Abstract
In this paper, I examine how reproductive identity is formed through a series of simultaneous demands, drawing on my personal experiences of becoming a mother while doing my doctoral studies. Informed by Athan’s (2020) concept of reproductive identity, I explore how becoming a mother while simultaneously doing my PhD, generated new questions about selfhood, belonging, and recognition. Central to this paper is the role of shame. Building on Ahmed’s (2004, p. 1) assertion that “bodies take the shape of the very contact they have with objects and others”, this paper investigates how emotions of shame can regulate one’s reproductive identity and shape understandings of the ‘good mother’ narrative. I approach shame as an affective and relational force, and reflect on how everyday encounters with some family members, friends, and cultural expectations, led me to feel shame in those early years of motherhood. In doing so, I turn to a series of poems I wrote during the early stages of motherhood where I recorded, protested, contested, and negotiated these encounters of shame. Poetry is used in this essay as evidence and the method of inquiry as it allows me to explore my lived and embodied experiences of motherhood, shame, and reproductive identity formation. This follows scholars such as Faulkner (2017) who approaches poetic inquiry as a way of demonstrating how theoretical understandings can arise from embodied experience. Drawing on scholarship on motherhood, this paper argues that reproductive identity is formed not only through reproductive events but also through the narratives, relationships, and emotional encounters that give those events meaning.
The ‘good mother’ narrative is widely explored and debated in both scholarship on the social construction of motherhood as well as accounts that explore personal experiences of mothering. The idealised figure of the ‘good mother’ can often function as a standard against which an individual’s maternal practices are judged. In Hays’ (1996) definition of intensive mothering, a ‘good mother’ is expected to devote all her time, money, and energy to raising her child. According to Sinai-Glazer (2016), a ‘good mother’ should also be perfect, omnipresent, exclusively responsible for their child’s welfare, and carry blame for their children’s fault. On the other hand, many feminist theorists have also recognised that there is “no essential or universal experience of motherhood” (O’Reilly, 2004, p. 4). Distinguishing between two meanings of motherhood, Rich (1976) challenges the ‘good mother’ narrative as a social construct and recognises the complexities, ambivalence, and the potentially empowering nature of mothering.
Becoming a mother for me, just like for countless others before me, was a profoundly transformative experience. Yet, throughout this journey – from the moment of pregnancy to child birth and the early stages of motherhood – I grappled with a series of questions around selfhood, belonging, and recognition. In making sense of my evolving self and identity, I drew understandings from the many encounters I had, both with embodied subjects and cultural objects, beginning to recognise, for instance, the multitude of societal assumptions, practices, and pressures that shaped various maternal thinking. A dominant narrative was that of the ‘good mother’. And it is here that I found my own experiences, decisions, and maternal practices often questioned, ridiculed, and at times regarded with ‘shame’.
Having been pregnant and subsequently giving birth to my son during my doctoral studies, I was becoming a mother while also becoming a scholar, and this dual role meant competing priorities, which were perceived to disrupt traditional and established understandings of the ‘good mother’. Whenever I told others I was pregnant I was asked, quite bluntly, how I would manage to do a PhD and look after a baby. This was a question that I initially found quite absurd. This is not to minimise the difficulties and the realities of these roles, but it was a question that I felt was driven largely by assumptions that I was being neither a good mother nor good scholar given the “all consuming and irreconcilable” nature of motherhood and academic life (Ward and Wolf-Wendel, 2012, p. 1). I was also taken aback by such questioning, and would often feel a sense of shame, guilt, and discomfort. Gradually, I learnt to anticipate such questions, and dreaded being asked about my choices. There were also many instances where I was deeply conscious of my maternal body, not just in my own university setting, but also at academia conferences and in undertaking teaching. It was as though being visibly pregnant somehow made me different from the image of what a scholar was expected to be. I knew that being a mother would not diminish my commitment to my work, however these experiences made me feel somewhat out-of-place in these spaces that I was occupying, leaving me grappling with a sense of ambivalence. Outside of academia, I was given endless advice on what I should prioritise as a mother, how I should care for the baby, and how much time I should spend with the baby, among others. Although some of this was well-intentioned, it was as if I was constantly assessed against a set of unwritten rules about motherhood, driven by generational beliefs, and cultural and social expectations. These encounters thus began to shape my sense of self, and attach new meaning to my identity. In such situations, I often turned to poetry as a way of capturing, negotiating, contesting, and protesting these expectations set upon a mother.
