Adrienne Rich is trying to pursue ambitions other than motherhood. She realizes that continuing to have children will foreclose everything else.
Before my third child was born I decided to have no more children, to be sterilized. … My husband, although he supported my decision, asked whether I was sure it would not leave me feeling less ‘feminine.’ In order to have the operation at all, I had to present a letter, counter-signed by my husband, assuring the committee of physicians who approved such operations that I had already produced three children, and stating my reason for having no more. … [M]y own judgment would not have been acceptable. When I awoke from the operation, twenty-four hours after my child’s birth, a young nurse looked at my chart and remarked coldly: ‘Had yourself spayed, did you?’
WTF.
source:
Of Woman Born: motherhood as experience and institution
by Adrienne Rich
1976. W. W. Norton & Co., New York
No comments:
Post a Comment