International Women’s Day: Give to Gain > Gain to Give

Sunday 8th March was International Women’s Day, a day focussed on raising awareness of gender equality, equity and advocacy for women’s rights. It also highlights a focus on social justice and anti-oppression, acknowledging historic and present inequality and inequity. Previous blogs I have written have focussed on a range of topics across gender, relational and sexuality diversity, but this International Women’s Day I was particularly moved to write through the topic focus of the day, ‘Give to Gain’. On first look the focus of giving out to one another feels innately beneficial, yet it also highlighted a pattern to me that I often see in my therapy practice of giving without gain, with neutrality or expectation. Across history women are often portrayed as the givers, supporters, peacemakers, cheerleaders, and these societal ideals ‘gain’ women often exhaustion, depletion, resentment and loss of self. Below I highlight five constructs of giving in society that I think warrant a flip, gaining understanding to give back.

1,2,3 ‘You and me’

Construct 1 ‘Women are carers and naturally maternal’.
Give suggested ‘Caring roles, attachment across maternity services and beyond’.

Construct 2 ‘Women hold relationships together’.
Give suggested ‘Mediation and delegation’.

Construct 3 ‘Women can show vulnerability’.
Give suggested ‘Empathic expression of upset’.

Many constructs centred around a gender binary between men and women focus on women taking roles as carers and maternal figures who hold relationships together. Value is placed on mediation and empathic understanding. Society needs all these roles, but the cautionary tale is finding them in gender norms. Arguably these constructs layer together, resulting in impact multiplied many times over. A woman in a society that expects her to hold the burden predominantly of caring, with a smaller village around her, being more vulnerable when told she is also responsible for whether her closest relationships are healthy because she is empathically able to express herself.

‘5 Alive’

Construct 4 ‘Women can have it all’.
Give suggested ‘Women can DO it all’.
‘Professional career identity given space alongside home life’.

Construct 5 ‘Women only need more confidence’.
Give suggested ‘Focussed personal development’.

Expanded constructs focus on individual capabilities and challenges. Women as capable of everything, only needing to build more confidence to achieve. While imperative to hold a sense of autonomy, these constructs often feel lacking for not acknowledging systemic barriers and can misdirect action.

So, what’s the alternative?:
Gains in focus

Looking at the same constructs again, each has a gain starting point:

Construct 1 ‘Women are carers and naturally maternal’.
Gain flip/ invitation ‘Acknowledgement, self-compassion and a village’.

As so much caring work is unpaid it often goes unrecognised. Considering all the roles together to run a household includes a whole team of work: cleaning, cooking, childcare, and imagining a value to it soon totals up to a considerable saved income. Daily and weekly noticing of what has been given is so important to develop a sense of progress in the everyday. Forming rituals to acknowledge through reflection / shared appreciation can shift perspective (without feeling loaded as expectations). Alongside what is given, planning time for oneself and when the village can support is imperative, or finding one’s village in the first place, as for many villages of support have become smaller, so first steps are finding new tribes.

Construct 2 ‘Women hold relationships together’.
Gain flip/ invitation ‘Boundaries and shared emotional labour’.

In an attempt to support relationships, it can more often fall to one partner to mediate and delegate tasks. Women tend to be more often socially constructed into the position of pleasing others. Here we see giving as a direct caution to wellbeing. The antidote – resetting boundaries, naming needs clearly and delegating ‘to think’ tasks as much as to do activities. Doing a little less, being as clear as possible about what one is willing and happy to do and what one is not willing to do. I often note a double check to this on what is wanted rather than a capability edge; being able to do something does not mean one should by default.

Construct 3 ‘Women can show vulnerability’.
Gain flip/ invitation ‘Space for all emotions including anger and frustration’.

Women are spoken to more as children and emotional openness encouraged more as a construct; however, more often than not there is a tendency for society to favour vulnerability, receptivity and sharing upset. Expanding a repertoire of emotions can be a core focus across therapy, cue looking at an emotions wheel and setting time to regularly reflect and check in. Many women I have worked with struggle to connect to anger as a primary emotion as it hasn’t held the same space with others in discussion. I often look to the permission setting for ownership of anger and frustration together with considering how others can attentively listen and acknowledge the experience. This is particularly important as emotions set us ‘in motion’ – anger may clearly be naming changes that one needs to make, and until one can connect to that emotion the ‘motion’ forward can be practically stalled.

Construct 4 ‘Women can have it all’.
Gain flip/ invitation ‘Intentioned choice of what is wanted alongside equal pay’.

This construct is one of the most contentious ones for me. Many women feel caught in a horrific bind of commitments through the capitalist dream. In the quest to have it all they end up doing everything and completely burnt out in the process. Advocacy needs to continue to move forward in fighting for equal pay, with the wage gap still ever present. Boundaries, as in construct 1, need to be made, but also there needs to be a rethink of season. Perhaps all experiences can be approached, but not all at once. Boundaries will only support where enough is taken off the table from the outset. Viktor Frankl noted we can manage almost anything with a why in mind. In our search for meaning there can be a joy in missing out through intentioned ‘yes’s’ and reframing ‘no’s’ to ‘not yet – can review’.

Construct 5 ‘Women only need more confidence’.
Gain flip/ invitation ‘Recognition of systemic barriers’.

There needs to be a hopefulness held of one’s ability to make change and there needs to be an awareness that change is not all held at an individualistic level. Systemic barriers exist across all sectors of life and there needs to be an acknowledgement of these to make collective change. ‘Invisible Women’ was a harrowing read to me, showing gaps through gender bias and lack of research that cost women many parts of their lives. On this point I will revert that the theme of International Women’s Day has absolute purpose when looked at from a collective: all of society giving out to gain all of society, but it cannot be rooted to each individual woman alone.

We will additionally be releasing a video on understanding menopause as part of International Women’s Day’s ongoing focus on giving out at a collective level, advocacy around a topic that has significant impact on women’s wellbeing.