Within that context, in this paper I build on Athan’s (2020) concept of reproductive identity, as well as Ahmed’s (2004, p. 1) assertion that “bodies take the shape of the very contact they have with objects and others”, in investigating and arguing how reproductive identity is shaped not only through reproductive events but also through the narratives, relationships, and emotional encounters that give those events meaning. In developing this argument, central to this paper are the feelings of shame that were attached to my maternal experiences, choices, and practices through everyday encounters with some family members, friends, and cultural expectations. Reflecting on these experiences, I investigate how emotions of shame are often used to enforce and regulate one’s reproductive identity and shape understandings of the ‘good mother’ narrative. In exploring this argument, I draw on a series of poems I wrote during the early stages of motherhood that convey feelings of shame. Poetry is used as a method of inquiry as emotions of shame can be embodied (Locke, 2007), and poetry allows me to explore theoretical understandings that can arise from such embodied experiences (Faulkner, 2017). It also allows me to record an experience itself. With poetry used by scholars as an auto-ethnographic inquiry, I also draw on researchers such as MacKenzie (2019) who use poetic inquiry to explore emotions of shame, demonstrating its potential of poetry to investigate experiences that are often difficult to articulate through conventional forms of academic writing.
Reproductive identity formation and the ‘good mother’ narrative
The theoretical and conceptual framework of this study is presented in two sections. In this first part, I examine the conceptualisation of reproductive identity, locate the ‘good mother’ narrative in scholarship and discuss arguments of the ‘good mother’ as a socially and culturally constructed ideal. Athan (2020, p. 446) introduces the emerging concept of reproductive identity as conveying “both conventional categories of parenthood/nonparenthood related reproductive experiences, and how people make sense of their feelings in the sphere of reproduction more generally”. Rather than reducing reproduction to merely a biological process, Athan (2020) regards reproductive identity as a dynamic and evolving aspect of selfhood. As such, it encompasses how individuals make sense of themselves within the context of reproduction, as well as how a person may interpret various reproductive events (Ćirović et. al., 2025). A broad and fluid concept, reproductive identity, Athan (2020, p. 445) explains, “is analogous to race, class, gender, and sexual orientation” where individuals “relate to these reference points, is referred to them by others, and is fundamentally shaped and shapes others through their prism”. Reproductive identity then is, essentially, “a fundamental aspect of who we are” (Ćirović et. al., 2025, p. 3580).
Becoming a mother, among others, is an example of “a profound shift in a person’s reproductive identity” (Wale, 2026, p. 5). Wale (2026) points out how mothers often experience disruption and loss of identity in the initial stages of motherhood, which is followed by the gradual reorganisation and integration of a sense of self that is often transformed. New mothers begin to reevaluate and modify various aspects of their identity as they face the realities of motherhood (Laney et. al., 2015). Some scholars are more skeptical of the ideal of the new mother as being able to take care of their babies immediately following their birth, arguing that many women feel overwhelmed and unprepared for motherhood especially at the birth of their first child (Choi et. al., 2005).
Practices of mothering are often shaped by perceptions of what or who constitutes ‘a good mother’. Scholars have approached understanding of the ‘good mother’ in many ways. Hays (1996, p. 8), for example, introduces the notion of intensive mothering where mothers are expected to devote “a tremendous amount of time, energy, and money raising their children”. In such a model, the mother remains the primary and central caregiver of the child, mothering is prioritised over any paid work, and if the mother is unavailable, other women such as female relatives should care for the child (Hays, 1996). Drawing on Hays, Hallstein (2006, p. 97) highlights how the ideal mother emerges as “all-caring, self-sacrificing” and “with limited and constrained agency in the public, professional realm”. In contemporary cultures, words such as “altruistic, patient, loving, selfless, devoted, nurturing, and cheerful” are also associated with the ‘good mother’ while she would also “put the needs of their children before their own, are available to their children whenever needed, and should the mother work outside the home, her children rather than her career should be at the centre of her life” (O’Reilly, 2021, p. 52).
