Althouse: "As a little girl, I had never imagined myself with babies, or, for that matter, with a husband."

May 26, 2015

"As a little girl, I had never imagined myself with babies, or, for that matter, with a husband."

"My vision of the future had involved an apartment in New York City, a cat, and a typewriter. I was sure children would get in the way of my ambitions — and, worse, that I’d poison them with my resentment. In Caroline Moorehead’s biography of the swashbuckling journalist Martha Gellhorn, she describes how Gellhorn adopted an Italian orphan after World War II. At first she was smitten, but before long she felt trapped, writing that her son was, 'through no act of his own, but because of a careless, inconceivably frivolous and selfish act of mine, making life untenable.' She was a distant and sometimes cruel mother, and her child grew up to be a great disappointment to her; she once described him as 'a total loss, a poor small unwanted life.' Chilling as this was, I took a bleak sort of comfort in it, since it confirmed that I was right not to take the leap...."

From Michelle Goldberg's essay "I Was a Proud Non-Breeder. Then I Changed My Mind."

61 comments:

MadisonMan said...: From the Article:

I fear I’ve let down other women who disavow children and who, because of my example, might face an extra smidge of condescending doubt.

As if the author is that important that her decision will in any way influence others.

You're just one of millions, honey. Nothing *Special* at all. Sorry to break it to you.; 5/26/15, 9:28 AM
MacMacConnell said...: Never say "never".; 5/26/15, 9:37 AM
Eric the Fruit Bat said...: What kind of a cat?; 5/26/15, 9:41 AM
Etienne said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 5/26/15, 9:48 AM
rhhardin said...: That's really long. Paragraphing saves it. You can read the first lines.

I agree with her that travel is really boring.

Not travelling is pretty interesting. This needs an essay. Thoreau maybe did one.; 5/26/15, 9:49 AM
Tibore said...: On the one hand, the author sounds rather self-centered, at least at first in her earlier life. On the other, she sounds pleasantly amazed to discover that there is such a thing as moving beyond being self-centered, and that parenthood can do that to a person.

I'll chalk up the first impression to the author providing intentional contrast with her earlier life to her preset one. The story's about growth, and it's a good one to see, especially in a magazine dedicated to the sort of self-absorbed individuals she used to be.

-----

As an aside, Goldberg's reference to Gellhorn led me to discover something I didn't previously know: Martha Gellhorn had both an adopted son named Sandy, and a stepson also named Sandy. Source is a Telegraph article titled "The war for Martha's memory" (I'd link it, but Google blogger tends to swallow posts I put links in for some odd reason). Gellhorn may have ended up resenting "Little Sandy" (the adopted one) and gotten along much better with "Big Sandy" (the stepson from her other marriage, who was older than "Little Sandy"), but the two step-brothers apparently got along with each other just fine.

I had no idea she even had children, step-, adopted, or whatever.; 5/26/15, 9:49 AM
traditionalguy said...: The raising of children is the Number One of human skills without which few others are ever learned. That's because 90% of adulthood requires using meekness and patience tools that are learned by letting a piece of your "me first ambition" die off to benefit the children. And forty years later it pays off.; 5/26/15, 9:51 AM
SGT Ted said...: Female culture is driven by narcissists and lunatics it would seem.; 5/26/15, 9:58 AM
Ignorance is Bliss said...: I'm guessing that a tag for golb is not what you intended.; 5/26/15, 9:59 AM
themightypuck said...: Post hoc rationalizion so as to cling to the idea of her unfettered free will.; 5/26/15, 10:01 AM
David said...: That was excruciating. With some effort, I almost make it halfway.; 5/26/15, 10:06 AM
Sydney said...: Tracy and Hepburn made a movie based on the Gellhorn adoption. Woman of the Year.; 5/26/15, 10:15 AM
Sebastian said...: "I’m not by nature a cheerful person. Like a lot of writers, I’m given to tedious bouts of anxiety, depression, and self-loathing. I am introverted, and feel shattered if I don’t have time alone every day. Worse, from a parental perspective, I am impatient, easily undone by quotidian frustrations."

