Why I'm Proud To be an Allerednic

Cherie Blair (Tony Blair's wife)

By Lauren Booth (Cherie Blairs half sister) Article summary from the Daily Mail Oct 27th 2004

Do you remember the heydays of `superwomen'? It seems like only yesterday we were all busting our guts to emulate the `success' like Nicola Horlick and, of course Cherie Blair. `Get out of the house and into the boardroom' was the message, as their well-to-do faces beamed out from coverage that made the rest of womankind feel as about dynamic as last week's nappies.

Then came the crushing truth - the `have-it-alls' such as Nicola and Cherie not only had a household `team' to aid their climb up their industry ladders but were also as frazzled and stressed as the rest of us. Beneath the veneer of supremacy, Horlick's marriage was crumbling. And in the aftermath of Fostergate - the embarrassment of Cherie's dealings with Peter Foster - even she admitted that her life was a juggling act and that `some of the balls get dropped - there just aren't enough hours in a day'. Well, this week Cherie was back in front of the microphone.She gave a speech as part of her U.S lecture tour and rightly chose to avoid speaking about politics, concentrating instead on the dilemmas faced by millions of women in Britain who have to balance the demands of careers with their roles as wives and mothers.

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Lauren Booth, goes on to talk about Cherie Blairs visit to the USA to talk to rich business women who had paid £35 to hear her speak.Cherie told the audience of of her `vacations' with her children (the period she spent looking after them) What a way to refer to childminding. 

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I could so easily have fallen  into Allerednic sydromne Cinderella in reverse ,' she said , outlining her nightmare vision of being a `princess' turned into a `scullery maid' by the burden of marriage and motherhood. What do these phrases reveal about Britain's First Lady ? They reveal that she now appears to see domestic work as beneath her and that , by extension , it is demeaning to all professional' women. How insulting and how cruelly out of touch with the majority of hard working women.I should know, because I, too am one of them.

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Lauren Booth, talks of her career as a journalist, and how her husband has looked after the children the 8 days a month she is `away', continuing that to refer to child minding as a `vaction' is an insult.

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How easy to mock the housewife who - so modern feminist thinking goes - must be sad, dowdy, commercially unsuccessful and probably not very bright. Fancy allowing something as demanding as motherhood to take up precious time that could otherwise be devoted to your career. Sadly, such misguided thinking has been accepted as orthodoxy by many working women.I, too, fell victim to it. When my first daughter was born, I rushed back to work after just five days, even showing off about how quickly I was `back to normal' I was under the mistaken apprehension that this was what an `intelligent' women just `did'. We have babies, then farm them out as soon as possible to others to care for, until their 18th birthday when, heaven of heavens, we can spend more time at the gym or with our alternative therapists. I worked part time, but such strange hours that I was hardly present for my baby even when I was home. Her cries were a distraction: her efforts to engage me in play met with bored compliance. Yes Mrs. Blair, I, too, briefly believed that domesticity was a form of slavery, a shameful struggle from which to escape at the earliest opportunity. For that is what Cherie's comments imply: that to struggle through a day's mothering without the pride of being paid is something to be ashamed of.

Then, after five months of regarding my gorgeous first born as a burden, I suddenly stopped. And, like countless mothers before me, I seriously re-evaluated my place in the grand scheme of family life. I suddenly wanted to be the one who, for the most part, fed, bathed and comforted my baby. I wanted and still want, to play, bake and clean with my two   gorgeous girls in the middle of the week, even if it is at the expense of professionally inflated ego: at the expense of ever having that three-million-quid dream home in a fashionable borough. What sort of warped society do we live in when the decision to put our careers on hold in order to raise and care for our offspring is seen as a sign of weakness?

As it happens, I think that Mrs. Blairs comment - that those of us who carry the domestic load are `victims' - is not just insulting but horribly dated. Where has she been during the raging work-life debate, when successful women, from Zoe Ball to Gwyneth Paltrow, have swapped career success for the joy of sharing in the wonders of the kitchen and the playroom. And countless recent studies show that millions of women long to do the same. Yes, Cherie, from your elevated status as international icon, it must now seem demeaning to wash or tidy up every day, to take out the rubbish in the morning, to spend and spend an afternoon making PlatDoh monsters.

But real women, those without nannies, millions in the bank and a high flying hubbie, do this every day. Not because we have to, but because we want to. If that makes us `victims' of Allerednic syndrome in your book, then put me down as a willing domestic slave. Just don't ever pity me.