Yet, as many scholars have argued, the image of the ‘good mother’ is not fixed or universal, but very much a social and cultural construct. The expectations of who or what a ‘good mother’ is are shaped by various political, social, historical, and cultural norms that vary with time and place (for example, Rich (1976) and O’Reilly (2004)). In what is regarded as one of the most influential conceptualisations of motherhood and mothering, Rich (1976) distinguishes between motherhood as an institution and an experience, highlighting how social and cultural expectations of motherhood can regulate and shape the lived experiences of mothering. Rich (1976) sees the stereotypical image of the mother as unconditionally loving and of motherhood as a single-minded identity – both of which left her haunted – as expectations demanded by culture. Building on Rich (1976), O’Reilly (2004, 2021) also discusses how dominant ideals of motherhood are produced within particular historical and social contexts, with their meanings varying over time and place.
Within such socially constructed nature of the ‘good mother’, Rich (1976) recognises the maternal ambivalence – on one hand, the resentment and the bitterness involved in mothering, and on the other hand the blissfulness and gratification the experience offered. Furthermore, she also recognises the empowering nature of mothering when women are able to negotiate, resist, and move beyond the set social and cultural norms, expectations, and ideals of motherhood (Rich, 1976). In later scholarship, O’Reilly (2004, 2021) extends and further theorizes these ideas through her work in motherhood studies, matricentric feminism, and maternal theory where she centers diverse perspectives, subjectivities, and experiences of mothers. In doing so, O’Reilly (2021, p. 46) sets forth a feminist counter-narrative that “contests, challenges, and counters” normative ideals of motherhood, and instead concerns “a maternal identity and practice that is empowering to mothers”. Here, she emphasizes work that articulates the “voice of the mother”, where the experience of “becoming and being a mother” is analysed “from the perspective and subjectivity of mothers themselves” (O’Reilly, 2021, p. 44). I situate my analysis in this paper within such understandings of motherhood as socially and culturally constructed.
Shame as produced through social and cultural encounters
Following the above discussions, in this section, I examine the notion of ‘shame’ as produced through social and cultural encounters, while also drawing on research that explores feelings of shame among mothers in academia. There is a wide-spread idea that shame, along with guilt, “are necessary components of mothering” (Sutherland, 2010, p. 310). As Sutherland (2010, p. 311) highlights, “mothers operate under the gaze of society – a society that has adopted clear characterizations of the ‘good mother’ […] As members of a social group (in this case, mothers), the social actor works within the knowledge of acceptable or ‘moral’ behavior.” As such, within ideal versions of motherhood, mothers can fear “being seen to have failed” (Choi et. al., 2005, p. 177). At the same time, as Babetin (2020) states, mothers can also internalise ideals of the ‘good mother’, and their inability to live up to these ideals as well as the pressures of being perfect as mothers can lead to feelings of shame and guilt as well as exhaustion and anger.
Locke (2007, p. 148) sees shame as “an embodied dimension”, and discusses how experience of shame can diminish one’s sense of self. Shame also overwhelms the subject, with the shamed subject often focusing on changing herself so as to “accommodate the demands of the milieu” (Locke, 2007, p. 151). It involves a sense of condemnation and social evaluation as well as an expectation or fear that one’s acts are socially judged or sanctioned (Liss, Schiffrin, and Rizzo, 2013). Yet, there is a certain taboo around shame, and a reluctance among mothers to express these experiences of shame.
Amidst such definitions, this paper approaches to understandings of shame as a social construct, placing it within Ahmed’s (2004, p. 1) assertion that “bodies take the shape of the very contact they have with objects and others”. Focusing broadly on the relationship between emotions, language, and bodies, according to Ahmed (2004), emotions are not just personal or private feelings that exist within an individual, but rather social and cultural practices. They are “effects of circulation” and “stick” to bodies, while they also “move between people, attach themselves to ideas, events, and identities, and contribute to how individuals and collectives are formed and governed” (Ahmed, 2004, p. 11). While emotions may feel personal and immediate, Ahmed (2004) argues that they are shaped by histories, cultural meanings, and social relations that influence how bodies come to experience and interpret the world.
