On motherhood and work

Motherhood is at once a universal and at the same time a deeply individual and personal experience. No one mother-child relationship is the same as another. There are many routes to conception, as many birth stories as there are births, and the experience will challenge and change women and those around them in myriad different ways. 

For some, becoming a mother will feel like the realisation of a destiny, a vocation; for others it will be harder and more undoing than they ever imagined. Some people will want to be mothers and not be able to – existing in and experiencing a loss of something that never truly manifested. But for all the differences of human experience, on all of these journeys, there will be shared thoughts, feelings, worries and realities. 

I am married to a woman. We had our two children via IVF with donor sperm. Having children together was complicated. I came into the relationship with a loudly ticking biological clock. My partner was a bit younger, and less convinced of the imperative to reproduce. Neither one of us was wholly comfortable committing to being in a long term relationship with someone of the same sex. 

We worked through these obstacles, and tackled the logistical questions around how to actually conceive. Once we had decided the preferred route would be with the help of a mutual friend, there were many more conversations to be had. And then there was trying to get - and stay - pregnant. Through a fertility clinic in London, with multiple failed attempts: a hormone-fuelled, physically and financially punishing rollercoaster of hope and disappointment. 

I carried both children and each brought unimaginable joy and unforeseen challenges. Struggles with breastfeeding, the renegotiation of my relationship with my own mother, the compromises and Faustian pacts of a return to work, postnatal depression, a reconstitution of self. 

Our kids’ early years also coincided with my growing and selling the communications agency I founded in 2011. The clash of what was demanded of me at home and work was intense – both rewarding and challenging. But sometimes I felt I struggled to be the Mum I wanted to be because of the demands of my professional life.

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On my journey I found comfort in others’ stories: some amazing bits of writing that saved me – ‘fragments I shored against my ruin’. When I had postnatal depression after my second child, Emma Jane Unsworth’s After The Storm - which treats the subject with irreverent humour, bracing honesty and self-compassion - offered a lifeline out of darkness. 

Maggie Nelson (The Argonauts) and Ariel Levy (The Rules Do Not Apply) both wrote about their experience of motherhood in a way that demonstrated it could be an unconventional, intellectual, artistic experience; deeply challenging, unmooring and yet congruent with professional brilliance and growth.  

Lucy Jones’ Matrescence was a revelation. It describes motherhood as political as well as personal, a construct and product of our modern industrialised society, and something that could and should be different. It is probably the best book on motherhood I’ve ever read. A manifesto for more awareness and radical reform. 

But there were some aspects of my experience that I didn’t find reflected in the literature I read. For example, I never discovered anything brilliant about IVF, and most of the books about same-sex parenting I encountered centred sexuality as an identity choice in a way that I didn’t find particularly helpful. 

So I thought when I stepped down from running my agency that I might write my own memoir: a contribution to the canon of insightful writing on motherhood that might help others where I had struggled, and that would enable me to make sense of my experience. I was motivated by a belief in the importance of stories to confer meaning and deepen understanding, to bring us closer together, to heal wounds and sow wisdom. 

I wrote a proposal - with a sample chapter, a full outline, a marketing approach. And I spoke to friends and family about it - exploring, elaborating on, and unpicking some of the things I had felt, thought or seen over the past eight years. 

The proposal is more or less finished but I haven’t sent it to any agents yet. That’s possibly because I suspect it needs a bit more work. It’s also because I feel a bit reluctant to put myself out there and share all the rawness and fear and love that motherhood entails. 

I might yet go back to it. But even the work so far has been helpful. It has allowed me to process some of what I felt but didn’t have the space to reflect on. And it has reaffirmed my sense that becoming a parent is a huge deal. 

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As professional mothers - or want-to-be mothers - we are expected to largely separate our domestic lives, our fertility journey, the ups and downs of having and caring for children, from what we do at the office. This is in spite of the fact that these might be some of the most difficult things we experience in our lives. 

