shut as I was so scared and it was only when my mother heard me being yelled at outside the house one day that she took it to the headmaster.
The bully and myself were called into his office and she was given a stern ticking off. She didn’t care though. I was amazed at how cheeky she was and at the time I was convinced this wasn’t the end of it. It was though. She soon got bored and moved on to someone else. What is most alarming about this particular bully is that a few years later, I went to university in Glasgow. So did the bully. She was a year ahead of me and studied Theology –I know! She had God on her side – so I never really saw her. I did become good friends with a girl who was re-sitting a year as she had spent a lot of the previous year in hospital. Why? This poor girl had the misfortune to share a flat with the bully. Her first year at Uni was spent facing such psychological torment, she was hospitalised with anorexia.
I don’t know why people bully others. The sense of power leaving someone shaking with fear must be a real high to people with very little going on in their lives. It saddens me and I really try to treat the spats my children have at school with the utmost gravity when they come to me. How many of us were dismissed by our parents when we’d had a disastrous day at school? It’s very easy to crush a little person and small things feel so big when you’re little.
Right now we are asking our kids not to bully each other despite the fact we now live in a culture of bullying. We watch people on Big Brother sitting tasks and we vote them out which feels like bullying to me. We watch Britain’s Got Talent and as a nation laugh at people with no talent – as a bully would. We should be caring for people like that. Fame is seen as an easy passage with no real effort. Stars do interviews claiming they “fell into” acting and “don’t really want to be famous”. Rubbish. Celebrities work hard at being famous and it’s very easy to bow out and live a low-key life.
Even X Factor is essentially a popularity contest rather than a talent show. From the outrage I’ve seen on Twitter, it appears that all the genuinely good singers have been voted out. The worst tv show for sanctioned bullying is I’m a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here. Celebs go on this show and the public vote for them to do all manner of humiliating, disgusting tasks whilst Ant and Dec stand laughing at them. Every year, the public gang up on one person they don’t like and again and again put them through these hideous “tasks”. Then we ask our kids to respect the feelings of others? What kind of example are we setting?
Twitter makes it phenomenally easy to bully as the 22 year-old Kristen Stewart discovered when she made the youthful error of having an affair with a man 20 years her senior who was also her (married) boss and should have known better. I’m not condoning what she did but there were definitely two parties involved and as far as I’m aware he wasn’t the subject of an internet-hate campaign.
Whilst Twitter makes it easier for trolls to attack the object of their distaste, similarly when celebrities with 2 million followers retweet criticism from another party, they unleash the venom of their followers on someone who has had the audacity to criticise them. If you are an artist – singer, actor, comedian, writer – you put your work out there to be criticised. Some will like it. Some wont. Shut up and deal with it. It’s bullying behaviour to point out to your legions of fans that someone doesn’t like you. It’s tantamount to setting the dog on them.
There has been a recent spate of kids committing suicide after internet bullying. This cannot go on.
Instead of sending emails to stop bullying we need to start with ourselves and the tv we commission and watch. How can we expect kids to show compassion if we don’t?