In this paper, the emotion of ‘shame’ is placed within this context, as an affective and relational force. Building on Ahmed (2004), feelings such as shame are generated through various contact with norms, expectations, and values attached to particular identities. This paper interprets “objects and others” as encompassing cultural narratives and social relations through which motherhood is judged. Cultural narratives here are interpreted broadly following Rich’s (1976) notion of motherhood as an institution and thus encompassing the broader social expectations around the ‘good mother’, family and cultural traditions, and the historical and social structures that shape such understanding. Informed by Butler (2004), in referring to social relations, this paper concerns interpersonal and collective relationships such as with family, friends, colleagues, and the wider community, through which identity is negotiated and shaped.
A further relevance for this paper is research on academic motherhood and I have explored these ideas in relation to feelings of ‘shame’ that the mother-scholar can experience as they look to balance their responsibilities towards their child with their career, including in academia. With caregiving and child-rearing privileged over other forms of maternal identity and labour in dominant understanding of the ‘good mother’, Bartram-Zantvoort et al. (2022) explains that it reinforces the perception that the competing roles of a caring and a working mother cannot exist simultaneously. Wolf-Wendel, Ward, and Kulp (2016) explore how the notion of the ideal worker applies in academic settings, arguing that students and employees in academia are expected to show full dedication to their work and careers, and show limited attention to non-work pursuits including raising children. Such socially constructed norms can lead to feelings of guilt and shame, especially among new mothers in academia, as they strive to navigate the responsibilities of motherhood along with research ambitions (Low and Martin, 2019). Pimentel and Bel Hadj Ali (2025) highlight the experience of a mother who felt her maternal body as “out of place” within academic environments, arguing how such incidents can produce feelings of shame, discomfort, and isolation. Mothers in academia can not only be “torn apart by guilt” (Pillay, 2012, p. 139), but in academia, motherhood itself can “imply feelings of guilt” with such feelings “externally created and perpetuated as well as internally reinforced” (Pillay, 2012, p. 142). It is within such conceptualisations and discussions that I explore the feelings of shame in relation to my own experiences.
An autoethnographic enquiry
Following this theoretical and conceptual overview, in this section, I explain the autoethnographic enquiry I undertook. In her work, Athan (2020) also builds on McAdams and McLean’s (2013, p. 233) notion of narrative identity, which is defined as “a person’s internalised and evolving life story”. I approach the series of poems that I analyse as conveying a “person’s internalised and evolving life story” (McAdams and McLean, 2013, p. 233). The authors argue that in “constructing and internalizing a life story”, the author seeks to answer questions such as, “who am I? How did I come to be? Where is my life going?” (McAdams and McLean, 2013, p. 235). I see this as a key function of the poetry I explore.
Within this context, this paper is informed by autoethnographic approaches where personal experiences and narratives are used to understand cultural experiences (Ellis, Adams, and Bochner, 2011). Described as a socially-conscious act, an individual’s experiences are placed within broader social and cultural contexts (Ellis, Adams, and Bochner, 2011). In this paper, the poems are considered as an autoethnographic form of enquiry where my personal and lived experiences of motherhood are explored and interpreted. As a mother myself, the poetry provides credibility and validity (Ellis, Adams, and Bochner, 2011). Following other researchers, the personal experiences explored through my poems are examined against existing research and cultural artefacts (Ellis, Adams, and Bochner, 2011). With autoethnographic methods encouraging personal agency and responsibility as well as giving a voice to the individual (Ellis, Adams, and Bochner, 2011), it can also aid application of Rich’s (1976) understanding of motherhood as an experience.
This paper also recognises limitations with this research placed within and reflecting my own lived experiences of becoming a mother. As an autoethnographic inquiry, the paper seeks to offer situated knowledge of how shame and reproductive identity are experienced, negotiated, and understood within specific social and cultural contexts. Drawing on Ellis, Adams, and Bochner, (2011, p. 283), “readers provide validation by comparing their lives to ours, by thinking about how our lives are similar and different and the reasons why, and by feeling that the stories have informed them about unfamiliar people or lives”. A further biographical detail important here is my identity as a doctoral student while simultaneously becoming a mother. I had approached motherhood knowing that I would and could be performing both these roles of scholar and mother, and there would be competing priorities. However, it was through encounters with other people and wider social and cultural expectations that such understandings I held were challenged, questioned, and ridiculed, contributing to the ideas and feelings of shame that are explored in this paper.