Feminism has made great strides. That women in the UK are able to work and have families, and have some legal and state support for that should not be taken for granted. And many employers have improved their offer for working parents. Meanwhile, the fact that I was able to have children with another woman is itself a triumph of advocacy and evolving societal norms - not to mention science - , for which I am really grateful. 

But it’s still a juggle; sometimes an impossibly pressured one. I know of many people - men and women - for whom the experience of trying to be ‘good enough’ at home and work has caused something to break. Meanwhile, I am sure that for women who wanted children but were not able to have them, or for parents whose children died, the pain and requirement to show up without the wounds visible, must be the hardest of all. 

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I set up my own company in part to be able to have a family without the compromises I’d seen others having to make. Up to a point I achieved that. I ran the business, enjoyed my work, and had more flexibility than I would have done if I were an employee somewhere else. I took maternity leave with both kids on full pay (six months with my first, three with my second). 

And I tried to extend a version of those rights and that culture to my colleagues (men and women), and to make di:ga a workplace that accommodated the whole person. We had generous benefits and leave policies for a small agency, and in the day-to-day people were encouraged to build in the flexibility they needed to thrive - not just to look after kids, but to do yoga, have therapy, spend time in nature, whatever. 

I believed that making work a safe, nurturing place to be - while still insisting on high standards - was likely to get the best out of people and make us more productive and better in the long term. But even in workplaces where the intentions are good, capitalism and caring are often in opposition to each other, and the stretch can sometimes feel impossible. 

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One morning in September 2021, when I was just back from my second maternity leave, I had to go to a meeting in a basement in London. I was worried I wouldn’t have phone reception. We had left a very young new nanny at home with both kids – more than an hour away. It didn’t feel right. I wasn’t sure she could cope. I rang my wife and asked her to check in, then went downstairs – where the person I was meeting offered to buy my company: something I had totally failed to anticipate. 

The contrast between where my head (and heart) were at and what was happening at work could not have been starker. I didn’t want to talk about deals, and how much money we would get and what the terms would be. I wanted to go home and hold my tiny baby, and breathe him in, and not expose him to the inhumanity of being cared for by a stranger. 

This was a particularly memorable moment, but this dissonance between work and mothering continued. On days when I worked from home, I would come down from the office at 6pm and have to shift modes, in the time it took me to walk down a flight of stairs. From a decisive, efficient, analytical CEO. To a flexible, patient, unjudgmental carer.  I always used to find it remarkable that at work people would do what I told them but at home I could be completely and utterly defeated by a two-year old. 

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When I was young I was fiercely feminist and determined that having children would not jeopardise my career. I remember how disappointed I was when my aunt – a successful documentary maker – had her first child aged 40. I saw her giving up her professional status for the chaos, anxiety and mess of parenting and didn’t understand.

Later, I found myself in my early 30s in a relationship with a man, and my views changed. I wanted what my friends were having: the status and purpose of marriage and motherhood. 

I in no way regret becoming a mother. It is the richest, most enlightening, challenging, deeply nurturing and stretching experience I’ve ever had. I love my kids more than I can say. And the demands that co-parenting place on my relationship with my wife are really tough but have made us stronger. 

At the same time I think - and I know I am not the first to say this -  that the concept of having it all is possibly a little unhelpful. It doesn't acknowledge the cost or stretch of that goal, or the reality that one person's ‘all’ will not be the same as another's, or that one's own ambitions and aspirations might change over time. 

Being a mother is the hardest job I’ve ever done. Probably the lowest status. But also the most rewarding. I think it made me a better manager, a better leader, more creative, and more compassionate. And I’m learning every day. 

I try to bring these lessons to bear on my work now - coaching individuals and working with leaders and teams to create compassionate, effective workplaces. Because the personal and professional can sit alongside each other - you can be the parent you want and do meaningful paid work. But it won’t always feel easy, and you will need support from others.