Lately there has been a lot of press about what women want. The current generation, it is reported, that they feel they were 'sold out' by the feminist movement and ran out of time to have children. While these women chased careers and bumped heads on the 'glass ceiling' it is purported in recent magazines such as 'Notebook' that these women missed the 'baby boat' and they are angry!

Why are they angry? Because they were lead to believe that life was a super ride to the top! Don a pencil skirt and grab your briefcase, add a pair of stilettos and climb or clamber your way to success! Don't stop til you conquer the corporate world because 'there you will find happiness'! Supposedly! But did they find it? Recent commentary would suggest that they haven't!

So, forty-something women (who grew up in my era where we were told "DON'T get pregnant, get out travel and get a REAL job and have a life!) are now feeling cheated.  They feel like they were lied to because nobody brought up the small detail of the biological clock ticking til it exploded. Now reaching middle-age they are not fallling pregnant, have realised their careers didn't cater to the lifestyle they thought they were going to have, or if it did, that got old real fast! So what now? If you are too old to conceive how do you get around that? Horrified there is a fertility use-by date they are bereft and longing... Past child-bearing age and furious what is left?

Germaine Greer (one of the single most famous feminists of our time) told one woman that in light of the fact she was a teacher, basically, 'don't get so bent out of shape over not having a baby... move on and make your job your life. Set about making the world a better place for the students you oversee and assist with 'transposing' the education system into a more viable and practical vehicle than it currently is'...  Problem is, I think that's the problem - she had already made her job her life...therein lies her problem (as she sees it now!)

I'm pretty certain Ms Greer's comments wouldn't have soothed my soul! I might have been looking for a duster to erase her attitude! If only it were that simple!

There is perhaps a shift in previous trends and a swing back to the 'lifestyle' of the 50's... Mums working from home because they genuinely want to be with their children!

Women are being wooed back to the kitchen and the laundry, to take care of their man and their offspring... but not without 'some' perks! We still want 'our men' to help out around the house, and we still want equality, but we WANT CHOICE! We don't want (so they say) to be forced back into paid employment at the salt mines! We want to be QUEEN OF OUR CASTLES and raise our kids ourselves... we want tradition! So, are we are swapping feminism for marriage and kids and the whole darn package! 

Are the Media on the money? Is this what women want??? In researching this question for weeks in the media, I thought who better than to ask than the women of today? Many of you are stay at home mums for a reason - because you want to be!  This is not to say 'working outside of home mums' are wrong or bad... I've been there and done that too!

The question I am posing, as a bit of a traditionalist myself and mother of 9 who enjoys raising my children is ... what is it women want?

Were the femininists right or wrong? Did they 'trick' their female counterparts into wasting their lives? And if so, what message have you got for the next generation?  Is it to work AND procreate? Or is it to forget that career - make those babies and worry about a job/career prospects once you have secured a job as a mother?

And lastly... can we have it all...or are we seriously diluded?

I am excited to hear your comments on this very emotional and topical issue.