Lucy Cavendish: Desperate Housewives?

Lucy Cavendish, writer for The Independent, tells about the shift in her attitude towards being a stay-at-home mom. Exposed to feminist thinking from a young age, she never thought she'd give up her career to care for her family, at a time when such a choice was looked upon with horror. However, she describes her experience as a full-time career woman, wife and mother as a disaster.

I barely saw my children... The cupboard was bare, the house was cold and unloved. I felt more tired than I ever have been... I made packed lunches at 11pm. I barely spoke to my partner. At work, I sneakily called plumbers and electricians. Yet I seemed to achieve nothing, either at work or at home.

She's still a feminist but she defines it differently now:

I think women are redefining things. Working hard, being successful and beating men at their own game now seems tiring and boring and, at the end of the day, not necessarily fulfilling. It's much more fun to have freedom: the freedom to be at home, to play with the kids, to walk a dog, to make my own decisions about my life.

If I had daughters, I'd give them the books to read that my mother gave me. I would encourage them to see that they have choices, and that those choices are not between a man's world or a woman's world, or between going to work or staying at home, but the chance to do whatever it is they feel they want to do. And if it's a duster that does it for them, hey, so be it.

As more and more women make the choice to stay at home for their families, we may be seeing a change in society's acceptance of the decisions they made.

Cavendish mentions the following books in her article:
Backlash by Susan Faludi*
Happy Housewives by Darla Shine*

Source: The Independent Online Edition
* affiliate links