This is a delightful response from The Travelling Circus to my 10 questions about your feminist parenthood. She shares some very interesting perspectives in her response, including being partnered to a professional athlete and living for some of their time in Japan and her conflicted relationship with breastfeeding. I love how she describes her interactions with her male partner around feminist parenting, too, but my very favourite part of her response was this:
- What has surprised you most about motherhood? It surprises me all the time how it is both so intuitive and so very confusing. I have feelings of real, true confidence in my instincts followed by sheer doubt over my decisions or priorities, often within the same 10-minute period.
- How has your feminism changed over time? What is the impact of motherhood on your feminism? My realization that my feminism does not have to be complete or perfectly wrapped up like a mission statement was hands-down the most important change I’ve ever made. I had this idea that I couldn’t share my perspective or give my opinion until I was 100% sure that I knew my position would never change/was correct/would be accepted by other feminists. Motherhood provided me that reality check by putting me face-to-face with the constantly evolving nature of life and knowledge. I am totally winging it when it comes to parenting, but that doesn’t mean I can’t have an opinion or feel confident or discuss my experiences and feelings. I apply that same principle to my evolving feminism and try to go easy on myself when I realize my own inconsistencies or change my point-of-view.
The way she expresses such acceptance in herself as a mother and a feminist – I really appreciated that.
(You can find all the many other responses in this series here. If you’d like to respond to these questions yourself you can either email me your answers and I’ll put them on blue milk as a guest post or you can post them elsewhere and let me know and I’ll link to them).
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