The Mother of All Questions

Is it environmentally sustainable to have a child? What does it mean to be a single parent in Australia in 2023? Are abortions accessible in regional areas?

As the world faces increasing environmental, economic and social pressures, the decision to start a family is more complicated than ever, particularly when considered alongside issues such as infertility, access to abortion and IVF services, solo parenting and the many structural barriers to parenthood experienced by marginalised communities.

Writer Isabelle Oderberg’s forthcoming book Hard to Bear focuses on early pregnancy loss and miscarriage. Award-winning journalist Gina Rushton writes extensively about reproductive rights, and her book The Most Important Job in The World examines the inherent complexities of the choice to parent. The youngest First Nations woman to be elected to Federal Parliament, Victorian Senator Jana Stewart has worked at the Victorian Aboriginal Child Care Agency and the Child Protection Service.

For this M/OTHER panel event, they come together to examine some of the considerations around choosing to start, or not to start, a family in an insightful and thought-provoking conversation hosted by feminist writer and organiser Karen Pickering.

Conversations in M/OTHER may include references to topics such as mental health, reproductive rights, and childbirth. If you need assistance with any of these issues, you can learn more and seek advice via the Centre of Perinatal Excellence (COPE), Perintal Anxiety & Depression Australia (PANDA) and Beyond Blue.

The official bookseller for M/OTHER is Neighbourhood Books.

Isabelle Oderberg’s Hard to Bear will be published through Ultimo Press in April 2023. Pre-orders are available through the Ultimo Press website.

M/OTHER is a weekend of fearless conversation about the ways ‘motherhood’ is experienced, portrayed and labelled by those who mother, have been mothered, wish they were mothers, do not identify as mothers, cannot or do not want to mother, and by society at-large.