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Nneka Kelly's avatar

This is an unpopular opinion, I think we did this devaluing of care thing to ourselves. We insisted that outside work was more valuable, and attractive than care which is very internal and unseen.

I see this in myself.

AND, we also missed that no matter how much day care, elder care, after school care, and all sundry things, we cannot outsource care. Again, I'm seeing this for myself as I care for my parents.

AND, there's no dollar amount that we can put on care.

Care takes something that we have very little of these days because we traded it for money. Care take time and presence.

We have a care deficit because we do not have the time, and more importantly, we do not have the internal resources to be present. We are malnourished in this area.

For me the fix is decentering money making, even as I strive to make more money so I won't have to worry about making money. I recognize that the circular logic is lunacy, but I don't know any other way.

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Mary Austin (she/her)'s avatar

Ah, yes, all of this. I have one kid, which felt like the number I could faithfully attend to and still have a life. I never succeeded in breaking the “default parent” mode, despite many explicit conversations.

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