 Most parents will acknowledge that children are hard work, but are likely to say the rewards outweigh the challenges. 大部分父母都承认养娃是辛苦活儿，不过他们很可能会说回报大于付出。 To feel differently is almost unspeakable, but there are women who regret having children. 感觉到的辛苦恐怕难以言表，不过也有一些女性为生娃感到后悔的。 Three women tell the Victoria Derbyshire programme what it is like to secretly wish they had not become mothers. 有三名女性告在维多利亚德比郡的一个调查中袒露心声，告诉人们内心其实希望自己没有当妈是怎样的感觉。 Rachel "If I could turn the clock back I would not have had children," says Rachel who is now in her 50s. “如果能把时钟拨回去的话，我就不会生孩子了，”瑞秋说，她现在已经五十多岁了。 She has three children - her youngest is 17 - and for most of this time she has been a single mother, which is when the reality hit her. 她有三个孩子—最小的才17岁—大部分时间里她都是单亲妈妈，也是在那时她感觉被现实击垮了。 "There were times where I didn't feel mature enough to be responsible for somebody, this little person that needed me for their existence," she says. “有时候我会感觉自己还不够成熟，不足以对别人负责，这个小孩却需要我才能生存下去，”她说。 "It just felt like an endless round of putting a bottle or food in their mouth for it to come out of the other end - and at what point was any of this going to be fun? “有时候感觉就是无休无止地把一个奶瓶或者食物放进他们嘴里，然后等着从另一端排出来—什么时候才会有快乐的感觉呢？” "I just felt like screaming that actually it's not all it's cracked up to be. If you're really maternal then that's great you've got everything you've wanted, but when you're not maternal all you've done is trap yourself." “我感觉想要尖叫，而且这还不算是最痛苦的。如果你足够有母性那很好，你就得到了自己想要的，但如果你不足够母性的话你就会感觉自己被困住了。” Rachel admits that she did not think hard enough about how having children would affect her life - had she realised, she wouldn't have had them. 瑞秋承认自己并没有完全想清楚生孩子会对自己的生活产生怎样的影响—如果她意识到了的话，她就不会生孩子了。 "But I feel guilty for saying that, because I love my children dearly," she says. “不过那样说出来我感觉很有负罪感，因为我其实很爱我的孩子们，”她说。 "You feel like you've not been a good mum and it's a guilt you always carry, it never goes away and you wonder if they know. “你会感觉自己没有当一个好妈妈，你永远会怀着这种负罪感，不能解脱，你还会想孩子们是否知道这一点。” "But life shouldn't be about giving up your life, your freedom, so they can have a life." “不过我觉得生活不应该是放弃你的生活，你的自由，然后让他们拥有生活。” This is tough for her to admit, because "people assume that you're not a nice person". 让她承认是很难的，因为“人们会认为你不是个好人。” Rachel is desperate for women who feel the same way not to be vilified. 瑞秋很希望跟她有一样感觉的女人们不要被人们轻视。 "I felt so alone. I felt like there was something wrong with me. Had I been able to talk about it and somebody understood, I may have found it easier actually to cope with motherhood."
Alison "I just saw the happy little family with the house and the garden, and children trotting off to school - the fairy tale," she says. “我看着那些有房子和花园的幸福小家庭，他们的孩子们小跑着去上学—仿佛童话一般，”她说。 Alison is adopted, and growing up she always dreamed of having a family of her own. 艾莉森是被收养的，从小到大她一直梦想着拥有属于自己的家庭。 It wasn't until she had her first son that she discovered she wasn't maternal. 不过直到她剩下第一个儿子她才发现自己不够有母性。 Desperate to get out of the house, and escape her new role, she went back to work after six months. 急于走出家庭，逃离自己的新角色的她，六个月后就回到了工作中。 "I would take days off and leave him at the childminder so that I would have a day to myself," she says. “我会请假，把他丢给托管所，这样我才能拥有属于自己的一天。”她说。 "It's not that I didn't want to spend time with him, but I didn't know what to do, I wasn't good at making up games." “并不是我不想花时间陪他，而是我不知道该怎么做。我不擅长跟他一起玩游戏。” Not wanting their son to be an only child, Alison and her husband had another. 不希望他们的儿子成为独生子女，艾莉森和她的丈夫又生了一个孩子。 Both boys are now at university. 两个儿子现在都在大学读书了。 She admits that if she had known what she knows now, she would never have become a mother. 她承认如果她早知道了如今的情况，她肯定不会选择当妈妈的。 "Everybody else's needs and wants came first. The mantra for the last two decades has been 'if everybody else is happy then I'm happy,' which is a bit galling sometimes," she explains. “其他每个人的需要和想法都会优先。过去二十年的咒语就是'别人都开心了我才会开心，’这有时是非常令人恼火的，”她解释道。 "I could have had a better career. I did the school run for 15 years, that is very limiting on a career." Alison is keen to stress how much she loves her children but admits that in hindsight she was too selfish to have them. "I begrudged their intrusion on my time". “我本来可以拥有更好的事业。我送孩子上学都花了十五年，这对事业发展是非常不利的。”艾莉森急于强调她有多爱自己的孩子，不过也承认事后发现自己生下他们是一种自私的决定。“我不愿意他们多打扰我的时间。” She says women don't talk about this for fear of being judged. 她说女人们往往不愿意谈这种事因为害怕会被别人评说。 "They don't want to be seen as being selfish. The implication is if you didn't want children then you're a bad mother." “她们不想被人看成自私的。人们总是认为假如你不想要自己孩子你就是个坏妈妈。” + It is impossible to know how many women feel this way because so few speak openly about it. 我们无法知道到底有多少女性会有这种感觉，因为很少有人愿意说起它。 But in a 2016 German survey by YouGov, 8% of 1,200 participants said they regretted becoming parents. 不过在2016年舆观调查网的德国调查中，1200名参与者中有8%的人说他们曾后悔成为父母。 In 2015 an Israeli sociologist Orna Donath published a study with women who all said they regretted having children. She described "the wish to undo motherhood" as an "unexplored maternal experience". 2015年以色列社会学家奥娜.多纳斯发表了一项针对那些说自己后悔生孩子的女性的研究。她将这种“不愿意当妈妈”的想法描述成“未经历过母性体验”。 Women who admit having regrets are adamant that this is different to post-natal depression. 那些承认自己后悔的女性非常坚决地表示这跟产后抑郁症不同。 Joy For Joy, who had her daughter 20 years ago, the realisation that she didn't want to be a mother came early. 对于乔伊来说，她二十年前就生下了女儿，而意识到自己不想做母亲的想法出现地比较晚。 "Everyone speaks of having this child handed to them, and this wild fabulous love that courses through them. I didn't get any of that. It just looked like a huge responsibility," she says. “每个人都说孩子交给他们后，那种伟大的疯狂的爱贯穿始终。我却完全不能理解。看起来更像是一种巨大的责任。”她说。 She struggles to look back on the early years of her daughter's life with any fondness. 她试图带上快乐去回想早年带女儿的生活。 "It was tough, it was a day-to-day grind of getting through. “当时很艰难，日子一天天地磨练着你。” "All mums I guess go through this, it's just that I wasn't finding anything I could say that I was thoroughly enjoying. It was bleak". “我想所有的母亲都要经历这些。不过很难找到能让我感觉到很快乐的事情，很少。” Joy believes she is missing the maternal nature that means other mothers enjoy their children. 乔伊觉得自己缺失的是一种母性，这种母性让其他的母亲喜爱自己的孩子。 "I wondered for a long while if [the other mums] were actually kidding that this was as wonderful as they would paint it or portray it, and actually one day they would come out and be honest with me," she says. “我有很长一段时间都在思考其他的母亲是不是在开玩笑，她们总说孩子太好了以至于她们想要用油画或者素描把他们画下来，我也很好奇她们是否最后会摘下面具跟我说出真话，”她说。 + "I didn't seem to have a capacity to be that lovely kind, warm, cuddly sort of mum. “我似乎不具备成为那种可爱的，善良的，温暖的，孩子们想要拥抱的妈妈。” "I wanted to be back at work. I wanted to continue with my career, the business that I was building, and this was just a great big added extra." “我想要回去工作。我想要继续追求的我事业，我正在搭建的事业，而养孩子只是额外事项。” Growing up, Joy's daughter doubted her mother's love "because I wasn't society's norm," says Joy. 从小到大，乔伊的女儿都在怀疑母亲的爱“因为我不像社会上标准的妈妈那样，”乔伊说。 "I do love her," she insists, "but the bond isn't gooey". “我确实爱她，”她坚持说，“不过关系不是很黏腻那种。” Joy says if more women were open with how they felt there would be less pressure on women to become mothers. 乔伊说如果有更多的女性愿意公开自己的想法，那么女人们不想当妈妈所面临的压力就会小很多。 "There are more of us than we ever speak about. “像我这样的人比我们想象的要多得多。” "What would be really great is if women could become deeply honest with themselves and if having kids and having a family is really important then go for it with all your heart. “尤为重要的是女人们应该对自己诚实，如果拥有孩子和家庭是你们觉得重要的，那么你就全心去追求。” "But if you have a sensation in you that says 'I'm really not getting this' then don't have any fear or shame about being able to stand up and say, 'I'm somebody that doesn't want to be a mum, I don't want kids'." “不过如果你内心有一个声音说'我真的不明白’那么不要害怕或者不敢站出来说，'我就是那种不想当妈的人，我不想要孩子’”。 All names have been changed. 文中皆为化名。 感谢关注 跟amber一起看世界 |
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