Poison Chalice

Wendy — Wed, 03 Oct 2012 14:04:04 +0000

The first time we met Chantelle Houghton, it was 2004. She entered The Celebrity Big Brother House as a non-celebrity. By 2004 Big Brother was in full swing. Initially no-one knew how the public was going to react to Big Brother. It was a warped popularity contest and as the show grew, it attracted all kinds of knowing, ambitious people, all desperate to be famous. Just famous. Not as actors or singers but just famous. Big Brother made huge stars out of it’s winners.
Chantelle Houghton had applied to be on the regular Big Brother but the producers, Endemol decided it would be more entertaining to keep her for the Celebrity version of the show. She went into the house as the only non-celebrity but given that most celebs are concerned where they themselves sit on the celeb-o-sphere, no-one knew she wasn’t famous. Her task was to convince them that she was. She was in the house with Michael Barrymore, George Galloway, Rula Lenska, Dennis Rodman – an American basketball player who had published intimate details of his sexual experiences with Madonna, Jodie Marsh, Pete Burns, Traci Bingham from Baywatch, a popstar called Maggot, Faria Alam who had an affair with Sven Goran-Eriksson and a guy called Preston from a band called The Ordinary Boys.
Unsurprisingly they didn’t suss out that she wasn’t famous. She then fell in love with Preston – who had a girlfriend at the time – and went on to win the show. She was very sweet. Her idol was Jordan and she worked occasionally as a Paris Hilton look-a-like. She felt bad about falling in love with Preston. I’d never heard of The Ordinary Boys and I thought it was a dull name for a band.
I vividly remember the interview that Michael Barrymore had with Davina McCall when he left the house. He said: “Chantelle is everything a celebrity should be.” No Michael. She is a nice girl. Preston promptly dumped his long-time French girlfriend and married Chantelle.
After Big Brother, she was famous. Not for doing anything but she was famous for not being famous. Is this the most post-modern level of fame yet? Chantelle had no real job. She wrote columns, did photo-shoots and attended premiers. Not only that, she got her boobs done and went blonder. Why she felt the need to do that is unclear. It may have been a self-confidence thing. A job where you have to look like someone else can’t do a lot for your self-esteem. Other stars who like Jordan or Jodie Marsh may have job-titles that seem pretty flimsy but they have had a gradual introduction to fame and more importantly, they’ve worked to get there. Chantelle just appeared and was famous.
The marriage broke down, she dyed her hair brown and she’s just had a baby with her idols ex-husband. Confused? Alex Reid was a cage-fighter who became famous when he married Jordan. He also went on Celebrity Big Brother and won. Both him and Chantelle spoke to the newspapers throughout their relationship about their relationship. When everything is out for public consumption, there is nothing left inside for you.
I’m a comic and I talk a lot about my personal life but I don’t share everything. There needs to be something left for friends and family otherwise you become brittle and empty. Whenever I see Jordan interviewed I feel for her. Her life is completely available for everyone to discuss, dissect and judge. I have certain respect for Jordan. She saw that big boobs and blonde hair were what was required for her chosen career and she went bigger and blonder than anyone else.
I worry about our society. Chantelle Houghton has been made famous as a little sub-plot, another way if maintaining interest in a tv show. She’s financially secure but her life is in tatters. She has a new baby, a difficult relationship and both parties seem to talk to each other through newspapers, magazines and Twitter. They feel like a brother and sister squabbling to parents. The difference is that a parent would care and want to help rather than sell a few more copies.
People want to be famous because life looks easy. Life is not easy for anyone. There is always a struggle. Actors are at the mercy of a production schedule if they are filming. If they are in a play there are matinee’s twice a week and a performance in the evening six days a week. Often big runs can last a year. Acting can be brutal. I was filming the day I found out my father died and they didn’t stop the production. They couldn’t. Actors may appear at glamorous parties occasionally but you have to work to get there. Comedians gig for years for very little money before they make it on TV shows and even the biggest rock star occasionally closes the door on his hotel room after a huge concert and feels utterly alone.
These people struggle and they do a job. There is a talent there to keep them afloat when the negativity sets in.
What keeps reality stars afloat? We make people famous. We are amused by the ups and downs of their lives but it’s their real lives. It’s not funny. It’s cruel.
Chantelle Houghton now has a baby girl to look after. It’s hard enough having a new baby without the stress she’s going through right now. She wont let her cross-dressing ex see the baby. You couldn’t make this up. It sounds like the plot of a bad soap-opera. Chantelle is still famous but I wonder if the fame she was after just feels like a poison chalice now.
I really hope life improves for her. She may well be wealthy but emotional contentment is so hard to find. I hope she stops sharing every detail with the world and focuses on her baby. That’s where true happiness lies.

