How do you solve a problem like Cameron Diaz? Or Jennifer Aniston? Or Renee Zellweger? Or Kylie Minogue?
Or any of the other female celebrities who remain awkwardly unmarried and childless after the age of 40?
Because they’re making everyone confused and uncomfortable, especially in Hollywood. How are we meant to view Hollywood’s ‘It Girls’ when they’re no longer young but they’re not wives or mothers either?
They must be unhappy. They must be disappointed. They must feel like failures.
Because the implication in every media story is that these women are failures; failures at life. They haven’t made that expected transition from ‘It Girl’ to ‘Yummy Mummy’, so we mock their plastic surgery and we tut-tut with faux concern about their biological clocks.
Cameron Diaz has reportedly said she’s had a gutful of this idea that her life is incomplete. Not true, she says.
According to RadarOnline: “During Oscar weekend, Cameron insisted to friends that she is fine and dealing well with life, despite not having a steady man for the last few years.”
Cameron’s very frustrated with how often she has to remind her friends how great her life is, right down to telling them that she has $50 million in the bank and her pick of any man she wants.”
Hollywood loves an ‘It Girl’. We all do. Hot, young, sexy women who ride the zeitgeist wave of fame, selling movies, albums, beauty products and magazines.
Julia Roberts. Gwyneth Paltrow. Charlize Theron. Beyonce. Jessica Simpson. Pink. Victoria Beckham. Kim Kardashian. Giselle. Elle. Angelina Jolie. Kate Moss. Liz Hurley. Reese Witherspoon. Jennifer Lopez.
They’ve all captured endless media attention. Many still do. But after that initial rush, all these women have had kids. And thank heavens, because it’s saved them from the incessant mindless question, “So…do you want to be a mother some day?”
Of course, regardless of age, we prefer our celebrities to remain hot at all times, even after kids. Preferably, they should also appear sexy during pregnancy and within days of giving birth.
The pressure to be a ‘yummy mummy’ should not be underestimated. But the idea that you’ve somehow failed as a woman unless you’re a mother is an even more destructive and condescending crock.
Like any story that seems to be about celebrities, this one isn’t really. Cameron and Jennifer and Renee and Kylie are simply the famous examples of a stifling ‘Incomplete syndrome’ that affects every woman in her late 30s and early 40s.
I have several friends in their 40s who don’t have kids or husbands, and they’re all exasperated by society’s refusal to accept that they may be at peace with their lives. Happy even.
“If one more person earnestly tells me, ‘It’s not too late! There’s always donor eggs!’ I’ll lose it,” says one.
“The fact I’m divorced makes people less uneasy than if I’d never been married,” says another. “But the no-kid thing is always met by unspoken sympathy or condescension.”
Even in 2014, we’re just not comfortable with the idea of a woman being happy if she doesn’t have a child or a ring on it.
There’s no shame in wanting those things but by choice or design, it’s not the default for every woman. Sometimes life has different plans for you.
And to suggest that the next 40+ years of these women’s lives are somehow a second-rate consolation prize is an insult.
No need to send flowers to Cameron or Jennifer just yet.
Top Comments
I am 51, never been married, never had children...and it wasn't for lack of opportunity or trying on my part.
For me, my life never worked out that way. It wasn't a conscious decision.
I am neither sad or happy, with age just comes the philosophical reply ''c'ést la vie''. The ability to be philosophical in a few languages also is a bonus of my status! The media tend to not know what to do with us. How are we packaged for marketing demographic, media targeted, how can we be pigeon holed?
I am lucky in that people think I am in my late 30's. Men in their 20's and 30's find me attractive and I just tell them that I am unable to have children (yes, I am post menopausal).
Perhaps my looks are more important to me as I don't have the security of a family, the comfortable life of a marriage and the persona of a doting grandparent. I have never had any cosmetic procedures but recently, have thought about it and might consider a small bit of filler and a little botox.
I have had a wonderful life of serial monogamy. I look forward to maybe meeting someone one day who would make an honest woman out of me. I am secure in being single, and embrace my equally single girlfriends and love our sisterhood bond and laughter.
I traded children for travel and worked for 9 years as a diver around the world in the most exotic locations.
The media finds unconformity uncomfortable especially with single women.. how they love to define us by the men we are with, our age, or our marital status.
From childhood I was heavily influenced by strong female my figures. My Mother who "if I'd never met your Father I never would have married", my godmother - a CBE awarded single woman who worked in 3rd world countries for Oxfam, My great aunt, madly in love with my great uncle and no children.
I was bought up to develop myself as a person, not to conform to stereotypes. However we wish to lead our lives the media should embrace us all!
I find solace that there are strong women under the media scrutiny that also believe this. Women that are heading into middle age with their single chins high in the air and a strong feminine middle finger raised in revolt at the conformity and expectations of the press and society.
Something else worth remembering is that people's priorities can change, and that's really the only consistent thing; change. At 21 I would rather have swallowed rat poison than get married and/or have kids. Here I am at 40, with my 5th wedding anniversary and my son's first birthday in the next couple of weeks. Some people know from the git-go what they want and that doesn't change. Some people's attitudes change as they get older. Maybe we can assume that grown women are capable of making their own choices, in what's best for them.