Footloose and fancy-free By Gauri Dange

(Source: The Hindu 26 Aug 2015) http://www.thehindu.com/features/magazine/gouri-dange-on-being-childless-by-choice/article7565746.ece

Young, urban Indians are increasingly choosing not to have children. The writer talks about why this does not raise eyebrows anymore.

In the early 90s, a whole bunch of labels cropped up — from yuppies (for young, upwardly mobile professionals) and dinks (double income, no kids) to dinkers (dinks with early retirement) and dewks (dually employed with kids). But the people without children attracted a lot of judgment — they were accused of being Peter Pans, selfish, anti-family, career-obsessed, and so on.Those who had children did the judging, the ones without children did the justifying. On the other side, books like Selfish, Shallow, and Self-Absorbed: Sixteen Writers on the Decision Not to Have Kids provocatively talk about “taking the parent-centric, kid-fixated, baby-bump-patrolling culture to task”. Ironically, both thought of the other as selfish, shallow and self-absorbed.

The whole issue, particularly in the last decade or so, has emerged as a much more nuanced and layered social phenomenon rather than just another us-versus-them debate. Having children is increasingly being seen and accepted as a personal choice and choosing to not have children is not necessarily seen as odd or deviant behaviour.

Does this indicate that perhaps becoming a father or mother is not necessarily hardwired into our DNA and our psyche, as we believe? Or is it that changing social and family structures have impacted that hardwiring? Perhaps the dissolution of the joint family, the village, and the stable neighbourhood has forced some urban women to see how the complete and total responsibility for child-bearing and rearing now devolves only on them, in ways that they simply feel unequal to taking on. “I could not see myself doing it single-handedly, nor can I relate to a life where having a child means having either an entourage of maids or have your life taken over by a helpful mother or mother-in-law,” says Mrunal, a 37-year-old lawyer.

But the reasons for choosing not to have children, it emerges, are many. Rarely is the ‘I hate children’ blanket statement, ascribed to the childless-by-choice, a factor. In fact, many say that they love and respect children too much to simply bash on and have one without thinking. Anil, an academic in his 40s, says, “Quite early on, when I was 15 or so, I began to register that lots of adults around me seemed terribly unhappy with their spouses and their children. I heard so many complaints about loss of personal freedom and choices… I couldn’t understand why people put themselves through such hell if they felt this way.” Anil did marry, but he and his partner chose not to have children.

As did Pervin, a writer-editor in her early 30s. “I started really thinking about parenthood in my early 20s. The first step was the realisation that it was a choice, an option, not a default role or milestone. After that, the decision to stay childless seemed very natural and clear to me.”

***

Could this clarity of not wanting a child become a deal breaker if the spouse or partner wants to have children? For some people, it is something that they felt they must tell a partner upfront, as soon as the dating got serious; and it did, in fact, become a deal breaker for some. In the case of Azhar and Garima, 15 years into their marriage, Azhar began to get a nagging feeling that not having a baby was not quite the right decision and that he had been pushed into it by his partner’s vehemence on the subject. They decided to part ways, and Azhar went on to re-marry and have a child, late in life, to the criticism of some of his close family and friends. He, however, seriously asks: “If a woman wants to have children and her husband refuses, the whole world feels bad for her and talks about never denying a woman motherhood, etc. Is this not applicable to a man as well, who may feel a great urge for fatherhood at some time?”

For Pervin and her husband, the issue was discussed on and off in their dating years. “Having grown up with the standard assumption about the education-marriage-children progression, my husband hadn’t considered that parenthood was something that one might consciously stay away from. The more we talked about it though, the more he leaned towards a future without children.” Pervin clarifies, “My decision to not have children has nothing to do with my equation with children —it is about my equation with myself. In fact, instead of saying ‘I’ve decided not to have children’, it would be more appropriate to say ‘I’ve decided not to become a parent’.” Pervin works closely with children as a textbook writer and conducts workshops with them.

For software engineer Pallavi, the issue was not discussed with any seriousness when she was dating or in the early years of her marriage. She says, however, “When we watch the exhausting and demanding aspects of parenting our friends are going through, we say we just can’t put ourselves through that. And that’s how it continues till date (over eight years of marriage and over 10 since we got into a relationship). Whether I had a career or not, I would think the same way. I understand that people who are parents do still feel it is all worth it, and kudos to them. It’s just that I can’t do it.”

