Over the years, your support has made Women’s Web the leading resource for women in India. Now, it is our turn to ask, how can we make this even more useful for you? Please take our short 5 minute questionnaire – your feedback is important to us!
The author writes about the deplorable state of women in India and emphasizes that whether to bear children or not should be a woman's choice- 'Her womb, her choices'
The author writes about the deplorable state of women in India and emphasizes that whether to bear children or not should be a woman’s choice- ‘Her womb, her choices’
I rarely browse through the newspaper. The reasons are too many, the major one being- unable to take time for it from my mommy-hood schedule. The other one being that, it depresses me sometimes to read through various hideous acts that get committed so casually.
Being a woman, feminism comes naturally to us and even if it doesn’t, we tend to join the herd of feminists because we women want to believe that nothing is unachievable!! Well, actually, there is nothing that is really not achievable for us.
We are usually able to achieve everything we set our hearts and minds at. If in case some of us are unable to achieve something, or we fail at something, the society (read family, friends, well-wishers and acquaintances) ensures we push ourselves beyond our acceptable limits and at least come close enough to achieving it. One such thing that the world in general believe is attainable by a woman is being able to bear a child. If for some reasons she is unable to then come in plenty and ample advice, cures etc. as to how she will be able bear one! Resorting to medical help come much later for some women even in this sci-fi-next-gen.
Imagine, we go all out in supporting a woman when she wants to have a baby, would we offer the same support, consolation, advice if she decided not to have a child. The recent newspaper I browsed through carried a full page article about how the act of abortion is being legally accepted by various countries.
Would it be accepted in a country where, fetuses are killed randomly because they suspect a girl child being born, where fetuses are always aborted when conceived unwillingly as the family is unable to bear the expenses of a child and the mother is going to be a single parent or an unmarried mother.
I strongly believe that each of us is a unique creation of god. I also believe that our time and purpose of being in this world is predefined. It may sound cliched but don’t we express similar views when someone departs from the world.
We often have heard people say, ‘my life, my choices’. Similarly for a woman it has to be- her womb, her choices. She needs to have a choice in deciding whether she is physically or mentally ready to have a child. The cases of postpartum depression are higher in woman who are not mentally ready for a child. There are cases where women are abandoned by family in the state of pregnancy over family feuds. Raising a child and bringing a child into the world is one of the most purest and beautiful feelings. However, it isn’t a very pleasant experience when it has to be done alone. A woman may not be ready to handle or give birth to a baby for various factors, major one being her health.
Legalizing abortion may have repercussions; it may lead to people indulging in unprotected sex without worrying about the consequences. It may lead to increase in the rate of abortion too! However the government would set some guidelines when legalizing it, wouldn’t they? We do have doctors now, giving medicines for abortion or using other techniques of abortion even though it’s not legalized. I’m apprehensive whether it will get legalized or not because as law makers we lay more stress on the ban of slaughtering of cows than passing quick judgment against rapists. As a nation, whether its cinema or sports, we will continue to be- ‘applaud men a little more than woman’. So, I don’t really know if it will ever be, ‘her womb, her choices’.
Image Source: Pexels
read more...
Women's Web is an open platform that publishes a diversity of views, individual posts do not necessarily represent the platform's views and opinions at all times.
Stay updated with our Weekly Newsletter or Daily Summary - or both!
He said that he needed sometime to himself. I waited for him as any other woman would have done, and I gave him his space, I didn't want to be the clingy one.
Trigger Warning: This deals with mental trauma and depression, and may be triggering for survivors.
I am someone who believes in honesty and trust, I trust people easily and I think most of the times this habit of mine turns into bane.
This is a story of how a matrimonial website service turned into a nightmare for me, already traumatized by the two relationships I’ve had. It’s a story for every woman who lives her life on the principles of honesty and trust.
And when she enters the bedroom, she sees her husband's towel lying on the bed, his underwear thrown about in their bathroom. She rolls her eyes, sighs and picks it up to put in the laundry bag.
Vasudha, age 28 – is an excellent dancer, writer, podcaster and a mandala artist. She is talented young woman, a go getter and wouldn’t bat an eyelid if she had to try anything new. She would go head on with it. Everyone knew Vasudha as this cheerful and pretty young lady.
Except when marriage changed everything she knew. Since she was always outdoors, whether for office or for travelling for her dance shows, Vasudha didn’t know how to cook well.
Going by her in-laws definition of cooking – she had to know how to cook any dishes they mentioned. Till then Vasudha didn’t know that learning to cook was similar to getting an educational qualification. As soon as she entered the household after her engagement, nobody was interested what she excelled at, everybody wanted to know – what dishes she knew how to cook.