“I'm sorry, but I just don't want to be your mother. It's not you, it's me. You were an accident. It was my mistake and you shouldn’t have to be put through this."

If my own mother said this to me as a young child, I think I would have been psychologically scarred. I might have turned into an axe murderer or mad cat lady. I never thought I would be in this situation, but this speech is what I, and I expect many other students around Cambridge, have been practicing in their bathroom mirrors for the last week or so.

Students at Cambridge are routinely forced into parenthood, many of whom are simply not ready for the commitment. It’s tricky enough to work to your own hectic timetable and organize your own life, let alone add another person’s to the list. Surely we don't want to propagate a generation of mothers who don’t have enough time for their child, who fobs them off to babysitters or dumps them in front of the telly. Instead, don’t we want mothers to be great and take their children for an ice cream, or to Cindies, and invest a huge amount of time and commitment in making their life at Cambridge easy and fun? Ultimately I, and I suspect many others, cannot make such a commitment. Being a good single parent in such a challenging academic environment is too much for anyone.

The Cambridge college parent system has made some of us unwilling victims of parenthood, with it being forced upon us in some cases, without want, or even overt consent to do so. It goes beyond artificial insemination to ultimately a pre-packaged delivery of a child! It's as if this university has adopted the same strategies as shops like Sports Direct, that automatically add a mug to your shopping basket, even if you do not ask, want or need one.  When we get into Cambridge, you never read the small print: that along with a place comes the responsibility of becoming a parent.

Single living is easier and more efficient. In this university – where there is a constant struggle to survive – it is even, perhaps, evolutionary advantageous. It is better to let your species die out than pass on your own incompetence. Its only fair to remain childless, rather than let your cubs fend for themselves in the buttery, get lost in the Savannah of Sainsbury’s or leave them at the mercy of any stray meerkats, warthogs or drinking soc presidents.

There are benefits to student parenting though. For instance, in how many places can you say you've slept with your grandfather or snogged your brother without getting done for incest, ending up in jail or being criticised by some Freudian for having an unresolved Oedipus complex?

But you can’t knock it till you’ve tried it. Who knows, by this time next year I might be a supermum. Or better still, a supermum who is on strangely intimate terms with her absurdly good looking son/daughter. Fingers crossed.