It is heartbreaking to see how our society constantly judges the mothers and makes them feel guilty about their choices.
It doesn’t matter who you are, society doesn’t differentiate when it comes to passing judgments and making you feel guilty. Working mothers are constantly judged for spending lesser time with kids and stay-at-home moms for not being financially independent.
Talking about the guilt of working mothers, last year during an interview, Kareena asked Kajol about why mothers tend to feel guilty when they have to leave their children behind and go to work.
To which Kajol, who is not only a working mother but also has been raised by a working mother, shared:
“I remember telling her [Tanuja] at one point that ‘Everybody else’s mother stays at home and they come to pick their kids up from school and my mother is the only one who does not come to pick me up from school.’
And she was like, ‘You know baby I have to work.’ I looked at her and I realised somewhere, may be as a child at that point of time I stopped resenting her….I think it [working mom’s guilt] is because of the responsibility factor.
In societies generally, the responsibility is always the mother’s to bring up the child. And that’s where the guilt factor comes in.”
Though many mothers undergo the guilt of being a working mom, it is more important than ever that we bring change in that rudimentary thought process. And, Kajol is taking a small step in that direction by raising her son right.
In one of her recent interviews, Kajol mentioned:
“My son wanted me to stay home on a Saturday, but I told him that work is work. I have to go to work just like he has to attend school. If I teach this to my son, he’ll grow up to respect his girlfriend and wife’s career.
He’ll know it’s a normal pattern. I’m changing the future today by changing my son’s thinking. If we want self-respect, we have to learn how to earn it and also teach others the importance of it.”
It is heartwarming to see how mothers of today are making sure that the women of tomorrow don’t have to bear the same burden of judgments and expectations that our generation did.
At IFORHER, we are not only in awe of Kajol but also of every parent, who is raising their sons and daughters without any gender bias. It is high time we raise our kids in a manner they respect women and men equally.
