The Lost Maternal Instinct - Erica Komisar | Maiden Mother Matriarch 50
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- Опубліковано 16 чер 2024
- My guest today is Erica Komisar: psychoanalyst, parent coach, and author of 'Being There: Why Prioritising Motherhood in the First Three Years Matters' and 'Chicken Little the Sky Isn't Falling: Raising Resilient Adolescents in the New Age of Anxiety.'
In the first part of the episode, we spoke about the importance of the early years, including the role of mothers in regulating their children's emotions, and the links between daycare, difficult behaviour, and later mental illness. We also spoke about the practical solutions available to parents stuck in the two income trap, and the importance of fathers and other family members in raising healthy and resilient children.
In the extended part of the episode we spoke about parenting adolescents, and particularly the role of homeschooling and alternative schooling for children who aren't well suited to mainstream schools.
03:32 Child development age 0-3
07:02 Why subsidising full time daycare is poor policy
10:03 Secure & insecure attachment
16:03 How characteristics continue into adulthood
18:50 Why it all went wrong with the Industrial Revolution
23:50 Has liberal feminism become anti-mother?
27:14 Two-income trap
32:04 Complicated relationships with nannies
39:59 What are the practical priorities for childcare?
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The worst day of my life was going back to work after maternity leave. I have a good career but all I wanted to do was be with my daughter. I'm so lucky that she was looked after by my mother and not in daycare, but it was still awful. And it was crazy because all I got was people telling me it was good to spend time away from her and "get back to my old self." Like no. I'm not even the same person now. I'm a mother and I want to be with my child.
Sad just how many women have been in your shoes, with society forcefully trying to convince them that all that motherhood stuff is just a waste of time and unimportant, that anybody could do it and your energies are best spent elsewhere. We've really done a number on women through this attempt at extirpating their core utility in life. It's as though people have forgotten that we were here getting on as a species for hundreds of thousands of years (or longer, depending on definitions) before the industrial revolution and the push to get everyone off the farm and out of the home. :(
I remember a teacher at my gkids school who by the end of the day would have swollen breasts and would be close to tears with longing to pick her baby up from daycare.
I know another woman who without making a long story of it didn't know she was eligible for maternity leave. She went back to work six weeks after her child was born. The child is eight but she often cries about it, even in public because she can't get over her grief. And yes the child has behaviour issues.
You're confusing a too-early return to work with losing yourself in the parenting role entirely. Quiet your drama and think, use your logic. Of course you're averse to leaving an infant. But having no identity outside of motherhood lifelong? Ridiculous. You are different after children, but you are still you. You need to settle down and grow back into yourself, girl.
@@sarahrobertson634 But motherhood is lifelong. You never cease to be a mother. And one baby is just the start. In a couple of years she may want another baby, and another. It's quite normal for women to absorb themselves in motherhood. But for some reason feminists hate mothers.
@@sarahrobertson634 this is so unhelpful and condescending. A perfect example of the problem.
Our society seems to have zero tolerance for kids being around. They seem to want them quiet and unseen. Its sad how many people have almost no interactions with children at all.
I keep hearing that from the UK. I don't think it's like that in Australia. Even pub's ussually have playgrounds for kids.
@@grannyannie2948 I'm in Canada. I feel it's like that in America too. There are lots of places for kids but very little integration with other adults besides parents. I know a lot of people who have never held a baby as an adult until they have their own. 😥
@@laura44135 I see what you mean. I saw more of that in the city. Apart from pubs as I described, many events focused either on families or adults. However I live a little more rurally now so there isn't that division.
The town's New Year's Eve Street party for example. It's summer here ofcourse, and there was face painting, and merry go rounds, dodgem cars, dare devils doing stunts, but there was beers and ciders and live music for the adults too. And two sessions of fireworks. An early one before the kids fall asleep in prams, and another at midnight. Everyone from zero to eighty attended.
And even when I lived in the city when women and teenage girls saw a woman they knew who'd just had a baby they would want to see, and if the infant was awake they would ask if they could hold the baby.
@@laura44135 I did reply but I'm having a lot of technical difficulties.
Our children are 23, 19, and 16.. We raised them on one teachers' salary in poor rural Northern Maine..Cloth diapers, one car, gardening and cooking from scratch..... We regret nothing..
Nor should you!
We did the same in Australia. Though my kids are about ten years older.
May I ask, what is your policy on electronic devices?
And vacation-wise, where was the farthest you had ever left from home?
@@marlonmoncrieffe0728 I curious why you ask how far they travelled on holiday.
Just curious about where lightly-budgeted can or like to go, @@grannyannie2948 .
I didn't mean anything bad by it.
The attachment theory part makes me think about surrogate situations, the birth mother sells the baby to another parent or is paid to rent her womb, still the birth mother and the baby attaches to the mother in utero. How much sense does it make to rip a baby away from their birth mother after birth? We don’t do that to animals, but we do it to humans. So many of those babies have trauma and it’s not recognized at all. The USA is one of very few countries that have legalized surrogacy. Awful!!!
My neighbors have had all of their children via surrogacy as the woman/mother cannot carry her babies herself.
I get what you’re saying but how would you suggest going about having their own biological children if not for surrogacy?
Adoption is expensive, a long and tedious process, and not everyone wants to adopt.
In defence of early feminism, back then there was no internet, no cell phones, only a TV. Many women felt isolated and alone as they stayed at home to raise their children. I am thinking of my mother. Today there are differences and I do agree with mothers staying with their young children. I think a lot as been lost but we do have more knowledge and information today. Unfortunately not all of it is good. Many animals treat their babies better then humans often do. Mothers and motherhood has not been respected, in the culture, for a long time, and the children always suffer.