Fashion Crisis

Wendy — Thu, 20 Sep 2012 22:08:56 +0000

One of the great things about my job as a stand-up is that it means I can be anywhere doing anything. I love this unpredictability. I have no definite routine and this suits me very well. I can be at a comedy club one day, hosting a fashion show the day after and recording a podcast the next. It’s never mundane.
The downside to this is that I have last-minute panics about the most ridiculous things. Last week I was hosting the main-stage of a music festival. I was introducing bands. When I booked the gig I thought it sounded like great fun and would be a real challenge. I was really looking forward to it – until the day before.
The day before I go to a gig, I pack. Normally I chuck in my wash-bag that remains unpacked from previous trips, pants, socks, fresh pair of jeans and a couple of tops. Last weekend I was thrown into a fresh new hell. I’m in my late 30’s. On my way to a music festival in my 20’s I would have thought about my three-day-wardrobe for weeks. In my late 30’s with three kids to look after, it only occurred to me as I was packing. Now, Festival Wear is an important consideration. Pages and pages of fashion magazines are dedicated to Festival Wear. Pictures of Alexa Chung and Pixie Geldof looking amazing are all over these pages. What the hell am I supposed to wear as someone who is old enough to be their mother?
I can’t go anywhere near the denim shorts/white vest/black waistcoat look that Kate Moss favours because – lets face it – you have to be Kate Moss to pull that off. I had a coffee with the girls and explained my confusion to them. I also confessed that as a younger women, when I planned an outfit I’d think ‘sailor’ or ‘army’ or ‘hollywood’ as my vague idea for the look I was trying to achieve. Now, here I was, ploughing through my wardrobe thinking; “What would Ferne Cotton wear”. It turns out that was a bum-steer as my good friend suggested I should’ve been asking: “What would Ferne Cotton wear in 20 years?”
It really shouldn’t matter. I shouldn’t care but I do. I hate the idea of being inappropriately dressed. I can’t bear turning up somewhere and feeling like a fish out of water when I have dressed for a prison visit rather than a Royal Visit. When other women are dressed perfectly I feel crap when I stand out like a sore thumb.
The week before last my packing was easy. I was learning how to race cars. Essentially – a boys sport. I thought about what to wear: something warm and practical. Boom! Done! I didn’t feel over-dressed or under-dressed. Men don’t put the same pressure on dressing for an event do they? Even if I had turned up to race cars in the perfect Hunter wellies, denim hot-pants and waist-coat, I’d have had to put my racing overalls on anyway so it wouldn’t have mattered.
For the music festival I didn’t channel Kate Moss or Fearne Cotton. I ended up going for the Russell Brand look: black skinnies, messy hair and a cardigan. I just didn’t realise he dressed like a middle-aged woman with an identity crisis.

Paramazing

Wendy — Wed, 05 Sep 2012 15:51:50 +0000

I have to say I was one of the people who thought the Olympics would be a pain in the arse. As a Londoner I initially thought it might be ok, so I applied for tickets. As my mates and I worried about how we’d pay for the hundreds of tickets we’d asked for, it soon emerged that the Olympic tickets allocators had learned of our fears and decided that it would be best not to offer us any. At all! I was a bit deflated but it was going to be all busy and annoying anyway so who cares?
Then came the adverts about changing our travel plans as London would be super-busy with all these extra people around. Then there were more warnings about leaving more time for our travel as we were having visitors in our town. It reminded me of my mother when we had guests over. Everything was to be spick and span and we were all to behave. A month prior to the games we even had Boris booming over the tannoys in the tubes telling us how hectic it was all going to be.
That was it. When school broke up, we all jumped in the car and drove to France. It was from a pub in rural France that I watched the opening ceremony. A weird thing happened. London looked beautiful. I felt a little proud. I was impressed at our Queen for having a sense of humour and joining in the whole James Bond thing. The French weren’t so impressed – they ditched their monarchy a while back – but I liked it. The opening ceremony was impressive, although I was watching David Cameron’s face for any signs of guilt as the NHS was flagged as the amazing institution that it is. I didn’t see any it must be said.
When the games started I felt my interest swell. We don’t have a TV in France so we watched the odd event in the pub next door and as the kids excitement grew, so did mine. We carried on watching when we came home, getting all caught up in the excitement of Jessica Ennis, Tom Daley and Mo Farah. I think in pretty much every photo taken of my son this summer he’s doing an Usain Bolt impression.
All the athletes were fantastic and inspirational. To work so hard and achieve their goal was amazing to feel part of. When they were interviewed they came across as such disciplined people and not only that – they all seemed nice. Decent and nice! It was such a refreshing change to the disappointment I feel when a footballer my son looks up to is in the papers for some misdemeanour. Sir Chris Hoy beat Sir Steve Redgrave’s medal tally and there was a feeling of healthy optimism.
We also learned about sacrifice and pain through a variety of stories. Tom Daley lost his father before the Olympics and other Olympians talked of the loss of loved ones and how difficult it was for them to go on without the support of close family who had been through all the training with them. Victoria Pendleton talked of how problematic it was when she fell in love with one of her coaches, leading to him resigning from his position. There was love too! The whole summer Olympics felt a little like a feel-good film.
Little did I know that the last chapter was going to be the “Triumph over adversity” section. By the time the closing ceremony took place, I was really excited about the Paralympics. It felt like I was waiting forever for it to start. The Opening Ceremony was phenomenal and it just got better. For the first time the Paralympic athletes enjoyed the same kind of platform as able-bodied ones and the whole of Britain seems to have grasped that. Who knew the Olympic Games were going to be the pre-cursor to the main event?
I have spent the whole of these Paralympic games marvelling at these extra-ordinary, brave, inspirational human beings. There are blind guys playing football, a British female relay-team with cerebral palsy and David Weir who was described as the “greatest Paralympian of all time”. I have sobbed my heart out as I have watched swimmers without arms cut through the water and visually impaired runners cross the finishing-line.
These Olympics and Paralympics have been phenomenal and I’ve enjoyed them immensely. The lasting legacy is that they have taught my children that no matter what happens in life, anything is possible.

