Why are there only two images of stay at home mums? Pie-baking…
By KIRSTY RICE
I was a feminist in Grade 4 when Tony W said the vampire in the play had to be a boy. He was my first bite.
I was a feminist when my first sleazy boss told me I was looking pretty and svelte. I told him my brain was quite large and unattractive.
I was a feminist when I chose to travel with my husband’s career because it was not only financially logical, it was my choice. Our choice. There was a choice. I like choices, you could call me pro choice.
I was a feminist when I stood in the kitchen barefoot in my pajamas and waved my husband off to work while I fed the children breakfast. You can do that, be a feminist in your pajamas with a baby over your shoulder.
I was a feminist when I returned to the office. I used to ring my feminist friends who were thankfully not at the office to ask for help. We were all feminists together, helping each other out.
I was a feminist when I heard you use the term ”just a Stay at Home Mum”. An offended feminist.
I was a feminist when I talked to my boys about being good men, and again with my girls on remaining strong and equal. That’s called an active feminist.
… or ironing.
Feminism arrives in many forms and presents itself at different stages of our careers.
The Stay at Home mother you’re judging today, may well be back “at work” next week, or not. We get to choose, that’s what it’s all about, that’s how it started. We asked for choices.
Feminists are clever like that.
Kirsty Rice is an Australian writer and Blogger currently living in Qatar. This piece was originally published on her blog, which you can find here. You can follow Kirsty on Twitter here
When were you a feminist? Are you a feminist today?
Comments
176 Comments so far
When you are a stay at home mum of young (less than school age) children, often people will make you feel guilty for not going to work, or tell you about the great early learning experience at child care. Well I don’t agree. I know of quite a few children who were very advanced by the time they reached prep because of the things they picked up around their parents. Sadly, because it is not measured or formally tested in the home, learning through everyday experiences is dismissed. Parents are better at identifying and encouraging their own child’s talents than teachers.
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Most of the criticism of stay at home mums comes from other women. There can be a lot of dignity in staying at home and raising the children and it should not be demeaned.
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Most of the criticism of stay at home mums comes from other women.
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I’m a man . I respect human beings because they command respect from me. And that respect does not vary with gender, colour, sexual orientation, work status or marital status. So this whole debate is new to me.
And I don’t know if I’m wrong in saying this, but I don’t think men look down on women if they are stay at home mums. At least I don’t. And those who do look down on ANYONE for ANY reason are not fit to be called men.
And no, I’m not a feminist.
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I think you ARE a feminist because you believe in equality – that’s what’s it’s all about.
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‘Hard-wired’ ‘Biologically Programmed’ ‘Natural for Females’ ‘What women should be doing’ yyyyyaaaawwwwwwnnnnnn…. oh sorry excuse me I zoned out there for a minute
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Then why do I still feel small when I tell people I’m a stay at home mum? I chose to do this, my husband and I agreed to this, I enjoy this (most of the time) yet even my own mum asks when I’m returning to the paid workforce. Or returning to study. Or starting a side business. I feel very, very guilty that I’m not doing ‘more’.
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Sparky, sometimes guilt is a useful emotion to make us realise we are actually not making the best choices. But if you’re happy and your life isnt falling apart, ignore the guilt and ignore everyone else and get on with enjoying your life!
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Sparky, you can only feel that way if you let others make you feel that way! If you’re happy with your choice, if you’re husband is happy with your choice and your children are benefiting from you being at home with them, then hold your head high and stand proud of YOUR choice!
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Then why do I still feel small when I tell people I’m a stay at home mum? I chose to do this, my husband and I agreed to this, I enjoy this (most of the time) yet even my own mum asks when I’m returning to the paid workforce. Or returning to study. Or starting a side business. I feel very, very guilty that I’m not doing ‘more’.
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I hear you. This is what I am dealing with at the moment. My son is five months old and I won’t be returning to work or to study til I am ready to do so. I have worked for my whole adult life and feel that I deserve to take some time out to be with my son while he is at such and adorable stage. I may never go back I love it so much.
My mother worked when I was a little girl and is still working now. She was a single mother and had no choice in the matter. I never wanted for anything and was well looked after but I would have loved to have had her to my self and to have her pick me up from school. So its for this reason that I refuse to feel bad about it and consider my slef very lucky that I can do this. As for “not doing more” you are doing the hardest job in the world…..raising beautiful children. Good on you.xx
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It’s just a wee bit perplexing about the idea of women fighting for women’s rights and in the same breath packaging it up in the idea that a woman should fight against staying home and looking after her own children. What about the rights of the child to have a mother who will nurture said child, as women, like it or not, were biologically designed to do. When I see a men being pregnant for 9 months, breastfeeding or giving birth, without some marvellous scientific intervention, then I will fight for the rights of a woman to go and work while others who are lowly paid to do so in many cases, look after her children. If you don’t want to nurture your own children when they are babies, and vulnerable, and really do, need their own mothers, then don’t have them.
