Hello and welcome to Season two of De-Stigma Dialogues! I want to apologise for the delay in this season’s premiere. I intended to start it in the beginning of February but alas, all my great intentions were fudged by the Universe. I do believe that everything has its time and perhaps the delay is for the best. At least, that is how I am choosing to receive it. So thank you for your patience and for the newcomers, my name is Tamara and I am your host / guide on this journey.
Y’all I can’t believe this is our second season. This time last year, this podcast wasn’t even a thought or a dream and to know that enough of you subscribed and listened and shared and commented means the world!!! Last season I kept repeating that I started this podcast / book club to create a community that rallies against silence. Many of us, women, were taught and conditioned to be silent and to defer and to hide so many of the things that truly mattered to us and impacted our lifecycle. As I started getting older, I didn’t want to live in the isolation that silence bred. At a time where our voices are systematically being taken away from us, we need to be louder than ever about the things that truly matter. This is the time that we need to speak up and not just for ourselves but for the generations coming up behind us. Silence is no longer optional, not if we want to create a world that values ALL human rights, not just a select few. A world where a woman’s voice carries just as much weight as her male counterpart. So yeah, initially this podcast was targeted to women specifically, but as I started talking I realised that it would be a one-sided conversation if the other gender wasn’t included. I believe that knowledge is power and when you know more, you can do more and so I didn’t want to exclude the men that truly sought to understand what we women go through so that they could become better partners and fathers and brothers and uncles and allies. So, to all the men that subscribed, welcome and you know, at the beginning of last season I said to gird your loins, well consider this your warning for this season.
Just some housekeeping before we get stuck in. Together with my technical engineer / social media manager / musical engineer, also known as daughter, we have worked to evolve the webpage so that the companion book club now has its own section. To wit, back in February, we had our very first Book Club meet up and discussion! It was lovely to meet those of you that popped in and contributed and thank you for that. Those that missed it, don’t get FOMO, this was just the first and I am optimistic that there will be many more to come.
So here’s what I decided to do this season as far as the book club is concerned. I will continue to post book club selections throughout the season from our shortlist. As with last season’s books, these selections will correspond to the themes of this season be it through the protagonist or the plot. Towards the end of the season, I will post a poll for you to choose the book to be discussed at the end of season meet up / live discussion. I think that way we will be able to summarise and supplement the discussions of the podcast with the book club, which has always been a part of my vision for this movement.
We will still post the weekly newsletter every Wednesday and that will feature relevant articles, some of the episode’s talking points and any other bits and bobs that tie in to the discourse. I mentioned in one of my notes, I believe, that I am hoping for this season to be more interactive, so I am working to incorporate maybe a collaborator, and / or chats or interviews into this season. I do encourage you to comment and make suggestions for what you would like added that can enhance your experience. You may not be aware but I love a lagniappe (that’s a term from my local palance which means something extra). Well, I want to keep giving any little extras as this season progresses, maybe even giveaways so stay tuned. Once again, thank you for your patience and grace as I continue to battle the formidable technology titans to bring you these little extras.
Musical Interlude: Alive and Kicking by Simple Minds
Moving on, I want to acknowledge that I am not doing this alone. This person stepped up and helped me last season and has graciously agreed to continue to do so this season. I am speaking about the wearer of many hats maven, Satori! Say hi Satori… All the musical interludes throughout each episode are played by her. Music has a way of cementing and punctuating and flourishing ideas so I think it really adds life to each episode. The song choices are songs that played in the background while I was writing each episode and those that appear are the ones that seemed to perfectly capture my thoughts at that moment. Of course, there are other songs that I didn’t hear at the time of writing but having listened to as much music as I have in my lifetime, I kinda know which song will rise to the occasion.
Why am I talking about this? Well, last season a couple of the dialoguers commented on the music and how much they enjoyed it. So, I’m thinking that if they thought enough about our music to say something, it may be the case for more. You know how it is in a class where you have a question but you’re hoping that someone else asks first, so by that logic, I thought why not make a playlist and make it available to everyone, you know a lagniappe. There may be songs featured that you hadn’t heard for a while, or you may discover a new favourite song or artist. As an aside, I want it to be clear that I get zero compensation or acknowledgement for this, so there is no affiliation to any particular artist or song, and same goes for the book choices. I will say though that I may have an affiliation to a particular decade of music. I’m a proud card carrying Gen Xer so I love all things 70’s, 80’s and 90’s and even 60’s, ok so maybe more than one decade. Y’all the fact is I just really like sharing cool things and music is cool, and so are books, just sayin. At the end of the season, we will post this season’s original playlist! We did this last season and I gotta say, it was pretty fire and I still listen to it on occasion. To that end I made a section for it on the webpage so you can go on and access the links on Spotify or Youtube for the first season’s playlist. I truly believe that like books, music has a way of stirring and soothing and we need both, given the current state of the world. Ok so enough housekeeping, let’s get into it…
Musical Interlude: Let’s Do This by The Outskrts
This season our big three are Motherhood, Career and Intuition. I know it may not seem to be as much heavy lifting as last season, but these themes and the stigmas attached to them carry just as much weight. I also know that last season’s big three (Perimenopause, Feminism and Narrative) will pop in for drinks given that all things female are intrinsically linked. So why these three? Well, like last season, I believe Motherhood, Career and Intuition to be kindred spirits. In the beginning, sorry didn’t mean to sound evangelical, but in the past, motherhood was the only morally viable career available to women. Not to say that men weren’t aware that women could do more than wipe noses and change diapers, it just didn’t align with the established gender roles. Then, you know wars and the need to blur the gender lines out of need. For example, during World War Two especially, women were being empowered to become Rosie Riverters while the men fought ‘the good fight’. Unsurprisingly, society’s mercurial MO proclaimed it an act of patriotism for a woman to become a member of the work force and according to the adverts: “Ladies, you can do it all, be mothers and career women”...
