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As a single parent of a daughter, this mom is proud of her child's pride in her as a writer, and would rather be called a 'parent', eschewing the expected pedestal that comes with being a mother in India.
As a single parent of a daughter, this mom is proud of her child’s pride in her as a writer, and would rather be called a ‘parent’, eschewing the expected pedestal that comes with being a mother in India.
“But kids don’t stay with you if you do it right. It’s the one job where, the better you are; the more surely you won’t be needed in the long run.” ― Barbara Kingsolver, award winning American writer.
I remember going to a daycare as a young child. One day, there was an inspection, and one of the visiting officials, a bespectacled senior lady asked, “So kids, what do you want to become when you grow older?” The answers ranged from astronaut, puppeteer, to the usual teacher, doctor, and when it was my turn, in my typical loud and strident voice even as a 5 years old, I said- “Mother!”
The way I witnessed my working mother carry herself in her life, the way she talked to me about another mother of two boys – Indira Gandhi who was then the first woman Prime Minister of India, I would think that being a mother was the most glorious “job” ever, and everything else you could do on the side.
As I grew up, I realized that being a mother was not really a personal choice for most Indian women, often a compulsion, and it wasn’t a job really. It was what they were expected to do to “justify” their existence in this deeply patriarchal and feudal society.
The writing was on the wall: whatever else you do, just be a mother for sure, preferably of sons!
In a few years as a sexually active adult I chartered the territory of unsafe sex and the fear of unplanned pregnancies. And I realized how significant reproductive rights were to my identity as a woman. I finally took the leap a few years after my marriage into motherhood, and as the cliche goes, dived straight into the deep darkness of post-partum depression.
So unlike the glossy mothering magazine covers and the perfect looking mothers on TV and billboards I was the no-combed-hair for a week mom who would often feel suicidal. Motherhood was not the pristine peaceful space that it is made out to be, but was the most difficult and tormenting period of my life.
Things did ease out later with some professional help and therapy, and I found an evolved co-learner in the offspring, and that’s where my journey to becoming more than a mom also began.
I no longer wanted to be “just” mom, I wanted to be an equal co-learner and evolve in more ways than one.
Since I was left single-handedly taking care of her and addressing my own physical and mental health concerns, I took to writing online, and since then have been more than a mom to two acclaimed blogs, columns, articles on worldwide platforms, and a published book of translated short stories along with contributions to many anthologies, journals, and portals.
I strongly believe that motherhood sharpened my existing interpersonal skills, made me grow in empathy and spirit, whereas the toll it took on my mental and physical health also made me tilt towards mental health and disability activism.
Every time my little one in a Montessori class would chirp loudly and say – “My mom is a writer, her superpower is words!”, my invisible crown would glow. Thankfully my writing and reading inculcated the love for literature in her too, and now we are a pair of in-house writer and reader. What more can one ask for?!
I often write about issues concerning women in India and it has become easier to empathize, ideate, and get motivated or agitated about these issues because of my daughter. It is via the route of being a parent that I have become a better writer who looks at issues more holistically keeping the next generation in mind, and updates oneself with their lingo and concerns.
I like to be identified as a parent of the female gender more than as “mother”, because it is a heavily-loaded word and concept in my part of the world. I have shunned all the pedestals of great motherhood now as a single parent, and I believe in wholesome parenting rather than being just dad or just mom. This, I feel, is the need of the hour to have a better, equal, and sensitive world.
Be their wings be their wind beneath but don’t charter their flight co-learning at its best let them fight their fight!
What happens in a social milieu like ours that anyway tells a woman that she is not important enough? That her dreams are secondary? That everything else comes first, and maybe after everything is taken care of, can she dare to dream for herself? What happens once she becomes a mom?
But the badass woman of today doesn’t have to put herself last – maybe she can do both? Being a mom AND being herself? Finding a place for her dreams too, and going after them, without attempting to be the ‘superwoman’ society wants her to be? Do you believe in being #MomAndMore?
Editor’s note: Pooja Priyamvada is the fifth winner of our #MomAndMore blogathon for Mother’s Day! She wins an Amazon gift voucher for Rs 500. Congratulations from Team Women’s Web!
Image source: Pooja Priyamvada
Pooja Priyamvada is an author, columnist, translator, online content & Social Media consultant, and poet. An awarded bi-lingual blogger she is a trained psychological/mental health first aider, mindfulness & grief facilitator, emotional wellness trainer, reflective read more...
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Shows like Indian Matchmaking only further the argument that women must adhere to social norms without being allowed to follow their hearts.
When Netflix announced that Indian Matchmaking (2020-present) would be renewed for a second season, many of us hoped for the makers of the show to take all the criticism they faced seriously. That is definitely not the case because the show still continues to celebrate regressive patriarchal values.
Here are a few of the gendered notions that the show propagates.
A mediocre man can give himself a 9.5/10 and call himself ‘the world’s most eligible bachelor’, but an independent and successful woman must be happy with receiving just 60-70% of what she feels she deserves.
Darlings makes some excellent points about domestic violence . For such a movie to not follow through with a resolution that won't be problematic, is disappointing.
I watched Darlings last weekend, staying on top of its release on Netflix. It was a long-awaited respite from the recent flicks. I wanted badly to jump into its praise and will praise it, for something has to be said for the powerhouse performances it is packed with. But I will not be able to in a way that I really had wanted to.
I wanted to say that this is a must-watch on domestic violence that I stand behind and a needed and nuanced social portrayal. But unfortunately, I can’t. For I found Darlings to be deeply problematic when it comes to the portrayal of domestic violence and how that should be dealt with.
Before we rush to the ‘you must be having a problem because a man was hit’ or ‘much worse happens to women’ conclusions, that is not what my issue is. I have seen the praises and criticisms, and the criticisms of criticisms. I know, from having had close associations with non-profits and activists who fight domestic violence not just in India but globally, that much worse happens to women. I have written a book with case studies and statistics on that. Neither do I have any moral qualms around violence getting tackled with violence (that will be another post some day).