We didn't just have TV, we had fantastic music and libraries full of books. We had telephones to actually speak to people instead of social media. We had big backyards and vegetables to grow, and chickens to care for. And we had each other. When staying home with your children was the norm, the suburbs were full other women doing exactly the same thing. So there were always other women to drink tea with. It wasn't until the late 90s that I felt the least bit lonely being a stay at home mum.
My great grandmother had 13 children and no tv. Her outside social source were other women. Women who cannot adapt to wife and mother are mentally ill. Doubly so if they cannot engage with other women in their station of life. The children are supposed to be the primary receivers of mother's social energy. It is then up to her skills and mental health to make outside friends. That is not a societal problem but an individual problem
@@louis-vd3ur Exactly. One of my great grandmothers had nine children and another had fourteen. And they did so without electricity let alone television.
Many animals also eat their children
@@deezed6478Yes, the reptilian and less intelligent mammals eat their healthy and unhealthy babies. Inbred and stressed animals are likely to do this, so my guess is that defective women are the most likely to abandon or kill their offspring.
I've seen that when women go back to work, not only does the time with their child go down dramatically but they are usually decreasing or stopping breastfeeding (if they nursed at all) and engaging in sleep training methods. That must compound the trauma for that child and make the attachment worse.
Yes, tired mothers make those choices. If you have to work during day you are too exhausted to get up many times during night. I don’t think reducing breast feeding or sleep training is a solution. I prefer to be exhausted than giving less of me to my toddler . I’m working and have baby. Even health professionals want you to force me into that decision .
Thank you for saying it as it is, and sharing it wide and far. Mothers who want to raise their children (and are prepared to cut the budget to make it happen) STILL have to go to work if they partner with someone who doesn't provide for the family. Heartbreaking!
Women need to be retrained to marry providers and not emotional safety sex toys.
Had my children in the 90s. My mom was there for me. Someone who had herself juggled work and motherhood because of economic circumstances but took jobs that prioritized her ability to be there for us. My husband worked for a foundation with a generous paternity leave (a rarity in the U.S.) We weren't impoverished or privileged but I had the ability and support to follow my maternal instincts. What an abundance of blessings. We involved are children in lots of cultural experiences as well as time spent with nature. It all made a difference. But our culture is sick. So hard on all of us.
I tried to put my 1.5 yo to daycare, because of pressure from my family. It lasted 2 days only.
I was with her to daycare for 3 days. No one interacted with her when I was in the room. They said it’s easier if we don’t interact now. Also you shouldn’t come anymore because your child is behaving bad other children will copy her.
I accepted to try what they asked.
They told me it’s more difficult for the mothers. Children cry only 2 minutes.
I tried it. My child cried 15 minutes in the first day. When she was looking better they sent photos. The second day as soon as we reached there she was crying hysterically. I tried to tell the teacher we should play together I’ll leave when she starts to play with you. The teacher hugged my crying child so hard and didn’t give her back to me. I felt helpless.
I picked her up after 2 hours and came to take nap. She was crying in her nap and calling me.
After I saw that. I thought it through. They said she was behaving well and didn’t do any of her usual curious behaviors. She sat at the table for longer period of time and more.
What I realized was ok so it was easier for them if they didn’t interact with her while I was there, because they used her fear of strangers to control her behavior. 😢 She was traumatized and after a month still is afraid of strangers. Her fear of strangers used to appear just as a shyness but not she screams.
The hug which the daycare professional gave her, might not look so bad. But just imagine you as an adult are afraid of someone, they hug you so hard that you can’t leave. Isn’t that like a raping? I’m so ashamed of letting that woman hug my baby .
Finally family after seeing her distressed in her dreams convinced that I don’t need to send her to daycare.
I know your struggle! I experienced something very similar with my 1 year old. After 3 days (only mornings) of daycare she completely change her atitudes, was crying all day and being agressive at home, which never happened before. We decided to raise her at home till 3 years old. I get a lot of criticism from family and friends. It is not easy but is our duty to do what we feel is best for our babies, regardless of what other people say. Wish you all the best!
@@anasantos3663 Thanks for your input. I really needed to hear I’m not alone.
In my case family accepted now but friends!!! They just tell me I shouldn’t spoil my child and I’m being over protective.
It’s hard in Finland where the whole society wants to turn women to men and men to women
I think one of the problems in the society is that most mothers feel guilty for not being there. Some of them to justify their decision want to push every woman to make the same decision.
@@mm-zv1lb I couldn't agree more! Here in Portugal is exactly the same. People usually leave babies at daycare at the age of 4 months and think if you don't then babies will become unsociable. Even my parents (in their time daycares weren't even a thing) think my daughter will be behind from being at home and that I am destroying my life for being at home 3 years... they are ashamed because I am not an "empowered" woman. It is absurd. I had a good career and have the rest of my life to dedicate to that. It is normal in eastern european countries for example to take some years to raise your kids before returning to work. And I think if you choose to be a stay at home mom forerever it is a very noble a hard job! The most important of all. Unfortunately our society of narcisism thinks parents needs are paramount and children needs are put behind. But being a mother is the hardest and most rewarding thing I ever experienced. Truly magical. I think we will never regret choosing our family over appearances
@@anasantos3663You are a wonderful mother. Our children deserve our resilience towards this cultural nonsense. 🌹
What a sound, grounded episode! Loved it
13:21 In many cases it's called restraint collapse. Older kids, teens & adults are also prone to restraint collapse. Thanks for speaking up for Nannies, I used to be one. My first nanny job lasted for 4 years & I Adored those kids & they loved me, but you speak the truth about the mothers emotional landscape & how it can often affect the nanny. The jagged way my first job ended still breaks me at times & it happened 20 years ago 💔 You talk about mother entrepreneurs in this interview, but in a different talk, you discuss the destruction that occurs when a child has to endure many transitions in one single day & many women entrepreneurs often do experience many transitions in a day that affect their children
Wonderful! Thank you for all your wonderful conversations and good work!
