I had been asked to do an urgent home visit of a new mother. She has no history of mental illness. She is sitting at a table in her kitchen. She has no expression on her face. Her 4-week-old daughter …
‘Can we rely on you?’: What not to say to mothers returning to work
‘When do you think it’s likely you’ll be looking to take maternity leave again?’ ‘How many kids are you planning on having?’ ‘Given you’ve got young children, do you think we’re going to be able to re…
A reality check: Not just #MyMum but #ThisMum too
Something quite extraordinary happened earlier this week. An own goal by the Daily Telegraph, in which the editors sought to suggest Labor leader Bill Shorten cynically omitted key elements of his mum…
The hashtag #MyMum is trending on Twitter & you need to read it.
Social media often gets a bad rap, and there are certainly occasions where that is absolutely warranted. But occasionally it serves to display humanity at its finest. Amplified. And today is one of th…
‘I convinced myself my panic was normal. That all new mums felt this way. I was wrong.’
Probably one of the key moments when a part of my mind sounded an alarm to say all was not well in the world of my mental health was the time I managed to get a burglar cornered by police and arrested…
Stop assuming having a baby means a woman only wants a part-time job
But she had a baby…. There are few expressions, in a work-related context, as loaded as this. ‘Having a baby’ is used so often to justify myriad assumptions that are not always accurate. Having a baby…
In debt, having an affair & murdering his family: Yet people raised their kids having autism.
Two and a half years ago a Colombian family who had made a life in Sydney made headlines for the worst of all reasons. Fernando Manrique, Maria Lutz, and their two children, Elisa, 11, and Martin, 10,…
I was a mum of two in a supermarket without my wallet. No one offered to help.
Almost six years ago on an autumn Wednesday afternoon in suburbia, with a five month old baby in tow, I completed a sizeable grocery shop at a major supermarket chain. Visits to the supermarket are ra…
The 5 words women need to start hearing: ‘It’s ok to be childfree’
Since the turn of the century, more women than ever are waiting until their early thirties to have children. The decision to delay parenthood may have improved our career opportunities and earning pot…
Podcast: Jane Caro on ‘accidental feminists’ & when is the ‘right time’ to be a woman in the workplace?
“You get what you resist,” says Jane Caro. And the author and media commentator has certainly been a vocal advocate against the status quo. Whether it’s feminism, making workplaces more accessible to …