***

Young women who choose not to have children are often asked sharply, “So you think you want to just have fun forever. When will you grow up, then?” But this takes away from the fact that surely, having children is a different kind of fun too. Becoming a parent cannot be seen as a ‘grim reality’ to which we must all turn. But more than that, as Garima adds, “When you don’t have children, does that mean you are not a person who is dependable, and who commits to things? In fact, I do not have the luxury of the ‘children have exams’ or ‘need to take my child for coaching’ and similar excuses that I see parents putting up when they are required for other things. I have been there for ageing parents, an alcoholic brother’s family, and been present and willingly helpful in many friends’ crises. Does this sound like I have signed up for a life of fun and frolic by not having children?”

Madhavi, 61, is an architect and town-planner. She describes herself as being in the vanguard of the childless-by-choice movement. “In those days, it drew such sharp reactions. I remember being very defensive. If someone asked me about children, I would snap at them ‘We chose not to breed, and we are very happy, thank you, you can go ahead and have as many as you want.’ After some years, it didn't matter to me to make my position clear. Whether people thought you needed sympathy as you had not conceived, or people assumed you were just too career-minded and had ‘deprived’ your spouse of progeny, I learnt not to enter into protracted debate or clarifications.”

The surprising eye-opener for many such women is how their own mothers and other older women in the family respond in private about their decision to not have kids: “If I had had such an option, I don’t think I would have had any children either.” This is said, not with bitterness, but as a considered sentiment quietly confided.

One pro-parenting argument used to be that children would offer support in old age. As families become more nuclear and scatter far and wide, there is a growing realisation that this cannot be a deciding factor. There are enough examples all around of benign neglect by grown children of ageing parents, of active harassment, or of the sheer inability to be there for ageing parents in any active and physically present way that argues against thinking of children as a post-retirement plan. At any rate, ageing urban Indians who have children are also now planning how to live (physically, financially, emotionally) in their later years with systems that are built without their children being compulsorily involved.

At the end, though, do people who choose to remain childless have doubts or regrets sometimes? How do they deal with it? Anil perhaps explains this best when he says: “Sure, I have had regrets. But if I had children, you can be sure I would regret why I didn’t try a life without children. I regret the fact I can’t taste every kind of life there is to taste. But there is just this one life, and one must follow one’s instincts.”

The writer is a family counsellor and author of the upcoming book Always a Parent.

To The Women Who Choose Not To Have Kids- Abby Rosmarin

 

Source: http://thoughtcatalog.com/abby-rosmarin/2013/12/to-the-women-who-choose-not-to-have-kids/

Abby Rosmarin

To the women who choose not to have kids, I have one thing to say: thank you.

You probably don’t hear it enough. In fact, you probably don’t hear it at all. What you do hear is an array of pro-childbearing responses, such as, “You’ll change your mind someday,” or, “Doesn’t your mother want grandkids?” or, “You’ll never find a husband if you never want to have kids.”

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All things considered, “thank you” is probably on the opposite end of what you hear.
But seriously: thank you. Thank you for recognizing that childrearing isn’t for you and being true to who you are. It doesn’t mean you hate kids. It just means that raising one is not part of your path in life.
Thank you for not succumbing to the societal pressures. I’ve known far too many parents who had kids because that’s what was expected of them. Working in childcare, you see more of this type than you wish to see. The resentment is almost palpable. They love their children — at least, they have no choice but to love their children — but every single movement seems to scream, “I wasn’t meant for this.” I’ve known too many people who grew up with at least one parent who harbored that resentment, who let that resentment dictate how they parented. I’ve seen how that influenced the way these former children are now as adults, or even as parents themselves.
Thank you for not trying to compromise who you are in an effort to keep a partner around. Thank you for being honest and open and refusing to apologize for who you are. Everyone has different values. Everyone wants something different in life. It takes a lot of guts and confidence to say, “This is what I want in life. It’s not the orthodox way, but it’s my way.”
Thank you for not trying to silence that feeling in your gut as a means to validate your life. There are too many people in this world who cannot figure out their path — or have stumbled while walking down said path — and decided that maybe having a child could provide that meaning and definition instead. You understand that down this path lies vicarious living and hurt emotions and you recognize that there are so many other ways to find love and meaning and joy in your life.
Raising children is a difficult, onerous, frustrating, and disappointing gig. It’s tough enough for those who want it. It is a rewarding and loving gig as well, but it’s not something one should go into while focusing only on reward and love and societal acceptance. In this day and age, with a booming population in almost every country, it makes no sense to pressure every person to have a baby. But we’re sticklers to tradition, ritualistic to a fault.
So thank you. It’s not easy to stand firm with your belief. Honestly, truly, and genuinely: thank you. 

Childfree in India..