I, I, I.

No wonder O does well with them.

At least she seems to come by her self-loathing honestly.; 5/26/15, 10:16 AM
Meade said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 5/26/15, 10:17 AM
Meade said...: SGT Ted said...
"Female culture is driven by narcissists and lunatics it would seem"

And what — male culture has been driven by other-centered sane guys?; 5/26/15, 10:19 AM
jimbino said...: Ann Althouse,

I invite you to reproduce Ann Landers's poll of her readers, if only to see if things have changed, now that kids have gummint for a third parent or ersatz. father; 5/26/15, 10:29 AM
jimbino said...: rhhardin says:

Not travelling is pretty interesting. This needs an essay. Thoreau maybe did one.

The mass of mothers lead lives of quiet desperation.; 5/26/15, 10:32 AM
bleh said...: There's got to be a microaggression in there somewhere.; 5/26/15, 10:48 AM
William said...: Puppies are cuter than babies and, after they reach a certain age, easier to housebreak. And when it comes to reciprocal affection sharing, puppies are far more cost effective. If you think mothers are narcissistic and self centered, you haven't spent any time with any two year olds.; 5/26/15, 10:49 AM
Ann Althouse said...: "I'm guessing that a tag for golb is not what you intended."

Ha ha. That's the failure of Blogger to autocomplete in the tag window (as it used to, as I got used to).; 5/26/15, 11:19 AM
dbp said...: "A purple-clad lactation consultant who’d been lauded by the New York Times prescribed a regimen of round-the-clock feeding, pumping, and tea-guzzling that, had I followed it, would have broken me in a day; her visit left me feeling crushed, inadequate, and then humiliated for not standing up to her."

It has been a while since the nursing era for our kids but this really resonates. My wife and pretty much every mom we know, has had the same experience with "lactation consultants". Really a better term for them would be lactation nazis. Really, whatever you do, it is not enough and you are not just a "bad mom" for not nursing enough, you are an awful person and should have your baby taken away if you don't nurse enough.; 5/26/15, 11:19 AM
Deep State Reformer said...: Please Michelle take Gellhorn's advice. You'll be a terrible mother, cuz you're a terrible person, and it's best if people like you just die off.; 5/26/15, 11:36 AM
JSD said...: I’m expertly trained to hear the dog whistle call
But “breeders” and “deniers” contempt on you all; 5/26/15, 11:49 AM
Deep State Reformer said...: It's best for everyone if Goldberg's ilk just dies out. The self-administered holocaust of SWPLs, anti-white, anti-Christian secular Jews, & left-wing intellectuals is a trend I like to see encouraged.

What the fuck is Martha Gellhorn even remembered for other than being married to Hemingway for a few years?; 5/26/15, 11:49 AM
YoungHegelian said...: Notice that in this whole discussion of Goldberg "birthin' no (or some) babies", she never once mentions any part that her Jewish faith or her Judaism played in any of her judgements. No wonder Reform Judaism is dying.

"But, YH", you say, "maybe she's just an atheist or agnostic, and she isn't a 'believer'."

To which I would reply that if you queried Goldberg on the roots of her squish-leftism you would no doubt get an earful of how it relates to her being Jewish. Why, you might even hear the phrase "Tikkun olam". But, mommahood & Judaism --- nada.

I also don't notice any mention of happy grandparents, either.; 5/26/15, 11:58 AM
Scott M said...: she once described him as 'a total loss, a poor small unwanted life

The amount of sadness this injected into my day was unexpected.; 5/26/15, 12:03 PM
jr565 said...: There feminists go again denying the natural state of things. Boys will be boys and girls will be girls. She has been at war with her natural state since she took college courses on male patriarchy. It's ok to be a mom. You don't have to turn in your feminism card.; 5/26/15, 12:19 PM
MadisonMan said...: It has been a while since the nursing era for our kids but this really resonates. My wife and pretty much every mom we know, has had the same experience with "lactation consultants". Really a better term for them would be lactation nazis

Same. Pumping and feeding them later? You might as well be feeding them poison. Unless you have the newborn attached to you 24/7, you are a bad bad person.