I am a big fan of Erica, I admire her work very much. beging a mom in a town in a so called first world country without support of grandmas and so on is awful. being a mother in a village in a little bit poorer country is not only healthier because of support of family but of the welcoming energy of every woman and children and elderly towards you and your child in everyday life is priceless. value still is lived there. missing it so much, feeling so ´un-previllaged´. but I am aware every mother contributing with love everything possible to make a difference is doing the change. Thx for this great interview.
Great conversation Louise & Erica! I resonate with, and recognize what you say to be "true" and "instinctual." I feel in the minority, but less alone for your work & podcast Louise. Thank you for your COURAGE & VOICE!
min 20:00 I would argue it is also additionally the fear for a woman that if her husband leaves her, she maybe will get some support until the child is grown but once she is old she will live with minimal income. In Austria poverity for women over the age of 60 is very high, in particular for those who got seperated and stayed home for many years. Like my friends father left her mother randomly as he wasnt happy anymore. He gave her a small apartment, but as she never had an education she now has to work as a cleaning woman and really barley gets through. Also as she was already menopausal, no guy would date her anymore and as she was so heartbroken she also said she cant trust a guy anymore. I know so many cases, where it originally was the perfect family, with living from one income and the guy making career and the woman being home. But it was always the man cheating and then leaving the woman and some would get child support but once the children were done with school, that was over and these women now have pretty much nothing. They barley survive like those people who get minimal income from the state. That is why I fe started to invest in certain things to make sure I have retirement money in some form later on in my life and also a monthly income next to the one where I am working. I didnt work the first 2 years when my child was born, but I started to work 1 day afterwards and also do more investment. My husband always supported me in that decision and I luckily also had the support of my parents who baby sit on days when I am working.
My mom without my father would not be able to sustain herself from the retirement money she gets. So obviously my father has always been in love with her and in case of seperation would grant her the house and another one so she has additional income. But still. She stayed home for 9 years until my little brother was 5 years old. She couldnt work fulltime, as my dad was barley home and they didnt have support from my grandparents. So someone had to be at home, cook food, do the housework.. Overall my dad worked 50h a week but didnt do anything at home not even taking care of us. My mom worked 27 h week and additionally 35h at home with cleaning, taking care of us, cooking, grocery shopping, studying with us, picking us up to music classes friends etc, taking care of my great grandma and great aunt (whome she is not related to), and all that work never gets viewed as work.
I am not suggesting on monetizing typical female work at home. i dont think it is possible as it is very often also a human emotional feeling and obligation to take care of the people But truth of matter is if you are a compassionate kind person and your partner at some point isnt excited anymore, you get taken advantage of.
My dad always encouraged me to make sure that I can sustain myself well. He would invest in a good education and also helped me with ways to invest my money. He would help me with buying a house and he made a prenup for me as I brought more money into my marriage than my husband. He always emphazised that I should not rely on someone else. Now my husband and I are a team like my mom and dad are a team. I trust him and I chose a man who is very idealistic and moralistic when it comes to family and overall life. But you can never know. Its always important to have something in case you fall. Now I live very well, and I wouldnt have to work, as my husband as an income to feed many people. But in case of his death, or if he would leave me I still have a good stable ground with which I can feed my kids and later on in my life will be able to live comfortable. Not luxrious but in a way of not having to look at every penny.
I do believe parents should start to invest money for their children early on so that they can help them so they are not in depth and afford housing. I do believe kids should be taught on how to invest money and how to stop instant gratification and delay that and rather invest the money into something. And I do believe women should get taught which jobs are lucratic but still possible with a child. Like an accountant can work easily from home and earns good money, a therapist can work from home, any job where you can plan hours around your families schedule, where you are not working for someone are awesome with kids.
And yes fathers and mothers have completly different roles which they take over.
This seems to be a lot of weight on women, right?
The solution is actually a stronger society, with more harmony
The problem is that individualism is increasing, and families don't help each other.
In the past, even if a woman wasn't employed, she could just go back to her family home if she got divorced or something.
Actually, if we assume all women started getting employed out of this fear, the average woman wouldn't be earning much. Her earnings would make her struggle on her own depending on where she lives.
But in the past, when the earnings of men could easily support a family, the woman's father would have also been able to easily support a family even if she came back home.
That is true, though in practical life it was connected with a lot of shame and pressure to not get divorced and also not all families had the luxery to take care of their adult children. The goal was to get them married as soon as possible so that the father doesnt have to feed another mouth. I do believe that it is about being individually capatable of sustaining yourself. I dont believe that this can solidly be done through work, it is about making the right investments, also if parents have less children they can provide those children with a better financial start into the future, as they have less children whom they would have to give something. I do agree that when it comes to society the idea that kids should have more space and room and it should be more normalised that people have children is important. But it will always be the case that there are jobs which are not ideal with children. This is why I mean that a woman needs to know this if she wants children. Also if she really doesnt like these professions, than at least get a job where she can earn a lot of money before she has kids, invest that money and then either not work anymore or reduce hours and live from the previously saved money. @@MA-gu2up
@@suvisantini9712
Divorce wasn't normalized because it typically connected to worse outcomes in the past and now for the children, especially.
But my point is that, even with most married women being out of the labor force, still, if a divorce happen the woman can go back to her family who will welcome her in a strong society with good family values, the problem is that with feminism and other factors, the society is becoming more individualistic, and this doesn't give much chance for the security of the family.
