Somehow, we and every American parent were expected to be “back to normal” in under three months. Without income? I remember thinking to myself, “If the practical reality of pregnancy is another mouth to feed in your home, and America is a country where most people are living paycheck to paycheck, how does 12 weeks unpaid leave economically work?
The truth is: for too many people, it doesn’t. One in four American women go back to work two weeks after giving birth because they can’t afford to take any more time off than that. That is 25 per cent of American women. Equally disturbing, women who can afford to take the full 12 weeks often don’t, because it will mean incurring a “motherhood penalty” – meaning they will be perceived as less dedicated to their job and will be passed over for promotions and other career advancement. In my own household, my mother had to choose between a career and raising three children – a choice that left her unpaid and underappreciated as a homemaker – because there just wasn’t support for both paths. The memory of being in the city with my Dad is a particularly meaningful one since he was the sole breadwinner in our house, and my brothers’ and my time with him was always limited by how much he had to work. And we were an incredibly privileged family – our hardships were the stuff of other family’s dreams.
The deeper into the issue of paid parental leave I go, the clearer I see the connection between persisting barriers to women’s full equality and empowerment, and the need to redefine and in some cases, destigmatize men’s role as caregivers. In other words…thank you. In other words, in order to liberate women, we need to liberate men.
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