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For All the Women Who Have Been Excluded on Mother’s Day
We deserve to celebrate this day any way we want
I went to the store a few days ago and saw flowers everywhere. I realized it was just days before Mother’s Day and so, even though it wasn’t remotely in my budget, I bought myself some pink Gerbera daisies that were so beautiful, I couldn’t stop smiling as I made my way through the store.
It’s a funny thing to buy myself something for Mother’s Day. I hate this holiday more than any other — even obnoxious Independence Day and April Fool’s Day.
But I only hate it because it is a day that feels aggressively exclusionary.
If you wanted children, but didn’t get to have them, tough nuts for you, sister. You don’t get a day to celebrate your contributions to other people’s children, nor will society recognize or acknowledge your grief in any way.
And if your only experience of motherhood was of loss — for instance, a miscarriage or abortion with a “re-do” that never came — you get even less empathy on Mother’s Day. Grief isn’t allowed, so those women get swept under the rug as if we aren’t here, at all.
If that’s not bad enough, then can we talk about the hyper-aggressive PR campaign around this holiday? Is it just me or do the ads start earlier…
