I consider myself to be a reasonable, rational person. I'm not prone to fits of rage (mostly), but nothing makes me see red like people who discuss "push presents" without making the universal "finger down the throat" puking sign.
For those of you blissfully unaware of such things, a push present is a gift presented to a woman by her partner after the successful delivery of a child. I'm not talking about a bouquet of flowers or a small trinket or, as in my case, a roast-beef sandwich with horseradish mayonnaise, mind you. Lavish push presents have taken on a culture of conspicuous consumption all their own, with gifts like diamond rings and new cars not being unheard of. The discussion of the gift-to-come sometimes overshadows the event itself, sort of how the honeymoon eclipses the wedding. The gift comes as recognition of the "suffering" the woman has endured throughout her pregnancy and the subsequent delivery, and its dollar value is often aligned with the amount of pain or complications related to the pregnancy.
I know from experience that pregnancy isn't always an ant-free picnic in a sunny meadow. Sometimes it means puking on a co-workers desk because they didn't think you were serious when you sent an internal email titled "PLEASE FOR THE SWEET LOVE OF GOD, NO TUNA SANDWICHES IN THE BREAK ROOM." It can also be unrelenting heartburn capable of melting iron from weeks 2-40. Or only being able to eat Beef-a-Roni and pink lemonade even though you hate those things. Pregnancy sucks sometimes and that's just the way it is.
But the idea by some that women are owed a substantial gift for "suffering" through pregnancy and delivery is both antiquated and chauvinistic. It reduces a woman to her reproductive function by remunerating the fruits of her labor — but the labor already bore the fruit (baby). Push presents make pregnancy and childbirth a commodity, and it's only two bus stops and a transfer from commodity to "worth." Designating something a "push present" differentiates it from other gifts like birthday gifts in that they are a reward for the "push," whereas a birthday gift is a celebration of life. Baby showers or gifts given in celebratory preparation for the baby serve a function, whereas a ruby necklace doesn't seem very practical for a new parent.
Google "Push Presents" and you'll find countless websites offering extravagant ideas for dads-to-be that are absolutely beyond ludicrous. But even if the gift was something reasonable, to imply that fathers or partners are actually obligated to purchase elaborate gifts for post-natal women also implies "payment" for a healthy baby. Payment is made for an exchange of goods. A baby is not a good, and women are more than a vessel/delivery service.
And the term "Push Present" itself is dismissive of babies who come to families by other means. Babies arrive through adoption and surrogacy, cesarean section, and I think I've even heard a story about a reed basket floating in a river. The women and men who become parents through non-traditional means are every bit as much parents as those who pushed them out of a uterus.
I've been pregnant and have two children who did not seem to enjoy their gestational time inside my body. One got bored around 30 weeks in and thought "Hey! You know what this party needs? Some pre-eclampsia!" I then spent the next six weeks lying on my left side in a hospital where everyone hated me because I snored like a lumberjack and this was before the internet and Candy Crush. My next baby tried to claw his way out and once kicked me so hard in-utero while I was bathing that water rocked over the side of the tub. So yeah; pregnancy and delivery super-sucks a lot of the time. If you're lucky, at the end of it all you get a beautiful child who is going to drive you ape-shit crazy for the next 65 years of your life until you finally die of exhaustion or bankruptcy.
Sorry parents, that is your push present.
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