Black Beauty

Wendy — Tue, 12 Jun 2012 11:09:51 +0000

The past few months I have been thinking a lot about how women view themselves. In April Samantha Brick wrote an article about what a terrible trial it was for her to be beautiful. She became the subject of a twitter storm with people saying the most awful things about her. Is thinking she is attractive the worst thing a women can do?
I’d love to instil in my daughter the kind of self-confidence that says “Yes I’m attractive” than a body-image that will make her analyse every morsel she eats, over-exercise and worry about whether that tiny piece of skin above her knee makes her look fat.
I’ve had a few incidents that made me think that black woman have got it right. Walking along Holloway Road with comic Matt Kirshen a couple of weeks ago, three large black girls walked past us. They were immaculately made up, with long painted nails and skin-tight clothes. I am considerably smaller than they and yet I wouldn’t have the confidence to wonder up the street dressed in spray on jeans but they looked amazing. I said to Matt; “Black girls have so much confidence with their bodies”
“They do,” he said. “And it serves them well”
It does. These three girls looked strong, attractive and sexy.
Two days after that I was in a store and overheard a lady saying; “I go to the gym every day. I look fantastic. I don’t feel 67 and I certainly don’t look it”. I peered over the rails to see a gorgeous black lady chatting away to her friend.
How do you get that?
I stumbled on a study by The Washington Post and The Kaiser Family Foundation about black woman and body image and it makes for interesting reading. While 41 per cent of average-sized white woman report having high self-esteem, 66 per cent of black women who are considered obese say they have high self-esteem.
Black women are also more likely to have a different view on what is attractive according to Princeton University Professor Imani Perry. Whilst white woman put it down to an accident of birth, attractiveness for a black woman is tied up with, style, grooming and how you carry yourself. This is amazing and once again, something I’d like to give my daughter.
How did this happen?
Once again I look to Imani Perry who points out that black woman have been over-looked by mainstream culture. They’ve either been represented negatively or not at all. Vogue Magazine started in 1892 but Beverly Johnson was the first black woman to appear on the cover in 1974. Not until 82 years later! I should point out that it was American Vogue. British Vogue put Donyale Luna on the cover in 1966 but this was amidst rumours that she had to cover her nose and mouth.
White woman have had this idea of the perfect female form rammed down their throats for years and it’s not Marilyn Monroe anymore. It’s Angelina Jolie or Keira Knightly – neither of whom is terribly curvy. In the absence of these ideals of body perfection, black woman have ben forced to come up with their own theories of what is beautiful and it has served them well.
I do recall an episode of Scrubs where the lead JD is discussing the difference between dating white girls and black girls with his friend Turk. “There is no difference. Except when a black girl says, “Does my ass look big in this?” you say “hell yeah!”