Posted in Childfree by urbanindianwoman

(PHOTO-ILLUSTRATION BY RANDAL FORD FOR TIME)
Every now and then, magazines like Time throw in a cover story that aims to capture fringe trends that are fast becoming mainstream.
This week’s story on Americans and childfree-ness is one such. Childfree forums and concerns are not new to the internet, but the TIME doing a cover story makes it a ‘legitimate’ trend,so to speak.
The cover shows a totally model-like couple with smug expressions, who claim, as the byline says provocatively, ‘ When having it all means not having children.’
Husband grinned when he saw the picture on the cover. ” Is that couple supposed to represent us?” he asked sarcastically.” Fuck, they look as fake as those pictures of saccharine families around the dinner table”.
He is right of course. We are childfree by choice and so are virtually 90% of our friends. But none of us can claim to ‘have it all’ just because we don’t have kids. Same goes for people who choose to have kids.
All of us,kids or not, have our usual troubles. Jobs, family, stress, money, health, meaning of life- all the urban worries that plague the modern urban person.
However, the very fact that most of our socialization happens with similar couples/ singles who don’t have kids says volumes about how profoundly life-changing having/ not having kids is in our society. Virtually all our best friends are childfree .I am talking about people in the creative/content side of media, which is perhaps the most socially/ economically flexible set in India. Even here, having kids or not having kids profoundly affects your life plans or orientation.
Even in our bubble like slice of life, I have seen how people drift apart depending on the kids in their lives. This is largely because of the different priorities people have depending on kids. Finances, attitudes, daily lifestyle, aspirations become quite different as you become/ not become a parent.
In India, in certain set at least, people are available to care for young kids and the burden is less on young mothers compared to those in the west. So it is not always the sheer ‘need’ of childcare that changes the pattern. But the priorities, which for parents, are usually kids, that moulds the life so to speak.
Parents naturally socialize with other parents, prioritize kids education when it comes to their decision to stay in a particular locality or job, go to holidays that their kids can enjoy, spend the time and energy on moulding the young child, plan financially keeping kids in mind.
The childfree tend to, in my experience, lead more flexible and footloosish lives, compared to parents.
No choice exists in vacuum. In Indian society having kids is defacto and voluntarily not having kids is so exceptional ( except in small bubbles like media, where childfree are almost equal in number), that there is very little mainstream discussion about it ( except stray articles like this or this ) . Unlike in American media, where every lifestyle choice has a name and an acronym ( GINK means ‘green inclination no kids’, for example!! By god one has to give it to the Americans!!), in India the term child-free is virtually unknown. Our entire social structure and notion of family is built around having kids. Most of our non-Indian friends/ colleagues are impressed by the sheer childfriendliness of our society. Majority of the people’s lives are structured around their kids. So not having kids becomes a matter of choice while having kids is more or less given.
But it has been my observation that the number of childfree are on the rise and the raised eye brows have been replaced by understanding smiles in the recent years. My small town extended family, for example, completely accepts our decision not to have kids. Our parents would have been happier with grandkids but they see that we don’t want kids and have accepted our choice more or less happily.
Because there are so few Indian people who decide not to have kids , and so many who decide to have some, there is no threat or concern for population or social change.
Most childfree come from a certain social / economic set that excuses their behaviour as ‘oh they are quite different/ western types’ by majority of the people.
Our society for centuries has gleefully championed values of duty and familial responsibility over all others, and since globalization, we have gone through major social changes that have challenged this tradition. I have observed that many people, with or without kids, find childfree life quite an extention of nuclear family and an interesting new trend, if not a social staple. It struck me with force during youth market researches I was involved in, where even small town youngsters ( especially girls) look at childfree ness as some sort of glamourous, ‘modern’ choice.
Most of my western european friends are amazed at the lack of friction between childfree and mainstream society in India. I think that because of awareness and exposure, ‘different’ lifestyles are still seen as ‘harmless curiosities’ and childfree-ness is one of them.
Of course, I am generalizing grossly, but I do have at least a decade of observation, market researches on youth and insider status as a childfree woman from small town to back some of these statements:)
In India, not having kids is sort of accepted as a fringe social trend and it will be decades before it becomes mainstream enough for magazines to write cover stories about it.
Coming back to TIME, Americans, much like the other advanced industrial nations, are having less number of kids and that one woman in five is in fact, choosing not to have kids at all. Virtually all advanced nations give attractive incentives to women to produce kids since birth rate is steadily plummeting. Economists worry that a skewed birth-death ratio would affect the future aging population. Conservatives bemoan the death of traditional values while some environmentalists declare that population growth is disastrous for earth.
Internet is strife with childfree forums/ blogs that range from genuine to rabid. Grave issues like ‘whether children should be allowed on planes’ to ‘ whether there should be child-free restaurants’ are discussed with passion. Most people on the forums say that they are not anti-kids, but are rather against:
1. Assumption that everyone has to have kids to lead fulfilling life and blames those who don’t as selfish.
2. hyper parents who force their ill-mannered offspring on society without care
3. Baby obsessed culture that pressurizes women to equate motherhood with womanhood

