I Choose to Be a Single Mum
A loud cry in the middle of a class at university is the least thing a student would expect, especially when the cry is coming from Skye, a four months old baby girl. Sky has experienced an unconventional upbringing in the very first months of her life. She goes to university at least 4 times a week, with her mum of course. Her mum, Catherine, 22 years old is currently in her final year at the University of Hong Kong. What would strike anyone about Catherine is her tenacity to stay strong and filled with bursts of determination amid being a single mum while still at university and working part time.
You could say that until this point nothing has stopped her from living the life that she wants or achieving her goals. However, it is hard even for extremely determined people to raise a kid on their own. But let’s not get this wrong. It is not because her inability to take care of Skye without the support of a masculine figure, nor her inability to do everything on her own, because that is exactly what she has been doing. With her resilience and tenacity, Catherine continues everything as normal, one of her ever-looming concerns however, is her reduced access to welfare for being a single unmarried mother.
During the first week after having Skye, Catherine was already helping her parents running all errands, feeding Skye, doing her home’s laundry and dishes and generally showing her parents that she was not going to be what they thought she would. When her parents found out she was having Skye, they were angry, particularly her mother, “it is out of a tradition that marriage should come first in our culture, and because they had never Skye’s father. They couldn’t understand how I would be able to take care of my studies at university and Skye at the same time”. Her parents tried to talk Catherine into finding a foster family for Skye, but Catherine was resilient and determined to have Skye. It was the clearest thing for Catherine, , she was having Skye and was not postponing her graduation. “Two weeks after having Skye, I went back to university”, says Catherine. “Hey everyone, we have a new mum and the youngest student in our class”, that was the way one of her professors introduced Skye and Catherine to the class. “I was prepared that some people might give me hard times about bringing Skye to lectures”, she says, but her professors were understandable with Catherine’s situation.
Catherine has maintained the same academic level throughout her pregnancy and after giving birth to Skye. “She’s making me grow to be more responsible and disciplined”, Catherine says. The way Catherine says she manages university is by having a strict routine, “how I manage both university and Skye is by being extremely disciplined and efficient”, she says. Catherine puts Skye to sleep at five, it then takes her about two hours for Sky to actually sleep, so from seven to midnight Catherine has a quick dinner and works until whenever she can, usually until two or three in the morning and sleep until Skye wakes up, which is habitually at six in the morning.
“One of my biggest struggles has been meeting her needs and at the same time completing what I have to do at university”, Catherine explains how for a 9:30am lecture, she wakes up at six with Skye, who wants to be fed usually just at nine, half an hour before Catherine has to leave her home to go to her lecture. “Carrying a backpack with a laptop, plus books, study materials and then Skye and all her baby things like milk bottles and clothes is not very convenient on campus” she says, “but now I just embrace it and if I were working I wouldn’t be able to take Skye with me everywhere and into my daily life but now is an opportunity to be with her and go to my lectures”.
In terms of her life on campus, Catherine has had major breakdowns out of stress and not finding enough facilities to deal properly with her baby’s needs such as changing her diapers and feeding her. “HKU implemented two nursing rooms over the past two years and they are encouraging women to have a family and to move into higher positions but when you have a new born as a student because is such rare case, we do not have access to the same facilities as staff”, says Catherine. When contacted HKU would not comment.Catherine suggests that HKU should offer some kind of support of counselling or platform to discuss about situations like hers, “it should not be a taboo, there should be an updated knowledge that students are allowed to have a baby”
Catherine story goes beyond having a child at a young age while still at university, and her story does not ask for sorrow nor compassion. Her story illustrates one of the most overlooked flaws in the Hong Kong legal system, that is the inequity regarding children born out of wedlock. Although Catherine is very fortunate to be able to leave with her parents at home and have them help her throughout, there are still many single parents in less fortunate situations in Hong Kong that do not get the same access to welfare that previously