Adult children of a family aren't a big expense on the family actually, even if they don't have a job, if the food is made in the house, it is just another mouth to feed, and it wouldn't cost much.
The adult children of the family also can help a lot around the house, so I don't think they are a big burden
That is however not how it was. I know from stories from my grandpa who told me stories about his grandparents that it just wasnt something that was done, as women feared to be rejected and it also happened. Maybe in high income families that was a different story and maybe sometimes if the parents truly loved their children (not the typical obligation care but truly bonded with them) and who had the financial needs to feed a child (even in times when food was rare). If the family had 8 kids, and it was the daughter from the middle, she already had less of a strong bond to her parents as its usually the first and the last. If the parents just used these children as insurance for later life to be taken cared of once they are old and if they were old none of their children made sustaintioable money like a lot of factory workers would, there was just no option for divorce, even if the husband was a drinker etc, also if there were children involved it was just culturally impossible and looked down upon to a point were either the woman would run away with a new option or kill herlsef (like goign into the waters used to be a big thing in Austria for women) I do agree that family values are important and that the bond should be stronger, but essentially the system back then wasnt better. The goal also shouldnt be to just create the same system as back in the days, as it was just sheerly too many kids, wth lots of them not getting perfect outcome and attention and fincial support. THe goal should be to create high quality kids, with a loving family whom they can rely on. That is however more so a problem of people not being able to submit and be responsible for their families. Not knowing if they even are the right people as parents as I would argue a substaintional portion of people are just not good parents and better to without as the children they raise become unusaful monsters. Also feeding a a grown up can be costly. I lived at the age of 18 with my grandparents for half a year. Their costs would go up for one more person and they would feel it as they had less money which they could use for freetime like taking a care ride for a coffee, buying clothes once the old ones were worn out (not that they do shopping like people in the states to but if cltohes are worn out at some point they need to be replaced). I'm not saying that it isnt somewhat possible but with a lot of downsides. Also why on earth would a grown up person put that much burden on their parents if they were able to work? It gives freedom also in the things you can provide for your children, if it is your money you are the one who makes decisions. And at some point your parents might be old and need financial support through their children. Women should be able to make money. But in case they decide for family they might have to reevaluate their idea of career. I for instannce dont work more than 15h per week. I do however earn more than some poeple with a 40h week work. That is because I made the right education choice. I also invest that money which gives me already the option to retire. All of that might be an extreme case, however even if you just do insurance for later years you can do that with less money and spend most of your days with your children. Another factor is living close by your parents or your partners parents, as I never pay for daycare or nannies..I have my mom and dad who love my children as much as I do and who would feel betrayed if I would put them under strangers wings. Many people could do that, but mostly their relationships with their parents is not as close tied. That is however upon the parents to make sure to not make a fuss and support their children forever once they are born. @@MA-gu2up
43:56 I had to stop the video at this point to write this as it was difficult to listen any more of it. I agree with some of what Erica believes, but she really, really comes across like someone from a middle to upper class background, someone who's lived in an affluent bubble for all her life. Some of her comparisons or ideas suggest she has little idea of what life is like for working class or poor people, beyond a certain top-down picture she gets from the international foundation her husband runs. She romanticises women working in the fields in India and Africa with their children - I implore Erica to try that kind of work for one day if she hasn't already. Much of it is truly backbreaking work, not the peasant idyll that I think Erica is invested in. A lot of those jobs in India out in the fields seem very unsafe for women generally, let alone having children with them.
She speaks of work that works well with raising children, like party planning, making cakes or invitations. Honestly, as a working class person, she might as well be someone from a different planet at this point. What are all these choices she's talking about? Sure, if you have lots of money in the bank already for things like marketing and materials, and live in a middle-class neighbourhood, starting a little business making invitations or similar must seem like a realistic thing to do for her, maybe easy even. For anyone else, starting a business that is capable of generating a respectable income, even to a part-time equivalent level takes A LOT of work, time, and likely some investment. A lot of self-employed people will attest to this. It's not just the making (cakes for example) that takes work - it's the planning, the talking, the interacting. The marketing itself can be a part-time job, depending on the industry. For many they just can't take that risk of having something like this fail. Then she goes back to comparisons to women in the third world again and says it doesn't have to all be binary.....again, very blinkered.
Coming from a lower-class background I can't help with agree with a lot of this, but I will say I've seen it done by a good number of women. I think her heart is in the right place, but yeah, it's tough to make ends meet and some people don't have that level of ingenuity or skill. I do think she makes good points about how we ever got here in the first place though. The fact that a single job can't cut it is a big factor. Nor do we have the community to help keep couples together, and without that you get a lot more divorce, not to mention the related problem of people refusing to marry in the first place, leaving a lot of women feeling insecure about their status with the fathers of their children, etc., etc. It seems like everything that made society work, that made raising children work, has just dissolved right under our noses. :(
Yes the rest of what she was saying I didn't mind as much, although I was surprised that she started talking about right brain & left brain function as this seems a littke outdates in neurology now. I thought it had been shown a while ago that functions happen in specific patterns across both hemispheres, rather right vs left.
Her references to the working poor in third world countries reminded me a lot of uneducated statments people make when talking about childbirth, how it's all natural and women do it in fields, dontcha know (therefore women need to shut up, suffer, and not ask for a elective c-section). They have an almost peasant-romance view of those women's lives, like everyone is walking around with ruddy cheeks, smiling. They never mention the desperation, the fact those women work physically demanding jobs right up until birth because they're so poor, and because their surival is so closely tied to farm work. They make no mention of the threat of sexual assault that field workers in India have to cope with because many still don't have access to safe, single sex toilets in or near those fields. That's why I was so sceptical when I hear talk of women in India and Africa doing work with children with them.