I do surf these sites once in a while and do agree with the spirit on the above points, but sometimes get amazed at the vitriol with which these points are sometimes made. Like any other ‘alternative’ choice, the child-free internetizens are quite vocal and aggressive. That is also understandable if the whole world is assuming that you are somewhat incomplete/ childish if you choose not to have kids. But I really think there are more well-behaved kids than unruly ones, that more parents try to control kids than not, that there are always going to be stupid judgemental people in life that are best ignored and that if one has made a choice that goes against the flow, one has to be confident about it. Calling mothers ‘moos’ and ‘breeding cows’ is as unfair as being called selfish and unfeminine for not wanting to be a mother. But then, there are all kinds of corners on net and I like to believe that they all add to the social dialogue ( not to mention provide hilarious entertainment.)
I think, at least for a few privileged people, it boils down to simple “Do you want kids in your life?” question. Some people do not want to have kids because they do not feel the need of having kids. Some people find kids limit their lives’ choices. Some people do not find enough time or energy or money to dedicate to kids.
We for example, have never felt that need or desire. We realised quite early on when we both were very young , that we are not ‘that’ fond of kids to change our lifestyle, nature and dreams, which would have been compromised with a kid. It is lucky that we both found each other because if one partner desires a child and one doesn’t, it becomes quite a bad compromise no matter what you decide to do. We both firmly believe that a kid is a big responsibility and kids should be given full care and love. We both get along quite well with kids, especially husband who works for one of the biggest kids’ brands in the world. But a child has never been even on a radar as far as our future is concerned. We do like the possibility that we are free to do anything without having to think about another human being. And these range from stupid irresponsible things to serious life-altering decisions.
I am not advocating any ‘lifestyle’ so to speak, but I do think that if people are not sure whether they want to be parents or not: it is better that they don’t become parents. One has no right to bring the child into life with unsure mind, seriously. And all that BS about ‘you will love your own child’, ‘you will adjust’, ‘so many people have kids and yours will also raise itself’ actually works against the very children it purports to advocate.
Of course, having kids is a rich and fulfilling experience. I am sure people who have kids get a glimpse into growing mind and life that is magical. I also think it gives people roots when they have kids and it is a beautiful feeling. If one wants that feeling and is ready to choose that , great. If one doesn’t, then we all should respect that choice.
There would always be judgements and marginalization, but hell, that comes with many choices, so be it.

Being Childfree in Fertile India

Source: http://childfreelatha.wordpress.com/2013/09/19/all-women-beco/comment-page-1/#comment-3

Oscar Wilde has been quoted to have said “All women become like their mothers. That is their tragedy. No man does, and that is his.” This quote itself is by a fictional character in a comedy written by Oscar Wilde, who was concerned that a particular young lady’s future character may not be a good one if she became like her mother. But the quote has become popular and taken on its own meaning. It is mostly taken to imply that if men became more like their mothers – caring and loving – the world would be a better place. I am not quite sure if the popular implication is also that women should become less like their mothers and toughen up a bit.
If I had a daughter, I too would probably want her to be tough and strong than how most girls are raised and if I had a son, I would want him to be more sensitive than how most boys are raised. Having said that, how I would raise my son or daughter is a moot point because I am not exactly afraid of becoming like my mother, but unwilling to become a mother at all.
By the time I was fifteen, I knew I did not want to bear children. India is already over-populated! I saw no real benefit to add one or two children of my own when we couldn’t feed millions of hungry children in our country. I thought I should adopt one or two children when I grew up. No one took me seriously then.
Now I am in early 40s, married and childless. I haven’t ever regretted not becoming a mother! I have recently learnt a new word ‘childfree’ to describe people who are voluntarily and happily childless! The word ‘free’ comes from ‘freedom’ and also to indicate there is nothing ‘less’ in our lives just because we have no children.
I have not met many people who are childfree by choice. In India, the ‘default’ way of life is highly valued. You grow up, study, get employed, get married, have kids, help kids settle, arrange their weddings, take care of grand-children. That cycle of life is very rarely broken voluntarily. I have met a few people who chose to remain single, but to date haven’t met a single couple who said they chose not to have children. Not even in big cities in India.
This makes me wonder what is it about life that fascinates so many people enough to produce more new lives? Is it mere biological urge? Is it ‘everyone does that’? Our country is full of problems. Often people feel so hopeless that they have even lost hope on democracy and wish for a dictator to take over India! Yet, they eagerly bring more children into this system! And poorer a couple is and less educated a woman is, more the number of their children!
I also wonder, in a highly-populated society like ours which continues to value reproduction a lot, how are men and women choosing to be child-free in India are coping. Not having children has given me a lot of freedom to do many other things. Now, I have begun a ‘research’ project to identify, get connected with and to interview childfree couples. I would like to give a voice to the minority we represent! 