Analysis: Negotiating shame and reproductive identity through poetry
Within this theoretical and conceptual context that informs this study, I investigate how I recorded, protested, contented, and negotiated these encounters of shame through poetry in reproductive identity making. This section presents four poems and their analysis.
35 weeks
The poem below titled, ‘35 weeks’ recounts the moment that I walked to the hospital to give birth to my son after I got my contractions. There are many versions of poems that I have written about this moment of giving birth, but this is a more humorous one and it is only later, following an encounter with friends, where I shared this experience, that I was made to feel shame.
At 35 weeks,
I didn’t know,
that the pains pricking me on my lower abdomen,
were slight contractions,
and when the midwife said so,
over the phone,
I went home,
to shave my legs,
on my way to labour.
When I recounted this story of the birth of my son to a group of friends, including the added detail that I had walked to hospital, I was met with ridicule and laughed at. I was asked, somewhat mockingly, who walks to hospital when they are in labour. My friends then proceeded to tell me, in detail, a series of anecdotes about what must happen in labour and were surprised that I didn’t experience many of those. Borrowing from Adichie (2009), according to this group, there was a single story of childbirth and somehow mine didn’t fit that story. My story of childbirth was seen as outside the norm. The responses I received from my friends were not informed by personal or lived experiences of childbirth but rather derived from culturally recognisable scripts. In their responses, I was supposed to be physically overwhelmed, unable to move due to pain, and be dependent. In fact, in Western cultural depictions of childbirth, women are made to fear birth and its pain .
To me, this moment was significant in the formation of my reproductive identity. In this encounter, I had expected some sort of understanding, yet it was interpreted as absurd, with that reinterpretation producing an affect, in this case, evoking shame and embarrassment, causing disruption in that circuit of identity formation. Babetin (2020, p. 412) quotes Wolf (2001, p. 60) in noting that in becoming a mother, one’s identity is “cloven in two” and her “independence cut by half”. In performing this act of self-care, I had also disrupted established understandings of a ‘good mother’ where as Babetin (2020, p. 412) goes on to highlight, a mother’s “personal needs and desires are no longer [her] top priority”. A further disruption was caused by my decision to share my story within a public space within a setting where a woman’s experiences of childbirth is still considered “an inner, often private experience” (Stern & Bruschwiler-Stern, 1998, p. 3, as cited in Babetin, 2020, p. 413). Placing this with Ahmed’s (2004) arguments, this experience of sharing my story and having this judged against social and cultural expectations of childbirth and thus met with ridicule, my reproductive identity was attached with new meaning. At that moment, I was left feeling exposed, ashamed, alienated, and lacking dignity. This encounter made me conscious that my experience did not fit the expected image of how someone in labour should behave, and as such illustrates how shame can emerge when lived experiences fall outside the norm.
I’ve just had a baby
The immediate period following the birth of my baby was filled with a myriad of feelings as I was confronted with the reality of what was happening before me – I was holding a newborn, going through immense physical pain, and grappling with uncertainties, varying emotions, and questions. In this poem, I capture my reality in the first few hours following the birth of my son.
I’ve just had a baby,
And I’m not sure what to do,
The newborn suits are too big for him,
At 35 weeks, he’s just two kilos,
I’ve just had a baby,
And I’m chewing gas-filled air,
They feel like wool between teeth,
But that’s the least of my despair,
I’ve just had a baby,
But my placenta is retained,
And I’m wheeled into the theatre,
My head still swirling, like a ballerina on stage,
And as my body turns numb from neck down,
I watch the good doctor on the horizon,
Her hands moving in a circle,
Stitching me up like a quilt,
I don’t want to think about this pain,
Nobody told me about,
I’ve just had a baby,
My body is shamelessly exposed,
Ah! I had thought I knew what labour should be,
But my body is no longer mine,
I’ve just had a baby,
Back home we update our list,
I shoot messages to relevant parties,
Just for some time, my PhD will rest.