As for a modern job where you can safely bring your child to work my daughter spent her pregnancy training to be qualified to work in childcare so she could literally bring her child to work.
As for subsistence farming. I've never been to India or Africa but in Australia in the 80s when I was a young mother at home with my baby, and this still applies today, I see young women doing it. I grew a good deal of the family's food, especially fruit and vegetables. On a small scale it can be safely done with babies and toddlers. Toddlers love it. You can buy them little tools and they love picking and eating their own food. Most of my female ancestors were farmers wives who brought their babies and children into the fields on large commercial farms with farm horses and later tractors. Children have been involved in farming since farming was invented.
@@RedArtistx Indeed, it all reeks of naturalistic fallacy to me. It also never bothers to discuss how many deaths happen during or soon after childbirth.
Both of these women are just so wealthy and out of touch.
The loss of values as a whole in society is no accident. People, organizations and forces that want the worst for us are making it this way on purpose.
This is my conclusion as well. The government in my country loves adopting ideas that have already failed in other countries.
Patriarchy doesn't value motherhood.
@@sarahrobertson634 Feminism values them less.
@@sarahrobertson634no one hates motherhood in this world more than mainstream feminism.
@@sarahrobertson634 That may be so, but Patriarchy doesn't exist in Western countries.
Love hearing from both these ladies!
As I was listening I was thinking about how another root of the problem is the disconnection not just from extended family, but from community in general. I am fortunate to be able to stay home with my children but I could not do this without my church community. We moved states about a month before baby number two arrived and there is no way we'd have been able to keep our sanity without our new church friends being there to help us. With the decline of Christianity in the west, a lot of people don't have that close-knit community to come alongside them in raising children.
Some of what is said is romanticized (like children at your feet at a food stand--most likely living hand to mouth) or idealized or unrealistic (like starting a cake business---extremely difficult to start any business and make money at it). But, yes, best for infant to be close to mom in the beginning years(with other loving family members caring for child so mom can take a break). In the past, most families could live a decent life on one income. Moms could stay home full time. No one wants to live in poverty. Poverty living is very high stress.
Although I read somewhere that stay at home dads don't usually turn out as well, for lots of reasons, I also read that that's not always the case. So, it occurred to me that stay at home dads might work better more often in urban areas, and moms everywhere else, if it's going to be one or the other parent at home for many families, instead of shared responsibility.
This occurred to me because, there's this whole movement now for men to do stuff like learn JRE self defense skills, to get in shape more, health craze etc. And cities will not be particularly safe places of course, for kids and women especially, we've been regressing to 80's and 90's in that regard. So, I thought one kind of male parental role could be as something like a children's bodyguard for their families in cities, safely transporting kids around the neighborhood, and even ensuring safety at home, in many urban neighborhoods.
This makes me think of lions; the females hunt the food while the male protects the territory and the cubs.
The whole Maiden, Mother, Matriarch is at play here. Families REALLY matter when it comes to raising kids and keeping them out of day care, But with gramma having to work till she's 80 or sick and mom working and the younger girls studying half way across the globe, the kid has no choice. Weird species to go so far off Nature's page and expect us to act differently than elk would given the same madness.
I babysit my gkids.
...Once again but in ENGLISH please?
I was fortunate enough to be able to give up paid work when my children were small, we had more money going out than coming in.. Late '80s. Things improved but marriage to someone who changed his mind about having children once the reality set in, ended in divorce as they approached teen years. While I went back to work part time to support us without financial assistance from him, my promising career never really regained the trajectory from my 20's. Now 66 with first grandchild on the way, those dilemmas reemerge for my daughter and for me! At least her managers are supportive and her work is a little more flexible post pandemic
The solution to all of this would be if motherhood was paid. This way they wouldn’t have to choose between being with their kids full time or having secure financial stability irrelevant to how one man decides to treat her.
Prof Sam Vaknin describes the increase in narcissism of the culture of society as a consequence of the dead emotional mothers and the general cPTSD affecting a lot of children. Children who have no identity or self. I recommend The courage to raise good men by Olga Silverstein that I read nearly 40 years ago, which seemed to me to be the sosolution to patriarchy.
Hi Louise, Thank you for your content!
I think you should also invite Rachel Wilson on your podcast. She is unjustly labelled in all sorts of ways, but she is really knowledgeable in the topics of the history of feminism and its relationship with motherhood.
Ah, I love Based Homeschool Mom!
Those glasses be crazy
Inflation has to do with greed and excess of material spending? What? Where did the guest get that from? Where I am the inflation of the past 2 years started as a direct result of our government printing unholy amounts of money and dumping it into the market, to pay for, among other things, COVID benefits to keep people home and not working, while simultaneously stifling production of goods, services through lockdowns, which resulted in a lot more money chasing a lot less goods and services. When you have more money but not enough things to buy with that money, that is when the price of things goes up and you have inflation! This inflation was mainly due to severe government mismanagement of the pandemic, and now, since the goverment seems to want to deliver the final KO, they are also adding needles tax increases ( i.e. carbon tax) and dumping millions of immigrants onto us, all of which drive prices for all sorts of things further and further up!
Printer go brr inflates money every time. Those who fall for Keynesians will try to blame greed for everything else.
36:01 I agree with everything but this part. Fragrance is toxic to everyone, especially to children. I don't blame the mother for not wanting her child to smell like toxic perfume.
1. Thank you Erica for the retrospectively plain and simply obvious explanation of ADHD which was right there in front of me all these years since they were calling it ADD but I never put the 2+2 together. Sometimes correlation can point a finger at causation. ADHD is what happens when a child is regularly placed into insecure situations where they must always be on guard - situations where they are separated from their trusted guardian, ie. their mother.
