When my sons were small and I was editing a magazine, I would return home wrung out from a wretched commute to find them adorable in pyjamas, and a silky inner voice would pipe up: “You’re doing this job for what? To see your kids one hour a day? Why struggle? Just let go . . .” Almost all my women friends had tumbled from the career tree. If the first baby didn’t push them off, the second would.
But another inner voice, angry and obdurate, kept me going. “What was the point,” it raged, “in all those years working late, fighting for a big job, if you flunk out now? Old men said this always happens: promote women and they only quit to have babies. Why prove the bastards right?”
Subscribe to The New Statesman today from only £8.99 per month
Content from our partners
