导读:以色列社会学家基于对23名后悔生了孩子的母亲的采访发表研究论文，希望社会对这些不同的经历给予更多空间。
‘I don’t think it was worth it.” Tammy is a mother who wishes she hadn’t been. “Don’t get me wrong, I love my kids. But it comes at a huge cost; mentally, emotionally and physically.”
“我认为不值得。”Tammy是一位母亲，但她希望自己不是。“别误会，我爱我的孩子。但这带来了巨大的牺牲；精神上的，情感上的和生理上的。”
Writing anonymously on feminist website the Vagenda, Tammy says: “My body was ruined, I had to have surgeries later in life to repair what was done to me by forcing an almost 9lb child through my body.
在女性网站Vagenda上，Tammy匿名写道：“我的身体被毁了，我不得不在后来做手术，修补生下近乎9镑重的孩子之后身体的损伤。”
And worse yet, it seems as though expressing this honestly makes me a monster ... It seems as though your entire self becomes nothing more than a functional enabler for your kids’ success.”
而更糟糕的是，似乎诚实地表达这种想法让我成为了怪兽……似乎你自己的整个生命变成了除了能够把你孩子成功抚养之外一无是处。”
So why do women regret having children?
为什么有的女性后悔生孩子呢？
Last year, Orna Donath, an Israeli sociologist published a study based on interviews with 23 Israeli mothers who regret having had children.
去年，以色列社会学家Orna Donath在基于对23名以色列后悔生了孩子的母亲的采访而发表研究论文。
In it she argues that while motherhood “may be a font of personal fulfillment, pleasure, love, pride, contentment and joy”, it “may simultaneously be a realm of distress, helplessness, frustration, hostility and disappointment, as well as an arena of oppression and subordination”.
研究中她指出，虽然母亲“是自我实现，快乐，爱，自豪，满足和愉悦的形式”，它“同时属于压力，无助，挫折，敌意和失望的范畴，并且是压迫和服从的竞技场。”
But the purpose of this study was not to let mothers express ambivalence towards motherhood, but to provide a space for mothers who actually have “the wish to undo motherhood”, something that Donath describes as an “unexplored maternal experience”.
然而研究的目的不是让母亲表达对母亲身份的矛盾，而是为那些事实上“希望不是母亲”的母亲提供空间，正如Donath描述的“未被探究的母性经历”。
“The ideological impetus to be a mother,” as Donath describes it, can be found across all walks of society and is founded on the powerful conception that complete female happiness can only be achieved through motherhood.
“成为一个母亲的意识形态冲动”发生在社会各个角落，而且是基于一个强势的概念，那就是女性必须通过成为母亲而达到完整的幸福，Donath说。
Those who seek to challenge this narrative face overwhelming opposition, which makes an honest, open debate difficult.
那些对这个陈述挑战的人受到强烈的反对，因此诚实、公开的讨论难以执行。
Donath speaks of the ideological promises made to prospective mothers about the joys of raising children, and of the “simultaneous delegitimisation of women who remain childless”, who are reckoned to be “egoistic, unfeminine, pitiful and somehow defective”.
Donath说这个意识形态上的承诺让母亲期待抚养孩子的欢乐，而同时“使没有孩子的女性非法化”，这些人被认为“自私，不女性化，可怜而有一些缺陷”。
I am a mother, too, and while I don’t regret it, I can deeply sympathise with women who feel betrayed by the eternal myth that enjoying motherhood is a biological predisposition.
我也是一位母亲，虽然我不后悔，但我能够深深地同情那些被享受母亲身份是一种生物上的素质这个隽永的神话所背叛的女性的感受。
And I wonder if I would have chosen to be a mother had I not been indoctrinated all my life to believe that motherhood is the only thing that will complete my happiness. I’m not so sure.
而如果我没有被灌输母亲身份是唯一一个可以让我的幸福完整的观念，我不确定自己是否会选择成为母亲。
Donath’s aim is simple: she wants to allow mothers to live motherhood as a subjective experience, one that can combine love and regret, one that will be accepted by society, no matter how it looks.
Donath的目的很简单：她希望母亲能够以主观的经验享受母亲身份，一个结合了爱和悔的经验，一个能被社会所接受，无论它到底是哪般模样的经验。