Childless, Naturally By Urvashi Butlalia -Reflections on not being a mother (Artlicle from Livemint)

Source: http://www.livemint.com/Leisure/jEGOb5320WMOVI1boGOfGN/Urvashi-Butalia--Childless-naturally.html

It has been two years since the man I nearly married and I decided to part. On a balmy evening, the leaves stirring gently behind us, we sit in a restaurant talking. The heartbreak is over, the friendship intact. We talk about what we shared, why we decided to go our separate ways and then, he surprises me by saying: ‘You know the one thing I do regret is that we would have had such lovely children, and you, you’d have made a fantastic mother, you’re such a natural.’ A natural? Me? What has he based this judgment on, I wonder, and what does it mean? It’s true that I love children—I did then and I do now, indeed I only have to see one on the road walking with or being carried by a parent and I ‘naturally’ veer that way. But does that mean I had what it took to be a good mother? I’m not at all sure.

Thirty years later. I am still single, I still love children. I’ve become familiar with the question: why have you never married? Don’t you feel you need a relationship? Are you not lonely? Don’t you want children? I’m not entirely sure I follow all the connections but the questions insert themselves into my head and I ask myself: do I want children? Am I missing something by not being a mother? Most friends I talked to actively want this, she wants to feel life growing within her, she wants to ‘give’ birth, she wants to be pregnant, to hold the child within her, to be able to give love unconditionally, to have someone to look after her (and her partner) in the future, to experience the joy of motherhood. I feel none of these things. Does that mean I am a cold fish? That I have no feelings? Am I fooling myself when I say I feel no active desire to have children—am I saying this because, in truth, I want them, but I do not want to seem lacking in any way so I imagine I don’t? It’s difficult to say. I’m constantly suspicious of myself though and worry: am I really the contented person I think I am or am I just pretending?

**********

My friend’s statement stays with me. It comes back to haunt me time and again. Am I such a natural? Then why is the desire for motherhood not growing inside me actively?

I think back to my friends who talk about being able to love unconditionally. I think, well, this is not something I am unfamiliar with—why do people assume such feelings then are only meant for children? My friends have children, talk of sleepless nights, of irresponsible husbands, unhelpful siblings, of school admissions, of careers given up, of grades and universities: I hear this all the time. And I hear the throwaway remark: ‘Well, how would you know? You’ve never been a mother.’

**********

I’ve just got my first job. It’s in a publishing house: my father goes to the general manager, a genial Bengali, and tells him that he had better look after his daughter. The general manager tells me this is the first time they have employed a woman in an executive position: normally they do not like to do this because women go off and get married and have children. He makes it sound like a crime. I promise him I will not do this. I keep my promise. Long after I leave my job. No marriage, no children.

**********

My mother and I are talking. I worry for you, she tells me, what will you do when you grow old? Everyone needs someone. If you don’t want to marry, why don’t you just adopt a child? But is that a good reason for adopting a child, I ask her, to have someone around when you grow old? And what’s the guarantee anyway? No, no, she quickly switches tack. That’s not why I think you should adopt. But just think what wonderful grandparents this potential child is missing out on! Good enough reason for adopting, don’t you think? I take her seriously. Perhaps she knows more than I do, I tell myself, and I start to search out adoption possibilities. For a while, I am quite excited by the change in my life that this promises, but in the end, I do not have the courage, or the motivation. I give up.

**********

I’ve set up my own publishing house, publishing books by and about women. I am fiercely passionate about this, it’s what gives me joy, it’s what involves me, I know this is what I want to do all my life. I want somehow to make a dent in the way the world sees women, to be part of that change. Is this madness, this obsession? Why didn’t I feel this way about children? Or am I just deflecting an unfulfilled desire? I’m told motherhood is a woman’s destiny, it’s what completes her. So what’s all this about publishing? But I don’t feel incomplete, or that I have missed my destiny. Is there something wrong with me?