In contrast to the previous poem, in this poem, ‘shame’ arose from internalised ideals of what a good mother ought to be and the failure to meet these ideals. The encounters that emerge here are with expectations and conditions attached to the maternal body. Labour is already a deeply personal and private experience. In this instance, not only am I undergoing a bodily transition, but a deep reconfiguration of the relationship between the self and the body. Reflecting on this now, the poem is dotted with various uncertainties, creating a sense of tension between on one hand, of that experience of becoming a mother, and on the other, the vulnerability that results from that sense of helplessness and unawareness. An idealised version of the ‘good mother’ would be one that is competent, better knowing, and better prepared.
Although my son was born naturally, a postpartum complication meant I had to be wheeled into the theatre. Thus, with this experience, which I capture in this poem, the body that had carried the child is becoming a site of medical intervention, exposure, and observation, and through the poem. I would argue here that such an experience disrupted dominant narratives that often regard women as naturally prepared for motherhood and able to seamlessly transition into her new role as mother. As Wale (2026, p. 5) states, “the romanticized discourse of “idealized” motherhood expects mothers to experience immediate bliss and instinctive competence in their new role”, while a mother’s vulnerabilities are often absent in dominant cultural scripts following the birth of a child. At the same time, there is also a sense of guilt I am beginning to feel here having had to rest my PhD, although, as I say here, it’s ‘just for some time’, signalling that the absence will be brief, and I will return to this work. Here, there is a sense of that maternal ambivalence that Rich (1976) speaks of, as I begin to negotiate my reproductive identity at this moment, having given birth to my son, experiencing its wonders, but also navigating the chaos of that immediate moment, while thinking about my doctoral work. This example shows how my sense of reproductive identity was shaped through the ambivalence resulting from the tension between my own feelings of uncertainties and internalised expectations of the ‘good mother’.
Uncultured choices
Below are draft excerpts from a poem titled, Uncultured choices. The first part of this poem captures the point I had made at the beginning of the piece where I was asked how I would do a PhD with a baby. In the second part, I capture recounting the birth of my son to ‘elders’ – meaning my wider family and their response to it, and unpack the feelings of shame.
A PhD and a baby?
They ask in disbelief,
I quietly touch my belly,
Where the little one rests,
How will you manage?
…
The baby is here,
I type the news on my phone,
For everybody else not near,
On the end of the line,
The elders demand to know
His time of birth, to check
If my choices align with his stars,
No, I protest
…
They call these choices
Shameful,
Uncultured…
In this poem, I reflect on the label ‘uncultured’ that was attached to my maternal choices, which came to shape my reproductive identity. I was often asked by various people how I would manage to do a PhD with a baby. There was a tone of surprise and disbelief expressed about the dual role I was performing as mother and scholar. As reflected in the introduction, I initially found this question absurd as I had known of other mothers who continued their work while raising children. Over time, I dreaded being asked this specific question. As scholars such as Ward and Wolf-Wendel (2012) have explored, both of these roles stand in conflict with each other, given they are demanding and each require full dedication. As Gonçalves (2019, p. 472) states, in academia, where “people are no longer identified by name, but rather by their H-indexes and ORCID ID numbers”, one is expected to demonstrate characteristics such as efficiency and productivity, all within competitive and compressed timeframes and resources. Within such settings and driven by such expectations, motherhood is often expected to hold a subordinate or secondary place to academic work (Pimentel and Bel Hadj Ali, 2025). As such, in these experiences, shame emerged as a relational encounter as this dual role disrupted dominant understandings of, on one hand, the ‘good mother’ who would privilege caregiving over any other form of work or aspirations, and on the other hand, what is expected of a scholar who would be fully devoted to their work.
In intensive mothering, while it is the mother’s primary responsibility to take care of her child, Hays (1996) also discusses that mothers should be guided by experts, and could seek the involvement of other women if a need arises. In this poem, I also reflect on elders (mostly women) intervening and offering advice with their own understanding shaped by cultural expectations. Yet, shame is constructed through this encounter, as I reject or disrupt these inter-generational demands of motherhood where knowledge and tradition is shared across generations. By attaching the meaning of ‘uncultured’, my act was also placed as outside of the legitimate or acceptable cultural or social framework that was guiding their knowledge. As such, ‘shame’ emerges through various encounters, shaping my reproductive identity. In questioning my choices and being labelled ‘uncultured’ for disrupting what is expected of me, I would suggest, emotions of shame are used to attach meaning to my reproductive identity.