Easy to laugh at now. A bit harder when you're a new Mom, doubting everything.; 5/26/15, 12:21 PM
n.n said...: Breeding is a technical description used in lieu of procreation, child-bearing, etc. with an intent to debase human life.

That said, the salient point is that procreation is a choice (before conception/fertilization), but it is the definition of insanity to normalize or promote orientations and behaviors antithetical to evolutionary fitness. As well as to recognize the psychopathy (e.g. narcissism) engendered by affirmatively denying our nature and reality.

Perhaps the burden of adulthood, including deference and responsibility, is too much for some women and men, and they can certainly choose to abstain from full participation. The "Peter Pan" syndrome is tolerable when it is not a progressive condition in society and humanity, but it is irrational to normalize or promote this syndrome in the general population.; 5/26/15, 12:21 PM
MikeR said...: Jeepers: http://www.stats.uwo.ca/faculty/bellhouse/stat353annlanders.pdf
The Ann Landers survey is used as a textbook example of why self-selection in survyes gives unreliable results.
Really random surveys got exactly the opposite result: about 90% of respondents said if they could do it again, they would have children.; 5/26/15, 12:41 PM
buwaya said...: Martha Gellhorn was a pretty good journalist, though unfortunately of the "celebrity" sort.
She did write some good stuff.; 5/26/15, 12:45 PM
buwaya said...: sample Martha Gellhorn -
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1961/10/the-arabs-of-palestine/304203/; 5/26/15, 12:48 PM
Renee said...: I never liked babies or wanted kids.

Until I actually found someone I wanted to have kids with.

I definitely do not judge, not knowing the background of anyone. I'm always sadden when I see a couple who is 'childless by choice', I mean if they really loved one another it wouldn't be the worst thing in the world if they had a baby. Again it's not a judgement, because there are so many factors. Sometimes I think the 'childless by choice' statement is something just to get people from inquiring about a private manner.; 5/26/15, 12:58 PM
tim in vermont said...: People who don't reproduce just opt out of the gene pool. Fine by me. They can go out and ask a Shaker how it works... Oh, wait.; 5/26/15, 1:21 PM
furious_a said...: "My vision of the future had involved...a cat..."

It usually does with these women.

"I fear I’ve let down other women who disavow children and who, because of my example, might face an extra smidge of condescending doubt."

Rationalize away, honey. The Future belongs to those who show up for it.; 5/26/15, 1:33 PM
buwaya said...: Upper middle class status competition is making having kids look much harder than it actually is.; 5/26/15, 1:35 PM
madAsHell said...: The secret to life hides between a woman's legs.; 5/26/15, 1:48 PM
Bilwick said...: "On the one hand, the author sounds rather self-centered, at least at first in her earlier life."

So not desiring children makes one intrinsically self-centered? (He wrote as if that's a bad thing.); 5/26/15, 2:09 PM
jimbino said...: Tim in Vermont:

People who don't reproduce just opt out of the gene pool. Fine by me. They can go out and ask a Shaker how it works

They can also ask St Paul and Jesus how it works.; 5/26/15, 2:10 PM
fivewheels said...: In other words, you don't really know what you're doing, you're capricious and not to be depended on for anything, and you're not really someone who thinks things through and understands an issue before you loudly proclaim your position on it. Just as we suspected.; 5/26/15, 2:42 PM
Scott M said...: So not desiring children makes one intrinsically self-centered?

It doesn't?; 5/26/15, 3:02 PM
Anonymous said...: Blogger Meade said...
SGT Ted said...
"Female culture is driven by narcissists and lunatics it would seem"

And what — male culture has been driven by other-centered sane guys?