**********

My friend Judith has been trying to have a child for many years. She’s deeply depressed, the relationship with her husband is becoming more and more tense. She’s gone through many miscarriages, they’re both desperate for children, but they can’t seem to have them. She and I talk one day, standing in the dark near a lamp post in a cold European town. Why don’t you adopt, I ask her? How can I, she says, I’m not at all sure how I will feel towards the child if she is not mine. But she will be yours, I assure her. She may not be born of your body but she will be yours. We talk. I am passionate about the joys of adoption, the importance of it, the fact that ‘naturalness’ means nothing in motherhood. Once home in India, I write her a long letter, persuasive, eloquent. She tells me that went a long way in making her decide. Today she has two lovely daughters, sisters, adopted from the same country, and she’s a best-selling author of a book on motherhood. Why was I so persuasive? I don’t really know.

**********

I’m with my friend Mona Ahmed, a hijra, at her home in Delhi’s Mehendiyan, an area with two mosques, a madrassa, two graveyards, a dhobi ghat and many houses. A man till the age of eighteen, and then castrated and now a woman after a sex-change operation, Mona tells me that she has always, always wanted to be a mother. I wanted to hold a child in my arms, to feel life against me, to learn motherhood, to bring the child up, she says. In her early seventies now, Mona fulfilled the desire to adopt a little over twenty years ago when a neighbour died in childbirth and her husband had no use for the daughter she had given birth to. Mona ‘created’ a family, herself as abbu, father, her hijra friend Neelam as ammi, mother, her guru Chaman as dadi, grandmother. The assigned roles though were a bit more mixed up. It was Mona who was the real mother; she was the one who nurtured Ayesha, gave her a name, a birth date, an identity. I chose the 26th of January as her birth date, she said, for I wanted that she be free like India. And I learnt how to be a mother, she adds, I went every day to the doctor, the pediatrician, and asked her to teach me how to feed the child, how to burp her, how to bathe, change, what to watch out for, how to develop antennae about when to wake up, and so on. Can motherhood then be learnt? Is this what there is to it? What about the ‘naturalness’ of it to women? What about someone like Mona—abbu, father, but actually mother.

**********

Mona’s daughter, Ayesha, comes to visit me. We talk about her life, a young girl, brought up in a hijra household, the father (Mona) actually her mother, the grandmother (Chaman) referred to as ‘he’ by everyone but Dadi, grandmother, to Ayesha. Can you imagine what it was like? she asks me. They gave me so much love, but a young girl growing up, she needs some things, she has questions to ask about her self, her body, who was I to ask? There was no other female, only these men/women, these people of indeterminate sexuality. I was so alone. Perhaps motherhood can’t be learnt after all.

**********

On a Thursday morning Bina, the daughter of the presswallah across the road, runs away. No one suspects anything till it’s afternoon. She’d gone to school to sit for an examination, perhaps she’s gone out with friends afterwards. But Bina is a ‘good’ girl, she does not go off without informing her parents, so as afternoon turns to evening they start to worry. Back at home in their community, they wonder whether to go to the police. They are afraid of scandal—suppose it is something innocent, the girl’s just gone off somewhere and fallen asleep, why make her disappearance public? But in the evening, they learn that a young boy, the son of a neighbour, is also missing. Suspicion begins to solidify into certainty. In the end, a report is filed. Two, three days later, both are discovered in a neighbouring town, and brought back home. They swear that they wandered away innocently—went for a walk to the zoo, then a film, then, frightened that the parents would be angry, they boarded a bus and went off to a relative’s house. Did you sleep with each other, the anxious parents ask in euphemisms, there is no straight way to ask youngsters if they have had sex, no real vocabulary. No, no is the vehement denial. The parents are relieved: they don’t stop to ask how the youngsters so quickly understand what it is they are asking.

A month later Bina is pregnant. Her mother and I take her to a nearby clinic. We try to tell the doctor that it was an accident, but Bina is quicker than us. No, she says, it wasn’t my first time with this man. We’re silent. Clearly she lied to her mother and to me. Her mother is devastated: I did so much for her, and this is how she pays me back? I understand her grief, but I wonder too—all that stuff about unconditional love, where did this notion of payback enter the picture? How do children pay back? Bina has her abortion, and remains persona non grata. The young man disappears from her life, and soon after marries someone else. Men’s peccadillos are easily tolerated.

Two years later, she runs away again. This time with a married man. His wife is unable to give him children, so he marries Bina, brings her into the household. She gives him two children, he is delirious. She’s now married, and a mother. Her parents are relieved and happy. Everything is settled. She’s a mother. No one will say anything now—besides her husband also has money. Legitimacy and wealth—a powerful combination. Later, she will finance her young brother to buy a car and begin a taxi service.