Good mum
Below are extracts from a poem titled Good Mum that was published in my pamphlet, Mother Self where I reflect on a specific experience with my child. It is a poem that I wrote at a particular moment of vulnerability, and is offered as a counter-narrative to established understandings of the ‘good mother’.
The first time you call me ‘good mum’,
you are four.
Your words are an offering […]
I want to tell you, how a good mum
carries kindness on her back,
as she wades through rough seas,
how she is a lighthouse that no storm can bury,
and so, where do I fit in?
You call me “good mum”, not
when I am these. Instead, when I
swoop and shriek
over the sea of blocks and toys…
Building on Rich’s (1976) understanding of motherhood as a lived experience, O’Reilly (2004, p. 2) states that “women’s own experiences of mothering can nonetheless be a source of power”. As pressures to be the perfect mother can result in feelings of shame, Babetin (2020) explains that new mothers search for their own personal truth. Babetin (2020, p. 424) highlights, “when women try to live up to an unattainable […] they will likely end up feeling exhausted and angry,” and in such cases, some women may “ask themselves how they are different from this falsely perpetuated image.” This means, among others, a mother “learning to own the myriad of emotions she feels and not just the ones the culture says are acceptable” (Babetin, 2020, p. 424).
This poem conveys a different encounter through which shame and reproductive identity are negotiated and understood. Within idealized understandings of maternal selflessness, ordinary feelings such as exhaustion and rage can be framed as failures which can lead to feelings of guilt and shame among mothers (for example, O’Reilly, 2021). As I reflect here, while I had failed to embody the idealised version of the ‘good mother’, through my son’s recognition, the shame attached to this perceived failure is disrupted and subverted. The poem thus offers a counter-narrative to the idea of the ‘good mother’ as patient, sacrificing, and taking blame. Instead, the good mother emerges as one that embraces the everyday complexities of motherhood, including its frustration, love, exhaustion, joy, rage, and the deep relationships between the mother and child. Borrowing from McAdams and McLean (2013, p. 233), this poem contains themes of “personal agency and exploration”. Building on this idea, and following Babetin (2020), in this encounter, I had allowed myself to lean towards the myriad of emotions rather than solely grappling with what social and cultural norms and relations deem acceptable, and with it encountered my own personal truth of the ‘good mother’. With this poem, not only am I challenging the social and cultural constructions of the ‘good mother’ narrative but also my own internalized ideals.
Conclusion
This paper contributes to existing scholarship by focusing on shame as an affective and relational force in reproductive identity formation. Through a series of poems I wrote, I have interrogated moments in my reproductive journey where shame emerged through various encounters with ‘objects and others’, where the everyday experiences of motherhood disrupt dominant narratives of maternal responsibility, competence, and belonging. This paper began by reflecting on my lived experiences of motherhood, and presented the sense of ambivalence that I was grappling with, given that while becoming a mother, I was also becoming a scholar. In many ways, my experiences did not fit well within normative ideals of motherhood, and as such, it was questioned and addressed with skepticism by others. It is here, through these encounters, as Ahmed states (2004, p. 1) with “objects and others” , that my reproductive identity took shape. I reflect on these in the poems that I present and examine.
Through the poems, I center my perspectives and lived experience, while protesting and countering the socially constructed narrative of the ‘good mother’. In doing so, drawing on O’Reilly (2021, p. 46) I seek “to imagine and implement a maternal identity and practice that is empowering”. In the poem 35 weeks I experience ‘shame’ through my encounters with others who judged me against socially constructed understandings of how and what a woman should experience at the moment of giving birth, while in I just had a baby, ‘shame’ is constructed internally driven by feelings of vulnerability as a new mother, the sense of shame at not knowing what I must do. In A PhD and a baby, my dual role as mother and scholar is evaluated against socially recognised norms of the ‘good mother’ and ‘good scholar’. In Good Mum, I seek my own personal truth, not only challenging the idealized image of the ‘good mum’, but my own internalised understanding of it, allowing myself to further negotiate my maternal identity. As demonstrated through the analysis, reproductive identity is thus formed not only through reproductive events but also through the narratives, relationships, and emotional encounters that give those events meaning. Yet, these lived experiences become a source of knowledge and power through which, building on Babetin (2020), personal definitions of the ‘good mother’ emerges.
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