Thankful for the right to choose

I know a girl who made a comment about a girl she knows a couple of months ago that has bugged me ever since. She said, "all that one of my best friends wants to do is get married and have children... Isn't that so sad?" At the time, I didn't say anything and I wish I had, so now I will.


I spent most of my teenage years, declaring to the world (or anyone who would listen) that I would never marry. "It's not worth it", I'd say. "Why would you bother? It's too much effort". Children? Children! Are you insane? I'd dealt with enough children in the first 14 years of my life to never feel a desire to have my own. I was going to be a high flying, single career woman with an all cream apartment in the city. Yes, an all cream apartment. Anyone who didn't share this dream, in my opinion, was weak. I felt this way until December 2008, at least.

I'm not sure what changed this opinion. Maybe it was leaving school and discovering that the world was a place that no man should have to walk alone. But somewhere along the line I realised that wanting to get married and have children is a worthy desire and should not be looked down upon. My mother did it, my grandmother did it and many woman before them did it too.


Granted, it was considered "the norm" back then. Women who had the desire to have a career and remain single or unmarried were rare, if not unheard of, but many fought for the right to do so and ultimately won. It's for those women that I will be eternally grateful.


You see, these women didn't want it one way instead of the other. They wanted it both ways. They wanted the right to choose between having a career or making the home or, in some cases, both. They wanted women to be acknowledged, heard and respected on an intellectual level.


As a group, we have come very far. Yes we're not earning the same as our male counterparts yet, but I firmly believe that we will get there someday. What upsets me is when statements, such as the one my acquaintance made, throw us two steps behind. Who have we really become if we look so disdainfully on those who choose a life of child rearing instead of boardroom appointments?


I'm so thankful for the right to choose. I was pretty sure that I had chosen but I'm not any more and I'm okay with that. What's great is that if I don't want to, I don't have to and if I do, I will. I'll always have the key to both doors.