2. Quite a neat segue from 1. to suggest that the 'health-care professionals' can call it 'early-childhood education' or any other cute little name their PR 'experts' can conjure up but that doesn't change the indubitable fact that putting your children into so-called 'day care' has absolutely no benefit whatsoever for said children. Not much benefit for the mother either, as was mentioned in this interview re the nanny's perfume. The only one who has ever gained anything from having women put their young pre-school children into the hands of complete strangers from morning 'til night has been Gloria Steinem and her post modern marxist feminist comrades.
Day care is not about children, most definitely. Day care is not about the mothers either in my opinion. Just an act of political martyrdom by proxy from ill-educated loudmouths with shoulders too narrow to bear the chips on them.
3. Regarding your suggestion about mothers taking their infants to work - in what way does that benefit the employer and MORE importantly, the CUSTOMER? Here is some simple advice for stupid women who can't work this out for themselves, free of charge: If you want to have babies, Stay At Home. Stay at home with them until they are old enough to atend school, ie. five or six years old. You might love the sound of a screaming child, but most people hate it, and we DO NOT want to pay for it! Got it, ladies? Paid employment is not about your personal problems. When you're getting paid to turn up somewhere, you can leave your personal problems at home. That is the reason you get paid.
Thank you.
I just paid $2.50 for 18 eggs, on sale. Humble yourself and BUY CHEAP and generic!
Luxury morals will be our society's undoing unless we can face reality as it presents itself. Recognizing and cultivating REAL WEALTH, Family Wealth, as presented by Bob Cratchett's family in A Christmas Carol, will be the sunshine that burns off the fog of our current insanity.
Thank you for all your work Louise! Love the show and that gold belt!
Where in the US can you buy eggs for $2.50/18? The cheapest local store bought eggs I've seen are twice that price ($5/18), still cheaper than $9/dozen, but $2.50/18 is crazy cheap. (I almost never buy eggs because we have a flock of quail and fresh eggs a just better.)
So inflation is greed, then deflation is the absence of greed? As expected, no clear answer how a family should survive on one income in the current economy. No good shaming mothers for choosing to work to keep a roof over the family's head.
I think they aren’t as much shaming women as they are shaming the culture
20:00 i agree, family life is possible on 1 income,
If the materialism is in check.
I agree with all this in theory.. massive change in practice. I am 45 and my generation was primed for to work, and I would feel vulnerable if I wasn’t able to earn a income for an extended period, and then feel concerned about getting back into the workforce (unless this was the norm) there would have to be a big cultural shift. Not everyone would be able to find work whilst caring for children, and it could led to mental health issues of mother, being full time care givers for an extended period, which is a feature of the past.
It is a feminist myth that mothers find misery in caring for their family. That is a sign of mental illness, not a need for social change. Inability to adapt to being a wife and mother is mental illness on the part of the woman. Along with her and her family allowing her to marry a man who cannot support her and her children. Marrying an emotional support sex toy is the modern answer to marriage and that is causing severe damage to family stability
How on earth could we have known or decreased stress at school with narrow-minded children and teachers?
When your children don’t want to have children, wow. Profound
Happiness surveys and mental health stats point us in the right direction: the happiest people are religious conservative women, with large families and secure marriages, with the husband earning enough to look after his family. But mental health health stats also say: the group with the highest mental health problems is single liberal/progressive young women. And political statistics of who votes for who tells us young single women in their 20s vote mostly for parties that offer them government help. It's almost as if women evolved in certain patterns, many want families and normal lives. Of course, that's heresy now.
I find religious conservative women tend to lie themselves that they are happy with their live because they are taught to say this. They have a huge number of children pulling on them without time to themselves. They have a huge stress of keeping 6+ kids with a house that the husband who probably won’t contribute inside of the house. Is that ideal? Liberal women are more honest with their feeling because they are taught to be a individual, and say your feelings more while the lateral is not.
So what happiness will be created if women are forced into marriage and childbearing?
Just because the single childless women are not happy does not mean that it will automatically make them happier.
Think of it this way. Imagine finding that horse owners are overall happier than non horse owners. Now imagine that some totalitarian leader decided that everybody will be happy because everyone is forced to have a horse. How many people will just be more unhappy with a big smelly beast?
To critics of my comments: I support choice, no one should be forced to do anything. But women today have less choice. They no longer have the option of being a traditional woman, as much as in the past. I ran across stats once from Holland that said about 20% of women would prefer to be single and childless and in a career, while 20% of women would prefer to not have a job outside the home and just be a full time mother, with the 60% wanting part time career, part time being a mom at home. There is no one size fits all solution, for all women, because they are all different.
Women need choice. Thanks to social patterns that encourage women to make careers their default choice, we have removed the option of full time motherhood, from women. That seems a tragedy to me. For some women, that option works very well promotes their happiness, it's what they want. That's the option that feminism destroyed, for women. That's a shame. Not all women have to be the same. It's more about choice, depending on individual circumstances, rather than forcing everyone to chose the same option. It's amazing how little choice feminism gives women. Tragic.
Sounds like an overcorrection.
The statistical outliers were treated as nonexistent when rules were made.
Then the statistical outliers decided to make the rules for everyone and it only got worse.
If statistical outliers are not given their space, expect them to eventually raise hell.
@@skylinefever Very sensible comment.
Wow, she comes to india. Interesting
This was a great episode and Erica offered some really interesting insights. That said, I felt she was totally unrealistic about the economics of two-working-parent households. Maybe it’s because she’s from an earlier generation, before the cost of living totally spiraled out of control. Towards the end, Louise and Erica were talking about what to do if the mother absolutely must go back to work - Erica suggests that, if you’re “really poor,” you should go in with another family to hire a babysitter.
