Esther Rantzen was one of the original working mums. So why has her daughter chosen to stay at home with her boys?
CHILDREN are suffering — and the cause, we are told, is working mothers. Well that’s great. Another thing for us women to add to the guilt list. And it was none other than my mother, Esther Rantzen, founder of Childline, who said it.
Mum wrote that we are raising a generation of lonely children who have no one to turn to, thanks to our obsession with being busy and a financial need for both parents to work. Where have all the housewives gone, she asked?
My sister forwarded me Mum’s article and we raised a joint eyebrow at its content.
While I admire her for speaking out, it does seem strange that she’s bemoaning the lack of housewives when she was never one herself.
Mum’s always been extraordinarily addicted to being busy. She went back to work when I was six weeks old. Six weeks, for heaven’s sake!
She set records for her career longevity. She has more than 2,000 programme listings in the BBC archives, has set up two national charities, written five books, stood as a candidate in the 2010 Election, been awarded an OBE, a Damehood, several BAFTAs and countless honorary doctorates.
None of which would have happened, I must add, had she been a stay-at-home mother.
And while I grew up incredibly proud of my mother and grateful for the wonderful life she provided for me and my brother and sister, there was a big part of my childhood with a Mum-sized hole in it.
So is that why I now stay at home as much as possible to look after my two boys, fiveyear-old Benjamin and Alexander, who’s two? Yes, I’d say it probably is.
I love the fact that I can be there — not a nanny, like we had — to cook dinner, bath them and witness their baby milestones.
But I’m a TV presenter, too, and I know that if someone offered me some of the jobs that Mum landed while she was a young woman and mother, then I would bite their hand off. I mean, she presented That’s Life! for more than 20 years, during which time all three of us were born and brought up.
I cannot blame her. There is no way I could have turned my back on the show I’d created, to watch someone else step into my shoes while I changed nappies full-time.
Growing up in the Rantzen/Wilcox household was a whirlwind of busy- ness. My father, Desmond Wilcox, an award-winning documentary filmmaker who passed away in 2000, worked hard with Mum to ensure we all felt loved and central to their lives, but we were never in any doubt as to how important their careers were.
They would always come home for an emergency or if we really needed them, but the normal day-to- day parenting was left to the nanny.
And when they were home, they were often still dealing with phone calls and work issues. We’d go to sleep hearing the clack of the typewriter as Mum wrote scripts late into the night.
As a toddler, my elder sister Emily used to wave Mum goodbye at the door and then go straight to her bedroom window, overlooking the driveway, to watch for her return.
At the time Mum was never told about this daily vigil, but, looking back now, she admits it breaks her heart.
But would it have slowed her down had she known? I doubt it.
Whatever she did, Mum was going to hurt someone. As she often says: ‘A woman’s place is in the wrong.’
Because she worked, we kids missed out. But if she hadn’t, we wouldn’t have her legacy.
Mum was a pioneer for women on television, and proved that they could do roles previously reserved only for men. She also spearheaded vital campaigns that saved lives and changed people’s fortunes.
Her series That’s Life! was the reason seatbelts were made a legal requirement in the back- seats of cars, and the reason playgrounds now have safe surfaces rather than concrete. It highlighted the need for organ donation, led to the foundation of Childline and raised awareness of child abuse.
I adore and admire Mum immeasurably but can see that her compromises continue to haunt her. That’s why the issue of the dearth of housewives struck such a chord with her.
SHE
tried to put us first — but it wasn’t always possible. She couldn’t be there when we came home from school every day, so she wasn’t there to talk through our wobbles and triumphs. By the time she did come home, we were all tired and the moment to talk had passed.
She would try, though. She would sit us down at supper and ask us in turn about our day. This was our moment to tell her everything, but it was brief and I always felt obliged to make her laugh and keep her interested rather than tell her my sad or irritating daily minutiae.
The recent report from Childline has reflected this. Children do feel isolated when both parents are working. They worry about tiring an already exhausted parent further, so keep their angst hidden.
Mum’s article also pointed out that the need for women to work is removing the safe old stereotype of the warm, matriarchal home where all issues are dealt with promptly.
I’m not for one moment saying that we were mistreated as children, or that we were somehow traumatised by having a working mother. We weren’t. We were incredibly lucky to have our childhood. Our parents were interested in our lives and genuinely cared for us. But the issues raised in the Childline study do suggest that the absence of parents is more pernicious than previously thought.
I can see why my mother’s comments have rankled with working parents. It seems unfair to blame people for trying to support their families, and as parents we all feel guilt all the time.
But it is impossible to give 100 per cent to both work and home when you have children. I discovered this for myself after Benji was born, when I tried to be a working mum.