**********

My friend from overseas is visiting. We’re talking over dinner. It’s her son’s birthday, she does not know whether to call him or not, their relationship is difficult, tense. She’s no longer with his father, he resents her because he feels she does not give him enough time or attention, she worries that he has not yet found a job. She calls him. Happy birthday son, she says. They talk, with affection, and then, suddenly, without warning, there is anger, resentment, almost a kind of hatred. I knew it, he says, you always do this, you always want to make me feel small. She tries to explain, he will not listen, she’s devastated, but struggles to keep the conversation open. It ends badly. Am I a bad mother? she asks me. Is it wrong of me to want a career? I have done what I could for him, I love him, but surely it is time he took his life in his hands? What do you think I should do? I have no answer.

**********

I’m at home. My mother, ninety years old, is unwell. She’s becoming weaker by the day, she’s unable to eat, she has to be helped to the bathroom. One day, as I take her to the bathroom and help to clean her up, she asks me, how will I ever repay you for this? And I ask myself, and her, why should she even think this way? She’s spent the better part of her life being a mother not to one but four children, surely we owe her something? That old payback thing again. As she gets weaker, I find myself structuring my life around her needs: leaving the office to come home for lunch so she is not alone, putting her to bed in the evenings, staying with her, her hand in mine, till she is peacefully asleep, bathing her, cleaning her, feeding her, taking her for a walk, spending time with her… in other words, being a mother to her. One of my friends comments on this, you’ve become the mother. My women friends and I discuss this, we find that all of us are in similar situations, mothers to our mothers, becoming our mothers. Was this what was meant by it being natural?

**********

We’re trying to fix a meeting for an NGO that I am on the board of. There are six of us who need to meet and we’re juggling dates. One of us, a man, says a weekend is better for him as his young son is getting married and he will not be free earlier. The other one announces that she is about to become a grandmother, and suddenly people start trading stories about being mothers and grandmothers, offering each other stories of how wonderful it all is. I pitch in saying I don’t know about any of this, and am told, don’t worry, we’ll make you an honorary grandma, no worries if you don’t have children. How true, I think, I have no worries of that kind. I will never have to worry about which school to send my child to, or be forced to think of her percentages when it comes to entering college. Or deal with the deeper anxieties that all mothers must have to deal with.

**********

But relief isn’t all. There’s also concern. I’ve just seen a friend totally devastated at losing her young son. Barely twenty, he died in a freak accident, she is inconsolable, she feels a part of her has been torn away, wrenched out of her body almost. This too is part of motherhood, this deep, intense attachment, this terrible, devastating despair when you lose a child. Could I have coped with this had it happened to me? Useless to speculate, but a sort of fear settles around my heart for all the mothers who lose children—surely, I think, there can be no loss worse than this. There’s relief too, perhaps a selfish sort of relief, at being childless.

**********

But there’s also concern, a question. For years I have identified myself as a single woman. It’s important to me this definition: singleness is, for me, a positive state, one

that is not defined by a lack, by something missing, by a negative—as for example the word ‘unmarried’ is. But with this children business, we don’t even have the language to define a positive state. I mean, there is childlessness and there is childlessness. How often have we heard that a couple is childless, that a woman who cannot bear a child is defined as barren. Why should this be? I did not make a choice not to have children, but that’s how my life panned out. I don’t feel a sense of loss at this, my life has been fulfilling in so many other ways. Why should I have to define it in terms of a lack? Am I a barren woman? I can’t square this with what I know of myself.

**********

I recall one of the authors we’ve published, a domestic worker called Baby Halder. She had her first child when she was barely thirteen. A child herself, she became a mother before she had time to even think. At some point, Baby, reflecting on her childhood, commented on how ephemeral, how brief it was. One afternoon, exhausted from playing host to her sister’s suitors, Baby slumped against the wall of her home and reflected on her life. So brief was her childhood that she saw the entire history pass before her in a few moments. I licked every moment, she said, as her cow licks her calf, treasuring it. For so many of our young girls, despite laws that forbid it, motherhood comes even before they have stopped being children. Is this right? Why is this thing so valorized?

**********

Nothing is simple though. The newspapers have been full of the story of a Bengali couple in Norway—the Norwegian authorities have taken their two children away from them. If reports are to be believed, one of the children has something called ‘attachment disorder’—he starts banging his head against the wall when he sees his mother. The papers speak of a tense, conflicted, sometimes violent relationship between the mother and the child. Finally, the mother is deemed unfit to look after the children, and they are handed over to their uncle. Back at home in India, the whole thing acquires other dimensions altogether—politics and nationalism enter the picture. The issue seems to be how Norway can decide on what is right and what is not for our children. In Bengal, the Child Rights Committee decides to give custody back to the mother. None of the reports in the papers says anything about whether the mother is competent to look after the children or not, or indeed how the children are being affected by this constant backing and forthing.

