Today Monday • March 7, 2005

In a generation that has much, S'pore women still can't have it all

Teo Hwee Nakhweenak@newstoday.com.sg

They headed straight for the cot. One took a corner of the blanket and lifted it slightly. They looked. Then, without a word to the woman lying on the bed next to the cot, the two women left.

Gender check.

That was my welcome into this world.

I was my parents' third daughter, and my arrival — to some — was cause more for disappointment than celebration.

When Ma gave birth to my eldest sister, her in-laws sent over a pot of boiled pig's intestine. One whole intestine, uncut.

My grandmother chuckled.

"Your in-laws are hoping for a son the next time round," she told Ma. "That big chunk of an intestine is to 'change' your womb, so that it can produce a boy."

It didn't work. By the time I arrived, Ma was exhausted. Three daughters in four years.

As she cradled me, she cried. Not for her, but for me.

Today, Ma looks at me with pride.

Sometimes, with a tinge of envy, she comments on my seemingly full life, my promising career and doting husband, my material indulgences.

But every now and then, she reminds me gently: "Nak, you should start thinking about having a baby. And then you'll have it all."

Can I really have it all?

While a woman's status in society has made quite a leap since my mother's time, some things have changed precious little. Perhaps they will never change.

The truth is, while women have dramatically expanded their role in society over the last few decades, men have hardly progressed.

The default burden of domestic responsibilities still falls primarily on women. In Singapore, where a domestic helper is almost de rigueur for working couples with children, even the handling of matters related to the maid is mainly left to the female in the family. We won't even talk about who does the household chores for a couple without help.

While women have stepped with ease into what is traditionally seen as men's territory at the workplace, men have not taken on domestic obligations as naturally.

When I go out with girlfriends of mine who have become mothers, I have come to expect frantic phone calls from fathers asking for help: Jamie's refusing to eat, what shall I do? When am I supposed to give the next feed? How much of that medicine did Doc say to give?

Not surprisingly, these dinners often end abruptly, earlier than planned.

In reviewing child-friendly policies in March last year, the Government predictably disregarded calls to consider paternity leave. Being the ever-pragmatic government, they are well aware how much help men can render, compared to women. Minister Lim Hng Kiang, the chairman of the steering committee on population, told the House that if given too much paternity leave, men would probably stay home "doing nothing".

In other words, while women today are expected to be superwomen, men remain just that — men.

Having said that, no one can deny the exclusivity of a mother's role in a child's growing years. This firm belief is what has kept me from venturing into the next phase of my life.

Motherhood is more than dumping your child with the grandma or the maid, or at an infant care centre.

It has to be better than affording your child 45 minutes of the day before he sleeps — because you have meetings to attend and work to clear.

Singapore has only just woken up to the urgency of developing an infrastructure that can sufficiently support the working mother. Foremost on the list is a mindset change in employers so that a mother-friendly workplace can be the norm rather than the exception. Can that happen within this generation?

Norway, reputed for its family-friendly policies and high birth rate for a developed economy, took 50 years.

So. Reality check.

If you are expecting the men to shoulder more than they are traditionally conditioned to, get real.

If you're waiting for miracles to happen soon at the workplace, forget it.

Want to have a baby, and give your child that undivided devotion? The best option might be the most obvious one.

It takes courage to say this, because it is just not politically correct to want to give up one's career for full-time motherhood. Many of the women I know would not agree with my view that a mother should commit to her new role full-time, at least for the first crucial years.

Because the women's liberation movement started out with fighting for a woman's rights to work, gender equality has since always been seen as being synonymous with a woman's ability to work.

I know women who have chosen to stay home — but feel lousy about themselves.

At the same time, I look at friends who are working mothers and very often see a harassed woman who complains about the trials of being a working mother. Ironically, while thinking that we have at last been set free, women have let themselves get weighed down by the shackles of the right to have it all, and with the measurement of a woman's self-worth by her career. Should not true liberation be the ability to go after the one thing that we want — happiness?

Right now, I have accepted the shackles. I have chosen my career, at least until my biological clock protests and my maternal instincts cannot be ignored.

Am I better off than my mother?

She had too little. I have too much.

For her generation, life was ruled by simplicity. For mine, it is complicated by greed. Compared to the world that greeted me as a newborn girl, society has moved on.

Still, for whatever those credit card ads would like us to believe, the feminist-propagated notion that women can have it all is a myth — still, at least for my generation. And I wonder, when I cradle my newborn daughter in my arms, what will I be thinking?

This commentary appears in Her Story, a book of essays by women published by the Singapore Council of Women's Organisations to mark its 25th anniversary this year. If you would have a view to share on the issues raised, please write to us at news@newstoday.com.sg