Don’t Call Me a MILF

As a mom, I still want to openly express my sexuality. I just don’t want to be objectified.

The red Lycra dress I wore opened at the sides, held together by nothing more than strings. With my bare skin exposed on each side of my form, I couldn’t wear panties or a bra with the dress. Well, I could, but it just felt better being nude underneath. I liked the sensation of the air on my naked parts and to be dressed this way in this semi-public space. My boyfriend and I were at the sex club we frequent. We’re exhibitionists, so the dress was perfect. Just lift it anywhere and…

But even as I abandoned myself in this environment, I still wanted to retain my identity as a human being. I’m a woman, who happens to be a mom, who also happens to like sex a lot. Besides that I’m also a writer, a traveler, a friend, a daughter. I’m my boyfriend’s partner. In other words, I’m a three-dimensional person, not an object.

I don’t want to be pared down to an acronym. So please don’t call me a MILF even if you do want to f*** me.

Calling a woman a MILF is just another way to sublimate her identity into a Magdalene archetype.

The term MILF rose to popularity in the movie American Pie, but has now become mainstream. Get your MILF coffee mug or T-shirt on Etsy, but you had better ask before calling just any mom a MILF.

Elizabeth Esther, an author and podcaster, takes particular offense with the term.

“I’m annoyed and disgusted by the MILF label,” she writes on her blog. “No matter how many women decided to ‘take back’ this degrading slang word it’s still, um, degrading.”

She sums up her problem with the term:

“No longer is it about our inherent worth as human persons. Now our value as mothers is determined by whether or not people want to have sex with us.”

I agree. I don’t want to be stripped of my humanity just to be a fantasy for men.

Writer Dina Leygerman also notes her dislike of the term in her piece for Romper, entitled: 8 Reasons You Should Never Call A Mom A MILF.

One of her best reasons?

“MILF is misogynistic…There’s no focus on individual features…. It’s an oversimplified and a crude catcall at best.”

Writer, blogger and author, Emma Waverman, also hones in perfectly on the problem with the term in a post on her blog: Embrace the Chaos.

“…the ‘I’ in MILF is about a young man. It’s not about self-esteem, or how you feel about yourself. It’s about your value on a scale set up by a patriarchal society.”

Calling a woman a MILF is just another way to sublimate her identity into a Magdalene archetype. It’s another way to show that there are only two options open for a mother to identify with. She’s either a mom you want to f*** or she isn’t. She’s an unf***able matron.

Relationship psychologist Dr. Natasha Sharma asks:

“Why do we have to identify a woman as a mom that you’d like to have sex with? That plays into the idea that this is a mom and therefore a member of a subset of otherwise asexual people who happens to be attractive. We’re inadvertently creating a culture that believes mothers who are sexual beings are an odd thing.”

As I recently wrote in my piece I’m a Mom and I’m Sexual. Deal With It, I refuse to adopt an asexual “mom” identity just so I can be viewed as a good mother. That said, I also refuse to permit myself to be objectified just because I continue to openly assert my sexuality.

I, alone, choose how I want to identify. I’m a human first, a woman next, and also a caring mother. In top of that, I’m a sexual adventurer with my boyfriend. But one thing I’m not is an acronym.

So please don’t call me a MILF, thank you very much.