Musical Interlude: Salute by Little Mix
And we did heed that call and then the war ended. Men returned to reclaim their positions in the workplace and women were expected to do the same. We were expected to forget the freedom that we were exposed to outside of the home. We were expected to let go of the campaign that was our siren song into the workplace. We were expected to not want something outside of caring for the family and the home. We were expected to forget the independence that came with earning our own money, though only on paper figuratively, but we’ll get to that later in the season. So yeah, there may have been some push back.
To remedy that, the ‘pre-war’ narrative (hello old friend) was resuscitated to remind us women of our place thereby casting the realm of career and work in direct opposition to motherhood and what it means to be ‘female’. The patriarchy (another acquaintance from last season, I tip my hat) used this narrative to divide and separate us by brandishing one to be a ‘higher calling’ or more befitting of our gender. We are women and therefore we are mothers, why aspire to be more or to be different, other? As a result, the ensuing and eternal tug-of-war was born, stay at home moms versus working mothers. This led to each side berating, belittling and shaming the other, oh and that even happened within each side’s delegation. Last season, we spoke about how narrative requires a hero and a villain. By placing finite values on both sides, we are told that we have to choose and then we are judged for those choices.
There was a period of time where we were told that we could have it all. We could be Corporate and Refrigerator Raiders. We can manage our households, children’s extracurriculars and offices in high heels and smiles on our faces. We were told that this was the dream we should aspire to live, and we should be so happy and so eager to be allowed to do that. Hollywood and the media, women’s magazines, remember Cosmopolitan and Elle and those insidious surveys, they all bought into this ‘so-called evolved’ narrative and sought to sell it to us thereby capitalising on this whole ‘female empowerment’ movement they helped popularise. During that time frame, and maybe even now to some extent, no one wanted or wants to admit defeat. No one wanted to change sides for fear of ridicule or admonishment, not with each side holding themselves on pedestals of self-righteousness. Thus the polarisation of a woman’s ‘calling’, future?
Musical Interlude: The Grass is Greener by Nancy Wilson
With motherhood and career representing flip sides of a coin, I believe intuition to be the metal from which the coin is cast. In days of yore and by that I mean as long ago as last week, intuition was often something that was and continues to be ridiculed and discounted in favour of ‘facts’... funny how the term ‘fact’ has become something of a dirty word, of late… but I digress. My point is that intuition has long been a means of guidance. Something that is often relegated to the realm of the female and one of the most significant traits we possess in our chest of magical phenomena. It can be loud and scream at us or so quiet that we forget it is there, but in all decisions relating to motherhood and career (both significant parts of life), intuition plays a role whether we choose to acknowledge it or not. We cannot discuss one of these themes without touching on the other.
Musical Interlude - Superstition by Stevie Wonder
So that was my thought process in grouping these three together. Throughout the season, each theme and their stigmas will be explored in hopes of starting conversations that can lead to further understanding and hopefully change. Remember, these themes and their corresponding stigmas impact one another and there are no rights or wrongs. These stigmas need to be exposed and in doing so, we get to live in the light.
First up this season will be our discourse on Motherhood. It has become my practice to start each new theme with a definition. It’s my way of anchoring the conversation. I think that it provides a root of some sort from which the branches of discussion would grow, (I love a metaphor). With a theme as well known and spoken about as Motherhood, I wondered if I even needed to do that. But I will because the definition of motherhood is individual. It can be looked at from various levels, micro and macro levels, and it is ever evolving. To further elaborate my point, were you aware that there is more than one definition for the term motherhood in both the Oxford English and Merriam Webster Dictionaries? Kinda mind blowing, but also not really.
Motherhood is extrapolated from the term mother which is defined as a female parent, woman in authority, old or elderly, source and origin, maternal in affection and tenderness, something vulgar and an extreme or ultimate example. Motherhood represents all that encompasses these definitions, and that is just the foundation, can you even imagine what that entails? In 2025, motherhood has grown to represent more than children. We live in a time where families look different. Women are no longer the only figurehead or symbol for motherhood, but because of our reproductive organs we are the only ones that can literally reproduce, for now… And so with that privilege all the stigmas surrounding motherhood are leveled at the female gender. Think about that? As we continue this discourse, we will specifically speak to those as it applies to us, women.
I hope I’ve grabbed your interest and that you will stay tuned for the rest of this season. It’s gonna be a good one, if I do say so myself! Next week, I will begin my deep dive into motherhood and its stigmas, you know, those pesky little things that we can’t seem to shake even now. Until next time, please be good to yourselves and remember to talk out LOUD!
Musical Interlude: Shout by Tears for Fears.
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