4 weeks ago today I give birth to a little girl. She was 4.1kg when she was born and came after a short painful labour. A girl, I wasn't sure how I felt about it at the time (wasn't sure what I felt about anything at that moment to be honest) and now I've had time to think over what it means.
I have a daughter. It seems to me that there are so many more questions and decisions to be made with a girl. The responsibility feels so much heavier than with the boys. Maybe it's because I feel that I will have to make more decisions about my life in order to be the sort of role model I feel I should be for a daughter. Raising a religious boy seems much more clear cut but the rules and roles keep changing for women and girls. This is a good thing, I wouldn't want to be stuck in a time where we had pre-proscribed roles and no flexibility, that the world is open and we can make the right choices for ourselves is a good thing. With choice comes responsibility, we have to take responsibility for what we do in a way that we never had to in the past.
My daughter is growing up in a different world than I grew up in, she will have more choices to make in areas that maybe weren't open to me. I hope I can help her make the right choices and more than that I hope I can be the mother she needs me to be.
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