The roles of the housewife were “home-maker” and “household manager”. She was told her job was to cook, be a seamstress, nurse, dietician, child-bearers etc. Women also had to be sexy, “can anything be more depressing that a wife or mother in a limp apron, flat slippers and curling pin?” asked Mrs. J D Salmond.
In the 1970’s women began to challenge traditional roles expected of them as ideas were discussed. New Zealand society was mainly traditional; women at the time were described as being “oppressed”. Women at the spoke out about their anger against constraints and demanded freedom and equality to make their own choices, the attitudes of women were growing restless. The second wave of feminism describes the groups, organisations and events of the 1970’s who focused primarily on challenging women’s subordination. Middle-class Pakeha women, dominated the movement influenced the issues, goals and actions of the movement. The women’s liberation of the 1970’s tired to raise the status of women’s domestic roles by redefining it as work and arguing for child care centers. By the 1990s women were marrying and having children significantly later and they tended to regard motherhood as a temporary interruption of their working lives, rather than a full time career.
During the late sixties and early seventies feminist ideas began to be spread by the women's liberation movement. This lead to women looking for alternative to the expectations that society held for them. New theories arose about the importance of mother-child bonding and the constant propaganda about women’s domestic roles. If a woman did work, it was part-time and in uninspiring jobs and their income was regarded as “pin money”. Many women embraced the domestic role and encompassed the role into their lives, however housework often became boring and repetitive. The role’s consequence was far more serious than expected, Thursday covered a cover story in October 1968, entitled “Who says I’m a cabbage?. It referred to the cabbage patch syndrome, which was filling mental hospitals with depressed women no longer able to find a reason for living. Dr Fraser McDonald told Thursday that he had treated whole streets of women for the same illness: depression, feelings of usefulness and a lack of home. Nadja Tollemache, commented, "All this bottling and baking is of no virtue if it is done because the neighbours do it". The magazine cover has the tagline "Who says I'm a cabbage?", this is the challenge to the housewives in suburban cabbage patches. He advised women to go to work, no matter what the income. The superintendent of Porirua psychiatric hospital, Dr M G McKay also pointed out that 125 women had been admitted suffering from reactive depression, which is four times the number of men. Wellington Hospital’s attempted suicide statistics told 123 had attempted suicide compared with 61 men. Married women had become the major user of prescription tranquillizers and sleeping pills. According to the 1971 study of GP’s prescriptions on the average day in 1971 8.3% of married women took a tranquillizer compared with 3.3% of men. The proportion of sleeping pills used by married women had almost doubled from 1958 to 1971.
The source of Dr Fraser McDonald is reliable and accurate, this quote was taken directly for Thursday magazine and is widely used in the study of the Second Wave of Feminism. This is a representative of his own clients, it is his opinion; however his patients diagnosis can't be seen due to doctor/patient privilege. However other doctors also found that depression was becoming more common including Dr M G McKay a top superintendent at the time who would definitely have access to the number of women suffering from depression. I believe both Dr Fraser McDonald and Dr M G McKay are both reliable and credible are in their chosen fields, both became well known during the Second Wave of Feminism by giving women the advice to seek help if needed.