“Motherhood should come with a warning label.” “I’m being penalized for giving birth.” “I stepped up and nurtured the next generation, and —” “Financially, we pay a huge price.” “My career took the biggest punch from it.” “Having children cost me around $750 grand in career earnings.” “I’m giving up my pension, essentially.” [MUSIC PLAYING] “The system is set up to shaft women.” “So I do feel like there’s going to be a penalty.” “Financial penalty.” “The motherhood penalty.” “I literally saw the motherhood penalty in action. I was working at this massive organization. Men who had kids came back from their parental leave, worked super hard, just like threw themselves into it. And yes, they’re probably going to get that promotion a year from now.” “My first child, coming back to work was a train wreck. I was constantly going back and forth between working and nursing and working and nursing, and —” “I would pump about three times a day. So it would be about an hour total that I was away from my desk.” “Trying to nurse a baby on a meeting, which is just a disaster.” “I was constantly stressed, like, oh my gosh, is someone going to complain that they can’t reach me enough?” “Oh, this person does not stay late.” “You are not able to go to a meeting, pick up a special project, stay late, go to happy hours.” “And you can’t help but see women who are kind of superstars and working crazy hours all of a sudden disappear.” “My husband looked at my W-2 and was like, how come you made such little money last year? I feel like you should have made more money. And I was like, because I had a baby. I didn’t get paid for four months.” “My husband and I came out of school making almost twin salaries. Right now, I’m at about half of what he makes.” “He has been able to keep paying into his retirement. I had to put all of my retirement payments on hold.” “I feel extremely unprepared for retirement. And it’s really scary.” “I feel like we’re kind of constantly a little bit in debt.” “The second I feel like you say, as a mom, you’re struggling, that’s the answer, is like, then just stay home. Why are you even in the workforce? I love my career. I worked really, really, really hard for my career.” “I loved being a teacher. I loved going to work every day. But why should I go take care of someone else’s kids when the amount of money I was going to make is what it would take to pay somebody else to take care of my kids?” “And then you add on the cost of child care.” “Child care.” “Costing like $2,000 a month.” “I was shocked. All I’m doing is working to try to pay for this day care center.” “Wow, so this is it? So because I decided to take this path, because I decided to be a mother, this is it for me? I have no protections?” “We did all the right things. We went to school. We got good jobs. We worked our way up. And we bought a house. And that’s really — sorry, I need a second. I didn’t think I would be so emotional about this. But it’s been really hard.” “I just wanted to be strong. And of course, my youngest, I couldn’t let her see Mommy upset. So you just kind of go in a closet.” “I am so, so angry that after all these years and everything that I have had to give up, that I don’t have my own Social Security credits to qualify for retirement in my own name. I don’t have a 401(k) of my own.” “My husband had a higher earning potential than I did. So I stayed home.” “This whole time, I’ve been at home, taking care of kids.” “That means my Social Security is nothing. It really is a pathetic amount.” “It put me totally financially dependent on my husband.” “I’m like shaking a little bit just thinking about it. It’s just — on a primal level, it’s terrifying.” “My stability should not be dependent on the strength of my marriage and my ability to resolve things in my marriage.” “My husband left when I was 52 years old. I never should have sacrificed my career for the benefit of my children, because now I have no real safety net.” “It makes me want to cry.” “It’s not right. Like, where’s the progress?” “I have a nice piece of paper, master’s degree in biochemistry. But I have no job. I have to go through and rationalize my existence all the time just to myself. I’m more than just a mom.” “I had something to give. And I didn’t get to give it.” “Was it worth it?” “100 percent. No choice. They’re amazing.” “I really want my children to look back and say, my mom was great.” “If our daughter watches this someday, I want her to know that it’s all worth it and that we love her so much.” [MUSIC PLAYING]
