Are you a Bumpaholic?
Bumpaholic is the new term for women who seemed addicted to pregnancy.
The term was coined in a recent Women’s Health article, claiming that a large number of women want lots of kids for all the wrong reasons.
“Having babies isn’t addictive in the way that alcohol and narcotics can be,” reads the Women’s Health article. “But bumpaholics feel compelled to procreate for many of the same reasons that substance abusers turn to booze or drugs.”
In this article, experts speculate about the reason women have more than a couple of babies. Attention. That hormone-induced high. Belly-rubs from strangers. (really, people like those?) To be waited on. To avoid returning to work or having to figure out what to do with our lives next.
Read the article here.
Women’s Health argues that “celebs photographed cuddling one adorable infant after the next, plus infamous moms who steal the spotlight when they give birth to higher order multiples, are stoking the flames of pregnancy lust in some women.” Think Octomom. Michelle Duggar.
But what about much more mainstream moms with multiple kids? Do we really need to question their motives?
As Megan Francis, Michigan mother of 5, writes on Babble: Why do we question the motives surrounding the decision to have children (or not) with so much more cynicism than we do other decisions? If someone volunteers for a nonprofit or has a large circle of friends, no armchair psychologist would bother to question whether she was trying to “fill a void” with meaningful activity or companionship. It would instead be accepted that creating relationships with other human beings is a normal, natural and human desire.
What about the idea that a large family can be intentionally and intelligently chosen? When did it become weird to like children, to want them . . . even more than two?”
Would love to read what SouthernMamas readers think about Bumpaholics. Please comment below!