Sometimes I hear people say, "God bless the USA" and someone responds, "And not bless the other nations, why?!"

I've never understood how people can come to that conclusion.; 5/26/15, 3:03 PM
buwaya said...: "They can also ask St Paul and Jesus how it works"
Very few people can aspire to be St. Paul, a greater number that can hope to be Einstein, a fair few who can claim, one way or another, to have foregone reproduction for the sake of God (as in Catholic clergy), a good number died young and childless fighting for their tribe or country.
But for the rest of us there is no excuse from this duty, save utter incapacity.; 5/26/15, 3:04 PM
JSD said...: Tim In Vermont – Actually, it’s not the celibacy that deters Shaker converts, it’s the intense rigors of communal living. There are all kinds of people looking for an alternate lifestyle. Thirty nine people joined the Heaven’s Gate Cult which also professed celibacy (before they hitched a ride on Comet Hale-Bopp. The Sabbath Day Lake Shakers in New Gloucester, Maine is the last working community. People show up every year and ask to join, but taking a vow of poverty and living in a religious commune in rural Maine is the hard part.; 5/26/15, 3:14 PM
SGT Ted said...: "And what — male culture has been driven by other-centered sane guys?"

My bad. I really meant "feminist culture".; 5/26/15, 3:22 PM
Deep State Reformer said...: Buwaya, Gellhorn's piece on Palestine you cited seems like very run of the mill stuff at best. Her journalistic voice is emotionally overwrought and accusatory. I stand by what I said, she was Hemingway's wife who was also writer, and that is the basis for whatever "fame" remains to her, not that she was a great writer who was also married to Hemingway.

And further, what kind of sanctimonious asshole calls another person's existence a wasted life? Did little Sandy end up a serial killer or something? Gellhorn is the perfect modern representation of Michelle Goldberg. She should take her own advice and just get a cat.; 5/26/15, 3:23 PM
Tibore said...: "William Chadwick said...
"On the one hand, the author sounds rather self-centered, at least at first in her earlier life."

So not desiring children makes one intrinsically self-centered? (He wrote as if that's a bad thing.) "

That's not what I said. I said she sounded self-centered in her earlier life. Her self-centeredness came through in her writing, not in her desire or lack thereof to have children.; 5/26/15, 3:43 PM
buwaya said...: Well, re Gellhorn's writing, de gustibus, and etc.

As far as I know she was quite well known and had friends in high places (the number one requirement for a celebrity journalist) prior to marrying Hemingway.; 5/26/15, 3:44 PM
Freeman Hunt said...: I fear I’ve let down other women who disavow children and who, because of my example, might face an extra smidge of condescending doubt.

She's not the first. She's one of millions. The millions are the reason they face doubt.; 5/26/15, 3:54 PM
furious_a said...: Jimbino, Michelle Goldberg, et al, ought to think through just what it is they're ensuring will happen.; 5/26/15, 4:08 PM
Lydia said...: Scott M said: "she once described him as 'a total loss, a poor small unwanted life'"
The amount of sadness this injected into my day was unexpected.

That made me sad, too. If it helps any, though, she said that in the context of his adult life, and it referred explicitly to a time when he addicted to drugs, unhappy, and fitfully employed. And she spared herself not at all as the cause. Here's the relevant page in her biography.; 5/26/15, 4:19 PM
kzookitty said...: Crazy cat ladies with typewriters do well to think long and hard before committing to motherhood.

kzookitty; 5/26/15, 5:45 PM
CatherineM said...: There is no such thing as a nice lactation consultant. They are zealots. Like PETA radicals for breastfeeding.

