International Responses to Regretting Motherhood

Abstract Recent debates about maternal regret, prompted by the publication of Israeli sociologist Orna Donath’s (2015) research with mothers who admit to regretting their motherhood, have manifested differently in different cultural contexts. This chapter situates Tiina Sihto and Armi Mustosmäki’s analysis a discussion regret among contributors an online forum for Finland (see Chap. 10.1007/978-981-16-1174-2_10 ) within international context comparing Finnish similar media Spain Anglophone countries. Our reveals that while idea woman might her motherhood is more readily accepted countries where institutional support lacking, there general acceptance inordinate pressures placed on neoliberal societies negotiate competing demands family paid employment make it inevitable some women will experience regret. Moreover, we find evidence open conversation triggered perceived as further step towards destabilizing traditional attitudes gender roles.