I thought this a telling giveaway of economic privilege. In my area, having a nanny - even a nanny-share that is paid for by multiple families! - is a privilege only available to the upper middle class and upper class. Even the cheapest daycares will probably cost at least $20k USD per year, per child. A nanny-share would probably be twice that. If you can afford that, you aren’t “really poor.”
🙌 ...YES!
If women want to LATER work, even full time and/or in corporate careers, I would support THAT and be against any sexist or ageist barriers that get in their way!
But modern women are screwing themselves over by thinking they can have it all and at the same time when that never was and never will be the case.
💰 I forget who but an interviewee on another channel pointed out to me that we overestimate how expensive it is to raise children.
Taking care of geriatric adults is expensive and exhausting but it an anti-natalist myth that more independently mobile and imaginative children are too.
🎙 Are you going to interview SUZANNE VENKER anytime soon?
I have a corporate job that I can do from home with flexible hours and part-time. I don't think it gets any more flexible than that, but I can't do it if my 2 year old is around. Please tell me what actual work can be done while watching a hyper toddler. At nursery he gets to play with his friends, do loads of arts and crafts, play in the garden, learn English (at home we speak Hungarian). If I had to juggle work and watching him, I would have had to force him to learn how to play alone. Now when he comes home I am there, I am present, and we have loads of fun together, and he ia definitely attached 😊
I am also at home atm with my second, and I can't stress how impossible it is to look after a newborn that is breastfed and a 2 year old toddler. Nursery was a godsend that let me spend time with my daughter, let me establish breastfeeding, take her to baby classes, etc.
@@smashikeAnd yet for thousands of years our female ancestresses raised families of many children in roughly two year spaces. On of my great grandmothers had nine kids, and an other had 14. And they did so with not electricity or running water. They cooked every meal and preserved much of the family's food, and sewed all the family's clothes.
And today with automatic washing machines and dryers, dishwashers etc, you say you can't care for two children.
Ofcourse you will tell yourself what ever you need to, to avoid acknowledging you are harming your child. That's the problem.
@@smashikePS what on earth are baby classes?
Sure, half of children also didn't survive to the age of 5, so not everything was great. Let me rephrase, I can keep the children alive when looking after them, but then I'm just focusing on the logistics of childcare, not playing/engaging with them.
I don't think what i'll say here will change the world, as I don't work and don't have kids either. But i'll say it anyway :) I agree with some of this woman points, but there is no perfection in reality. There's no perfect parents, then there's no perfect children and that's fine. It doesn't mean it went all wrong. There's many ways things can be right and this is what makes the world so diverse. Parents will have their own journeys to live, their own privileges and dificulties. The children will have their own traumas and experiences. What matters the most is to take the best of the situation you are according to your own values. For someone who can stay home with their children and would like that, it must be done. For someone who cannot be with their children because of work, thats fine too. Those children will be raised different and will be different beings. Some day they maight need one another to learn things they didn't with their parents. And this is the life! Surviving, changing, learning and mooving.
I’m wondering her thoughts on community based Day-Homes?
Eggs are NOT $9, by the way. And, she's right, she's not an economist.
Komisar has it all wrong. In the US it is easier to stay home. The OECD states that spendable income per capital is $44,000 in the US and $28,000 in the UK. Higher take home pay for one parent makes it easier for the mother to stay home. The workforce in the US is much more flexible than in the UK. With employment at will in the US a mother can quit her job knowing the labor market is more flexible to have a job for her when she wants to go back. More government programs like Komisar admires will reduce take home pay and make it harder for mothers to stay home. Intelligent people like Komisar are sometimes blinded to the best solutions by the bubble they live in.
So much to respond to here, but I’ll just say that eggs are not $9 a dozen. I live in NYC and I can buy a dozen eggs for $2-3 in any supermarket
And where is THAT?
I'm here in Queens and I WISH eggs cost that little!
What part in NYC? I'm in Brooklyn NY.
@@TheYoli182 me too.
girl I don't live even in NY and my eggs cost at least 6-7$....
💕
Inflation is too much money tracing too few goods. Inflation is everywhere and always a monetary phenomenon, meaning that it is caused solely by the money issuing entity, these days nearly always a government, a central bank, or a currency board, creating too many dollars, pounds, or euros for the available goods and services supplied by the market. Prices are the ratio of the number of money units in people’s pockets that they are ready willing and able to spend, to the number of units of stuff they want to buy, as a population.
In the infamous 2030 You Will Own Nothing, video. It is explained the people will accept owning nothing to escape debt and inflation. I don't fancy that option either.
🌹
22:01 sadly some mothers are like that. Quite a lot of women out there who have no business being a parent.
Dozen eggs for an hours work. So more food than I could possibly eat and I only have to work 1 hour for it and that is supposed to sound bad?
I was thinking about that from the chicken's perspective...
I guess you could blame "greed" for rising prices, but it's probably not the greed Komisar is imagining. Unless you're comfortably protected against competition, you can't just charge higher prices on a greedy whim. So let's talk about things that prevent competition from driving down prices.
Most people's biggest monthly cost is housing, followed by transportation (which is closely related). Why isn't the supply of housing keeping up with demand in so many markets? Regulation, mostly. And not being able to build close to the action drives up transportation costs as people have to locate farther away. But the people approving those regulations would say they're just protecting their neighborhoods, their schools, and (they often admit) the value of their homes. How much of that is "greed" is in the eye of the beholder.
