Still penalized because of our wombs

I have been reading many articles lambasting western women for not having more babies. Written by men, these articles quote all the statistics and demographics about how we are not reproducing ourselves sufficiently. While I completely agree (I have four children from 30 to 37 and only 1.5 grandchildren), I know the problem. But nothing has changed for women. We are still penalized for bearing the biological birthing function. I remember in 1971, saying to the president of DuPont of Canada, my employer at the time, that I would have to shortchange my career to have children and I resented it. We were at an employee cocktail party and he scoffed in disgust and walked off. Of course, he was about 50 at the time and his wife had stayed at home and raised his children, so who cared about those of us who had been well-educated and wanted a career and children. Still can't have both. Amazing. If you get your career started and take time off to have children, you are penalized. You lose at least a year or two and the related salary increases.

It seems to me all the wrong people are having children. The teenagers, the uneducated, the single mothers, the unemployed -- basically all the women for whom having children doesn't involve a penalty. Sorry to be so elitist, but there we are. For these women, having children is actually a social boost! Instead of being losers, they are lauded as "mums" and given housing and social status as "single mums". Countless charities support them. It is an industry. Please!..and please again. I was born out-of-wedlock, but in the era when I was given to a married couple who wanted me. My birth mother went on with her life. She was never a drain on the tax dollar.

I remember being successful in a competition for a job, but when they learned I was pregnant, they cancelled the competition. A few months later they hired the guy who came second. I also remember hiding my second pregnancy for as long as I could at the office for fear of being fired. I managed to skulk begging back into the workplace after six months on unemployment and was given a "joe job" until I "proved myself again". While not as blatant, pregnancy discrimination is still dominant.

So, if society still does not value women having children and continues to penalize them for doing so against all odds, what is a young wife to do? Go ahead and have children. That's what I say. Nothing is more rewarding.