I am not a fan of Michelle (from her blogging heads and some other things), because she is all about orthodoxy. I think due to that orthodoxy, she feels like she broke with her tribe vs she (who has an amazingly compatible husband, together since she was 21 - how lucky they are) has mellowed. I don't think she was selfish, I think when you are young and have that much of a need for adventure about the world, it's better to wait and see than be resentful. Also, someone mentioned above about the competitive "mommy" crap, people rarely talk about the good things. It's always how tired they are, "exhausting" rather than it flies by quick.

It should be said, there are a lot of people who have kids who shouldn't, but do for all the wrong reasons (like perhaps the fear of being called selfish by some of the self righteous assholes above).

Then I have friends who raised siblings as the parents were too poor and had too many and relied on them too much. As the years went on...that desire for their own never came. Or they realized that the husband they love is not reliable (if only my grandmother realuzed that...she who would always say, "at least you're not in the family way" if you complained), but they don't want to leave. There are so many reasons. No one would call them selfish. They are fantastic wives, amazing aunts (takes the nephews/nieces for weekends and trips) and always there for their parents.

Who are you to judge? If you do, you are just as bad as the people who judge Michelle for having kids.; 5/26/15, 6:30 PM
SJ said...: @William,

If you think mothers are narcissistic and self centered, you haven't spent any time with any two year olds.

I, a single bachelor man, agree with you. (Though I suspect the better comparison is to women who are not mothers, rather than women who are mothers already...)

Of course, I've seen two brothers and a sister pass through the two-year-old stage.

@n.n.

Breeding is a technical description used in lieu of procreation, child-bearing, etc. with an intent to debase human life.

"Breeding" reminds me of eugenics, attempting to produce offspring with specific looks/colors/behaviors/features. Dog breeders are well-known, but breeders also work with livestock and plants.

(I was told once that a friend-of-a-friend was part of breeding that produced Honeycrisp apples. A little while back, this blogger posted about a relative of his who worked to breed a new variety of wheat.)

If someone refers to child-bearing as "breeding", the image of eugenics, and a laboratory of expectant mothers comes to mind.

Another part of "breeding" is stopping reproduction from certain lines that produce undesired results. I almost feel like making a sly reference to Nazis, but the Supreme Court case of Buck vs Bell could also be mentioned.; 5/26/15, 6:48 PM
rcommal said...: My mom actually did tell me, when I was a just a little younger than my son is now, and in any case back in '70s, that she should not have had children. She did regret having children. She regretted having us, and most particularly me. Under no circumstances would my mother have participated in questionable polls, because that's not who she was, and also she had no use at all for all sorts of media, especially women-media, back in that day.

My mom also did actually tell me, by way of explanation, and also when I was in my teens, that there was a reason why I was more problematic than my brother. What she said was that the thing that was the biggest difference between my brother and me is that my brother inherited the traits that she and my dad most liked in each other and that I inherited the traits that she and my dad most disliked in each other.

Helluva thing, that is, and I do not deny it. However, I have had four decades to consider it, and also 40 years of seeing how that worked.; 5/26/15, 9:34 PM
rcommal said...: [out]; 5/26/15, 9:38 PM
rcommal said...: At a convenient time, look around.; 5/26/15, 11:18 PM
chickelit said...: Shorts and all...

Alternatively, she's got balls; 5/27/15, 12:41 AM
rcommal said...: Well, chickelit, you know what? You win, and not for the first time.

You win, you winner. You are a winner, and you have many friends who are winners. Also, your family is a winner. All have won, each and every one of your family has and all of your friends have. This, specifically, is the point, chickelit.

---

I, on the other hand, ought shut up, full stop.; 5/27/15, 1:17 AM
rcommal said...: You, like Althouse, are the mean (the average, plus nasty).

Bless your hearts.; 5/27/15, 2:06 AM
Kirk Parker said...: furious_a,

Don't waste your breath.

jimbino is our resident crank who rants and rants about 'breeders', all the while failing to acknowledge that he, himself, is a son-of-a-breeder, and also failing to do the One Thing that would rectify his parents' heinous lapse.; 5/27/15, 2:48 AM