Whatever the rights and wrongs of this case, what concerns me is a different thing. On a membership-based email network called feministsindia, there is a general sense of relief that custody has been awarded to the mother. There seems to be an assumption that the mother is the ‘natural’ (back to that natural stuff again) guardian, the best person to look after the children. It’s not the rights and wrongs of this particular case that worry me—my knowledge of them is, after all, only based on newspaper reports.

What concerns me is this: as feminists, we’ve questioned everything about the ‘naturalness’ of motherhood but here we are, in a way almost unquestioningly accepting that naturalness, not even entertaining the notion that mothers can be violent, that they can be incapable of looking after their children, or even unwilling to do so. I wonder what is going on here—was the response of the Norwegian authorities a culturally insensitive one? Or was it that they believed, as often happens, only the father’s version? Were all media reports of the mother’s supposed violence towards her children then totally wrong? Or are we, as feminists, reaffirming the motherhood myth? Where does the truth lie? Is the relationship between a mother and a child always a wonderful one? I have no answer to these questions.

**********

So what do we have in the end? The ‘naturalness’ of motherhood? The ‘curse’ of childlessness? The dread of barrenness? A life filled with lack, with loss of what might have been? Or just another way of living? A choice, happenstance, circumstance, call it what you like, but for me, it’s a happy, contented, fulfilled life, despite—or perhaps because of—being what is called ‘childless’. For those of you who’ve doubted yourself about this, let me assure you, it’s a good place to be.

Urvashi Butalia co-founded India’s first feminist publishing house, Kali for Women, in 1984. She continues to publish and promote books for, on and about women in South Asia as the publisher of Zubaan. She has edited several collections, and is the author of The Other Side of Silence: Voices From the Partition of India.

BEING FREE

I remember the relief and joy when I heard the term “Childfree” for the first time, I felt that it conveyed my attitude better than the self-deprecating ‘child-less’. Would you ever call an intelligent, beautiful, smart, fun-loving, and not-to-mention humble, happy-go-lucky woman who is completely at peace with herself and the world as “anything”-less? Other than, probably, stress-less or worry-less! In my eyes without a child I am only ‘more’ of everything that I personally value.  Till I hadn’t heard of CF, it irked me that I might get labeled as something I am clearly not: Child-less. Not anymore though, now there are three kinds of people in the world:

1.       childfree-by-choice,

2.       childfree-by-chance , and

3.       parents;

All three have the equal right to live happily with their heads held high. The point is: no one is childless anymore; and having a child is a just a preference, it is not an obligation. (Even the people who were called “childless” in the old times aren’t to be pitied, I have personally seen many such ‘erstwhile’ childless couples live an enriching and fulfilled lives till their very end; but this is besides the point.)

Many people choose to be free of kids for different reasons, but one thing that is common with all of them is the reactions they evoke from their friends, families and even strangers. We get to hear responses ranging from dis-belief, shock, anger, denial, ridicule, hate, hurt, sorrow, pity (ewww!)  to  jealousy . It kind of makes you wonder what’s ailing your loved-ones, where did all the love and affection suddenly disappear? Sadly, often, we get defensive in the onslaught of such negativity.

In times like these it helps to remember that although the people’s perception of you might have altered, but the love of your friends and family would not really change, in fact it is the same love that is causing them to be the rain on your party. They are un-necessarily, yet genuinely, concerned that you have made a wrong choice; and they’d do anything, including ramming their fists up your comfort zones, to dissuade you from it. However earnestly you may talk about the wisdom of being child-free you have to accept the fact that many of your loved ones will never really completely understand or agree with you on this. The more they love you the more they’d trouble your peace.  I personally find here, as in the face of any adversity, we just need to keep calm and hold on to our wits. Little disagreement is in fact good for any healthy relationship; it gives us a chance to be in that relationship and also to be ourselves.  A combination of infinite patience and sense of humour is a potent cure for all evil. It can be a weapon and it can be a shield; used either way it can effectively save you from getting hurt by others and, more importantly, it keeps you from causing any dent in your social-circle “without compromising on your peace”.

The divide between the parents and CFBC will always be there, but let us remember that since CF have more time and more peace of mind from not having a brat-infested home, it would be nice to help the ward-weary parents now and then. Be their missing link to fun and peace.  The onus is on us to give the resemblance of some sanity to the world; try to clean the unholy-mess they are creating for their unsuspecting little bachchas to inherit.  Not just the blah-bys but their pah-rents should be thankful that some of us have the good sense of using our minds instead of our wombs.

  

CannyKan: “There is no mystery half as alluring as a woman secretly smiling to herself.”