Healthy Happy Mum

Wendy — Wed, 04 Apr 2012 09:02:30 +0000

In New York this week a study has been published that says working mothers are healthier than stay-at-home mums. Apparently they are less depressed and report a better general overall health than mothers who stay at home full-time.
I don’t know the best way to do things. I muddle through and try my best and hope no one gets to screwed up by my efforts at motherhood. For some reason there have been a lot of articles recently that have piqued my interest. There have been lots of pieces about being the best mother or woman or lover. I suspect most working mothers would be more concerned about what is best for their children than whether working makes them healthier.
However, the impact of a healthier mother is much better for everyone. Sometimes, doing what makes you happy has a positive outcome for everyone. The act of being a little selfish can be a good thing. I am heartened by that research. If I don’t work and have something that feels like it is mine, I begin to feel a little loopy. I don’t know if it’s the same for everyone. I work in a creative industry so I have to get it out – to perform, to write or do something that feeds the furnace.
I have a friend who went to an expensive school in London – St Pauls – and was brought up to believe she would marry a banker, have lunch with friends and send her kids to St Pauls. Her mother never worked. My friend’s life didn’t quite pan out like that. She has to work. Her kids go to the local school and she feels cheated.
A working mother may be happier and healthier but she also teaches her kids that you have to rely on yourself. You go out and get the money and provide for your family. Daughters learn that they work and sons learn that the women in their lives can have careers too – it’s the norm. I know many ‘modern men’ who think that they are enlightened and supportive of women having careers but when it boils down to it, they had a mother who was at home waiting for them and feel dissatisfied when their partner doesn’t do that. I do feel guilty when I have to leave the kids with a sitter and go to work but when I come home to them and I am refreshed by having a few hours off and am ready to swamp them with cuddles and kisses. I am not irritated by their requests or their constant questions because I’ve not been around it all day.
Of course there has to be a balance. I couldn’t bear the thought of leaving them day in day out with a nanny just as I think looking after them 24-7 would send me nuts. We all need space, even if it is from our children. When I come home from work I am there for them and fell a lot more emotionally available. What greater thing can you do for a child? At the risk of sounding like my grand-mother, I really do believe that “a change is as good as a rest”. With a change of location, you come back revived and refreshed. I can get loads done in a day if I am doing different things but if I just have to clean out the fridge? It can take hours. It’s good to talk to some grown-ups too. Work brings interactions with other adults that can be sorely missed in the early stages of raising young children. You may well have a husband or partner who comes home to you and you want to talk them through your day whilst he wants to talk about his work pressures. That’s a conversation that never goes brilliantly. It can be even worse if you spend all day looking after the babies and once they are in bed, there is no one who comes home. That feels spectacularly isolating. What are you going to do? Log onto Facebook and spectate on everyone else’s fun and full lives?
I’m always shocked by badly behaved children who are cheeky to their parents but the days when I feel like I am constantly telling mine off, I have to remind myself it’s because I don’t want the kids to be dicks. I want them to be responsible members of society who think about other people whilst looking out for others who may need a little help.
I like to think that being a working mother teaches them that and paves the way for a future generation with a sense of responsibility

Don’t tell the kids….

Wendy — Sun, 11 Mar 2012 11:47:16 +0000

I’ve not blogged for a while. I’ve been caught up in the whirlwind stages of a newborn whilst working and trying to make sure the other two don’t feel marginalised because a baby has turned up.
I get a a lot from my children. It is really hard work but it’s supposed to be. For each one of them, I’ve breast-fed, boiled and pureed veg and tried to guide them and love them but not spoil them. It’s a fine line, loving without damaging them and I’m sure I’ll have done something that they will remember for the rest of their lives as “that moment where mum said…”.
When I found myself on my own with two children, I really had to step up. When my ex couldn’t help me financially, the kids still had to eat. The buck stops with mummy. I had to get friends round to look after them and get out there and earn. I really don’t believe that it’s a bad thing – it was at the time – but my son and daughter know that their mother has to go out and work. They know it’s not just the preserve of the man and while they’d like me at home sometimes, they understand and that is an expectation I’m glad they have.
I have to admit, I enjoy going out to work. I love my job and it’s nice to have some respite from thinking about the needs of little people all the time. Now they are older, it is ballet and piano and football and swimming. I run them around more, invariably having to figure out how to be in two different places at once. Most mothers have to do this. The multi-tasking that takes place would blow the mind of the 20 year-old me. This week I was at an event for International Women’s Day run by the WIE network. There were talks and seminars by extraordinary women doing extraordinary things. During one of the talks I received a text that one of the kids clubs had been cancelled and I had about two minutes to sort out someone else picking him up. As I turned to my left, the girl next to me was furiously texting – in the exact same predicament.
The new baby is now six months and I have a confession to make. I find it a little boring. I love him and he’s cute and I am happy to get up at 3am and rub bonjela on his gums but my life is on hold at the moment. It is difficult to admit beause I know I am so lucky to have him and he is amazing but the day-in-day-out humdrum of bottles, nappies, mushy food and teething drives me up the wall. I look at the food I’m shoveling into his mouth and I feel like that is what is happening to my brain. I can’t ever inamgine being at work the way I was before. It feels like a distant memory.
Another friend who has just had her first baby called up and talked round the subject for ages before eventually coming clean. “ITS REALLY BORING”. Being a new mother can be very isolating. It’s ok if you have the money or inclination to go to baby massage or take them swimming or to the cinema but it’s often not possible.
When you make arrangements to get a sitter and look forward to an evening out it’s very exciting. I planned to do that yesterday. A couple of hours before I was due to go out, the sitter cancelled. It wasn’t the end of the world but it bloody felt like it. I wanted to sink a bottle of wine but you can’t can you? What happens if something happens to one of the children in the night and I have to drive to the hospital half-cut? Not going to happen.
I know I’m lucky with my lovely healthy children so don’t tell me off for being ungrateful just let me have a moan about it occasionally. And dont tell the kids…