The Ordinary IS Extraordinary- International Women’s Day 2022

In early 2020, as the world was plunged into a global pandemic, and something that has always been hidden away below the surface of our capitalistic, patriarchal society came rising up and laid bare … just how much of the functioning of our social structures relies on unpaid/ lowly paid caring, nurturing work of people who are predominantly women.

NOTHING worked without it.

Surely, this pivotal moment in time should have shifted something …

Surely, the immense value of this work to society would now be seen, recognised and honoured …

Surely, the inequity and injustice of the burdens being carried by the nurturers of these communities would be addressed in line with now better understanding just how much depends on these carers being able to keep caring, the nurturers to keep nurturing.

But no.

As the pandemic raged, no relief was to be found.

Sure, there were articles and conversations about it, but the reality of it all was that the carers and nurturers received no relief.

Instead, they had layers of EXTRA pressures and strains layered on top of their already heavy shoulders. Remote learning, remote working, hands-on support services shutdown, staff shortages, prenatal and postnatal care reduced to impersonal and at times callous levels of service.

Add in some extra doses of financial stress, underemployment, unemployment, natural disasters, oh and now a war …

Yep, life as a nurturer in 2022 is just peachy.

And that’s before we turn to look at the state of relationships and abuse in predominantly cis-hetero partnerships.

Rates of family violence here in Australia are eye-wateringly bad. We are only just starting to come to grips with what ‘Coercive Control’ is, with many women only now starting to realise just how abusive their relationship is.

And for anyone who has had a baby in a relationship would well know, the perinatal period can put a strain on even the healthiest of partnerships let alone one built on a foundation of abuse.

We see every single day in our free peer support group, mothers desperately seeking ways to speak with their partners about how to get them to actually help them at home.

The common themes feature men who still believe we are in the 50s and that their job is to bring home the bacon and hers is to play housekeeper and bring up the children.

Or men who need their leisure time and outlets but fail to afford the same to their partner.

Or fathers who want to dictate how their child is raised while playing little to no part in the actual raising or do so in a way that contradicts and denies the mother’s parenting values and nurturing.

Yes, there ARE many examples of brilliant partnerships in our group, too. Men are more than capable (just as women are) of being worthy, compassionate and valuable nurturers, carers and partners. I know, I'm married to one of them.

But let’s not pretend that this is the case for many families right now, today.

And it is not okay.

And let's not forget the dead weight of layers that come from racism, ableism, homophobia and more.

The way our society works and is structured loves to keep our nurturers small.

It makes us feel and genuinely believe that we aren’t enough. Forever guilty, forever trying to do better, forever trying to cope.

Sleep training culture is all built into this. If you just do this, don’t do that, you’re spoiling them, don’t you want them to have healthy sleep habits for life, etc etc

As is all of the research BS of the ‘overly-attentive mother’, ‘over-functioning mother’, ‘mothers with low tolerance for crying’ as though any or all of this is because we are pathologically flawed women for actually needing to meet our baby’s legitimate needs.

We are often isolated, lonely, anxious, depressed, bored, unseen, unrecognised, undervalued and f#%^ing angry.

We are also complex, adoring, adored, in awe, filled to the brim with love, admired and often mysterious in how we actually manage to pull of our shit together and get on with life.

We live and breathe ambivalence and in that lies our strength.

We can have all of the competing emotions and STILL be incredible mothers, women, humans nurturers and carers.

Society is trying to keep us small. It needs us turning in ourselves.

This is by design.

While we continue to believe that it is US that are flawed, we will turn inward for the solutions.

But it isn’t us.

We ARE enough.

It’s what is being asked, nay DEMANDED of us that is flawed.

No human can thrive when faced with the demands we have been lead to believe are simply the ordinary acts of an ordinary mother, nurturer, carer.

We might survive, and that, my fellow nurturers is nothing short of extraordinary.

So on this IWD2022 I ask all of you to look outward.

Let’s direct our anger, our frustration, our hope, our dreams, our imagining outward and into seeking to change the way society works to one that is actively supportive and healthy for the people doing the most important work of all … nurturing new humans.

Let’s nurture on, but let’s also lead our way to a society that treats the ordinary acts of care as the extraordinarily valuable contributions they are, every day.

Our work here at Little Sparklers, home of The Beyond Sleep Training Project and Podcast strives to make this a reality. We’d love your support if this has ignited your fire.

Let’s nurture the nurturers and create a more peaceful and whole society.

Carly

Founder of Little Sparklers, home of The Beyond Sleep Training Project and Podcast

#iwd2022 #nurture #families #UnpaidCareWork