Working women torn between maternal instinct and career

Leo Wahyudi S, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Though working mothers are commonplace, many of these women continue to harbor a sense of guilt as their heart is torn between their career and their maternal instincts.

Many women in urban families are often faced with the predicament of providing a second income to bolster the family coffers while child rearing which, in Indonesian society, continues to be perceived as the primary responsibility of women.

Child psychologist Najelaa Shihab pointed out that it was only natural for mothers to have such feelings, as opposed to the father, as they were often emotionally closest to the younger children.

Such an emotional dilemma, Najelaa remarked, often led mothers to feel guilty and fraught with a sense of irresponsibility while it could burden their minds and eventually affect their careers.

Najelaa adds that mothers miss and long for the mother-child bond.

Speaking during a recent seminar on raising children for working mothers, Najelaa said these mothers did not need to harbor a sense of guilt if the child is left in good care at home.

She stressed that every working mother must accept that they had to leave their child "as a logical consequence of her decision to work".

Another psychologist, Seto Mulyadi, who has worked primarily with children, stressed the importance of psychological intimacy through quality and communication rather than the physical proximity of a mother-child relationship.

For example the mother before leaving for work could give her child an assignment which she would check upon her return, he said.

He added that in the long term, positive values could also be ingrained in the child who sees the mother having to work. These include perceptions of gender equality.

Seto further suggested that even textbooks at the elementary school level should be changed to suit this changing environment, where currently the general impression given to children was "father goes to work while the mother cooks in the kitchen".

"It should be changed into 'Mother goes to work and father helps sister take a bath'," said Seto who is chairman of the National Commission for Child Protection.

This will teach children that a father should also help with household chores and that both women and men could go to work at the office, Seto remarked adding that child rearing was the responsibility of the father too.

However one common mistake committed by working mothers was that they often spoiled their children to compensate for their own sense of guilt.

Former 1970's child singer Ira Maya Sopha recounted that as a mother and career woman she relied heavily on family support and baby-sitters.

She says that it was extremely important to find trustworthy and capable baby-sitters who could help care for and educate the child. She added that both parents must continuously oversee the baby-sitter and their child's development.