Benji was six months old when I returned to work as a TV presenter. I was on a big primetime consumer show on BBC1, which involved lots of undercover filming and long days in far-off places, all the while juggling my responsibilities to a breastfed baby who wouldn’t take a bottle.
WHEN
I left him at home with his paternal grandparents, Benji would basically starve for the duration of my ten-hour shoots. Then he’d feed all through the night — which meant that on set the next day, I was frazzled and sleep-deprived.
I felt like I was being a terrible mum and an even worse TV presenter.
But the truth is, my priorities had changed. And, if it was a question of my child suffering or my work suffering, there simply wasn’t a choice.
What I couldn’t afford when I was working was a good support network of the type that Mum had.
With her position of enormous power at the BBC, she was able to buy herself a solution and make her family fit into a career which was not family-friendly.
She created an in- office crèche for my siblings and me, so she could continue producing, writing and presenting. This was alongside the countless other things she also did.
My children’s lives are so different from how ours were.
When we started at nursery and then school, we didn’t see Mum from 8am till 7pm most days, and that was without the late-night filming dates, the social events and awards nights. Throughout our formative years, my parents were riding high on the crest of success.
When we did spend time with them, they were often shattered. A brief weekend walk in the park would exhaust them for the rest of the day and we’d often find them snoring on the sofa.
Once, my sister wrote a school play and asked Mum to come. She arrived late from work and — by mistake — entered the theatre centre stage. Her arrival in a huge sweeping red coat and black fake fur hat added a surreal and much appreciated element for the audience.
My sister was mortified, though — but can now laugh at the memory. And though Mum did arrive late, at least she was there.
My parents always made sure that one of them would attend the school plays and parents’ evenings.
Dad was a school governor, and Mum would drive me in each day while listening to me reading out my homework. Even today, she helps me with any work assignments.
They always tried to make us feel central to their lives. These days, as a parent myself, I can really appreciate the difficulties they must have gone through to achieve this.
There were many bonuses to having successful parents. Our time with them was extremely wonderful but limited. We had breakfast and suppers together most days, and it always felt like a special event filled with wickedly fun games and laughter.
Mum would read to us most bedtimes, from her favourite childhood books — a habit that I continue with Benji and Xander.
Nonetheless, it is impossible to fit 24 hours of parenting into the
bookends of each day. So things were missed that might otherwise have been spotted earlier.
I could tell my mother anything, and she always took great pains to say that. But sometimes it’s hard to tell an answer machine or a well-meaning PA that you think you’re being bullied at school. Or that you can’t stand maths and you might be dyslexic.
Once told about these things, Mum always acted immediately and we got the best help available. She was brilliant at that.
But being a teenager is appallingly hard for parents and children. I can’t help wondering if it would have been an easier time for us had Mum been around more. I do remember feeling lonely and misunderstood at times, but isn’t that how all teenagers feel?
I’m dreading the day my two boys enter that self- doubting adolescent phase. But will I be working when they do? For my sanity, I hope I am. But for theirs, maybe not.
I loved work and I miss it. It added a spark to my life and gave me a chance to use my brain.
For now, I am happy to sacrifice it so I can focus on my sons — and I’m lucky to have this option.
Most households depend on a double income, so the choice to stay at home is not always possible. Today, more than 70 per cent of mothers work. We stay-at- homers are becoming rarer and we realise we are privileged to have that choice. But even if it is possible economically, leaving your job to look after your children is not an easy option.
Friends who have left successful careers to become full-time homemakers reminisce about the freedom they once had when all they did was go out to work.
We get up with the children at 5am, make meals, clean clothes, wipe surfaces, do school runs, tidy the house, change nappies and cook countless cupcakes for school. It’s a 15-hour day.
Who wouldn’t want to go to work for a rest? It’s relentless at home, and often mind-numb- ingly dull and lonely. Is it any wonder that I’m jealous of Mum’s glamorous career and her astonishing success?
Yet Mum, it seems, is surprisingly jealous of me. She often says, wistfully, what a great mum I am and how important it is for the children that I am around for them and how much the two of them benefit from it.
For me, the sacrifice of my career so that I can be at home is outweighed by the knowledge that I am giving my children something more precious: my time.
But I know how lucky I am to have this option, and I won’t heap guilt on those who need to work. I’ll leave that to Mum.
AND NOW, OVER TO ESTHER . . .
WOuld I have done things differently given my time again? Probably not.
The terrible truth is that you are who you are. I did once ask my elder daughter, when Childline was launched and doubled my workload, whether she thought I should give up.
Her answer was absolutely not. ‘The children need you,’ she said.
I now recognise that all the children in my life needed me — and I am very sorry if my own children feel I sold them short.
But the truth is I was very lucky: I had a husband who was a very active and involved parent, too, and I had a job which meant I could employ the best nannies.
Fortunately, we all speak to each other every day, so could it be that they have forgiven me?