If we want to make it easier to stay at home with young children, housing is the biggest hurdle by far. Living on one income is harder if housing costs an arm and a leg. Parents should be able to add rooms to starter homes without a ton of red tape. They should be able to build granny flats to accommodate grandparents or an _au pair_ to help with childcare. If we really want moms to be able to fit in a little work alongside their parenting, it'd help if they could work out of the home or live very close to work and everyday shopping, so ditch the zoning restrictions that separate low-impact commerce (like corner shops) from residences. And reducing commute distances for spouses who work outside the home allows them to spend more time at home.
Another potentially big (pro-natalist) policy option: give parents a break on payroll taxes, which can be accomplished with an expanded Child Tax Credit with refunds applicable to payroll taxes.
Old-age entitlements like Social Security and Medicare are getting harder to fund because people aren't producing future taxpayers. People who work at raising future taxpayers should get credit for that.
No just when we're gonna talk about cool dads😂
I was raised by my dad since I was a baby. I had the same thought.
@@gjmottet nice, I was looking forward to this. Guess I gotta pay to hear that
Whose right left brain work is she referring to. McGilchrist?
Can women just be allowed to have their own preferences? No, apparently. 😢
Inflation is about greed??? Possibly the most simplistically incorrect definition I've ever heard.
It seemed to me that she meant greed from people wanting to buy too many material goods.
@@rathelmmc3194 Even so it only considers the demand mediated inflation and completely ignore supply mediated inflation.
@@patheticpear2897 That's true.
@@patheticpear2897exactly restrict supply for essential products and increase inflation
We would know how much of inflation is greed driven if money printer could not brrrr.
Please talk about single mothers! No choice!!!
Which single mothers? Out of wedlock single mothers?
@@marlonmoncrieffe0728 all of them, holy crap, out of wedlock?? Gimme a break!
I don’t want to live the way they do in Africa or India. She is free to move there if she pleases.
This lady made a # of quack opinion claims without providing a shred of evidence for any of them. Like apparently she is so brilliant and all knowing - that she knows why children have more mental illness in the USA than Britain - she has the most SIMPLE explanation, its really that simple & she knows the answer! Also provides no evidence for that claim, just states it as fact. Total waste of time & terrible interview
I actually agree with many of her conclusions, but the logic used to get there was very quacky. I think we have enough data on how baby primates don't thrive when not near their mothers that reordering to society so women can have babies earlier and reentry the work force with children in tow makes sense. Tossing kids into daycare results in behavior issues. As someone that has been a teacher, I can tell which kids were sent to daycare based solely on behavior and I would put good money that the little hell raisers I have had to work with don't help their parents' mental health or marriages (one of the reasons I no longer teach in public school). An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. Kids that feel connected to their parents are a joy to be around and grow into productive adults. That comes from one parent (or a grandparent) staying home with the kids for as long as it takes to build that connection. I don't think it is as clear that it HAS to be the mother, but one consistent person is a must. Most mother's want the job, so let them, everyone will be better off in the long run with well attached grown up children able to contribute to society in their teens and 20s instead of having quarter life crisises from compounded weak attachment and behavior issues resulting it not being able to cope when they should be living it up and finding a slot to fit into society.
@@gjmottet I don’t think it’s possible to accurately pinpoint one factor that leads to behavioral problems in kids, as if daycare is the magic bullet the makes or breaks kids. Parenting styles have dramatically changed, kids often have terrible diets (obesity rates have gone way up in younger kids), kids are often spoiled/coddled/undisciplined, etc.
You can’t just assume DAYCARE is the magic factor
Full time cooperate jobs are not good for anyone
Come on lady, you say "This is what the Industrial revolution started.. leaving your children behind"?! Really? Hmm, let's see.. the options are: starve to death, almost starve to death, live like a peasant in dire poverty... orrr take a regular pay job so I can feed my family regularly... Hmm... Tough call that! I just love the way all these modern intellectuals crap on the choices millions of peasants and serfs made when the Industrial Revolution came along. Oh and by the way, the Industrial Revolution was responsible for the greatest material uplifting in world history, so there's that... Please for crying out loud, get some historical perspective. Now does that mean the Industrial Revolution's sweeping changes had effect both good and bad.. Well yes, of course. But given the options for a peasant it was perfectly reasonable and beneficial for them to make the choices they did.
The industrial revolution also propelled public health initiatives, education etc. Rural slum versus urban slum was the brutal choice along the way
Sorry but it's a little ridiculous how much this lady demonises daycare! I have a 2-year-old in daycare and he does not have any behavioural issues. He's a perfectly happy and healthy boy. He started early because I am self-employed and the main earner of the family. However, I wouldn't have wanted to stay home, even if I could afford it, because I needed that mental break from being needed 24/7. Mothers are people too and we shouldn't have to martyr ourselves for everyone else's wellbeing.
Disappointed at her advice to find “something less binary.” America’s economy cannot in any way be compared to India’s economy/culture. There simply are not many options for part-time work for women. I will be advising my daughter to plan to not have an income when her kids are very young and wish I’d been advised to do the same.
Booo AI art thumbnail AGAIN. A glance through your archive and so many videos of yours are AI thumbnails. Ripping off the work of human artists, real people's work being scraped and robbed for these images you're making.
cmon this podcast / channel should be better than that. Either pay an artist to make you some decent thumbnails for your videos or just use public domain images... This is no joke, you're contributing to something evil.
At some point the question of infant circumcision and it's potential effect on maternal bonding might be broached... I have learned that people aren't willing to consider such a thing if the subject is brought up by one of my particular sex, be that as it may, it just seems like an obviously potent early childhood experience that could result in downstream developmental consequences.
Glad i`m a working class Aussie man
LoL. Hi from an Aussie grandmother.
Gidday from a 61 yr old Brissy bogan@@grannyannie2948
A working Aussie bloke salt of the earth.
@@user-md1os6gl4n Cheers