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So a father is biologically incapable of nurturing their child? It’s only something a woman can do? I think you may have totally misread the point of the article in that it actually supports women who stay at home with their children. You don’t have to be in paid work to be a feminist.
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No, I did not say fathers are biologically incapable of nurturing their child/ren. I’m referring to our biological predisposition for an infant to seek the nurturing and comfort of its mother during their early days, weeks, months, years, similar to what happens for many species in the animal world. So, we either rob our children or we embrace them.
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You know I dont think anyone knows what being a parent is truly going to be like until they have their first child. And once you have that baby and decide that you dont really enjoy it, cant cope, its boring and nuturing and caring for your baby is not what you expected and would prefer to be doing something else, that is understandable.
However, I just cant get it then, when many of these people go and do it all again and have more babies, knowing that they dont really enjoy the long haul of it and dont want to be caring for them beyond a few token months! Why do they do that? Thats not fair on the baby at all.
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There is a lot of blurring of different issues here. Choosing to not to be in the paid workforce (to look after your kids or whatever) has nothing to do with feminism or not. You can be a feminist in the workplace or at home or in the volunteer sector. A feminist is someone who believes in, advocates or fights for women’s rights on the grounds of political, social, and economic equality to men. My mother was a very strong feminist although she didn’t enter the full time paid workforce until I was in my late teens. She continually reinforced to my sister and I that we could achieve and be what we wanted to be, be that an engineer, doctor, lawyer, journalist or teacher.
Many people confuse feminism with libertarianism ie the freedom to make individual choices. The freedom to choose is a ‘human right’ and doesn’t necessarily imply a ‘feminist right’. Choosing to stay home or not stay home has nothing to do with feminism, however women’s access to employment, professions, the same rates of pay etc does.
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Thanks Marls, this is interesting. So if feminism is about advocacy then what you are doing; stay at home, paid work, student, volunteering in a developing country, makes this a non-debate?
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yes! you can be a feminist whether you are employed or not employed! What relevance does employment status have? If I exercise a choice to stay home with my kids I am still a feminist, exercising a human right (ie men have the right to make that choice to!). I will continue to believe in and advocate the rights of women for equality in employment, social and economic spheres. Be that president of the P&C or CEO of the company I work for. I believe that these choices should be made on the basis of ability not gender. Therefore I am a feminist. And proud of it.
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exactly!!!!!!!!!
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The whole stay at home mother vs everyone else battle does my head in. Everyone is such a martyr about it.
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Yes!
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Who are all these people judging SAHMs? I’m too busy worrying about my life and family to care about how much or how little paid work everyone else does, let alone ‘judge’.
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I am a mum who works from home, volunteers time at my child’s school/s, who has not seen her husband for 3 months. Not only am I keeping this family fed, watered, clean, tidy and organised but at the moment I am also playing dad while my husband is off overseas doing what is expected of him with his paying military job. He may earn more financially than I do but I wouldn’t swap my life for any of my past ones for anything (well except for maybe the few years I travelled the world.)
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I just want to give you a giant virtual *HIGH FIVE*.
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I am a woman.
I am a mother.
I am a post grad qualified professional.
I am a SAHM.
I am a feminist (at least I thought I was).
I am a volunteer.
I am a fundraiser.
I am a home renovation project manager.
I am a sports coach and manager.
In addition to the above roles I cook, clean, wash, pay bills, run errands, pick up dry cleaning and manage various contractors and advisers in my day- to- day life. Same stuff as everyone else.
Only one of the above roles has resulted in me being remunerated.
After reading the commments below, what I am confused about is that of all the roles I have have enjoyed (and chosen), apparently only the one for which I was remunerated qualifies me to call myself a feminist. Bummer!
Where did I go wrong?
I can’t help but think that the energy used on the endless discussion and debate about working parents vs non-working parents, who is and isn’t a feminist, and what choices you should have made before you can claim to be a feminist, would have been better spent on actually pushing for change to things like equal pay, flexible work conditions, and childcare. But what would I know?
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I think it also needs to be said noted, as the main child carer in our family, with only a (small) part time income, I was advised that I should have AT LEAST $400k in Life Insurance so that if something happened to me my husband would be able to still care for the children and also pay the bills.
And we don’t have a Mortgage……..
As far as I am concerned, my input as a child carer is equally as important as his as the main wage earner…..
They are OUR children, this is OUR family, and we are both contributing in our own ways.
This isn’t a “feminist” (or lack thereof) decision – it just makes sense, in a practical, workable way. For us.
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i don’t think the first- and second-wave feminists were fighting so hard so women could stay home, look after kids, leave jobs to follow their husbands, clean a house, cook and keep the home fires burning for their man! It is ridiculous to suggest so. Kirsty, you may be a feminist, have feminist ideals and principles, but right now, you are not living’ the feminist dream. You are doing what women have done for ever and what first- and second-wave mainstream feminists were rallying against.
From a single parent who is not working (much) so she can mother her child and despite having feminist principles (and a degree majoring in history/ womens studies) is also not living the feminist dream right now. xx
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I think they were fighting to have CHOICE and if she willingly chooses to do these things rather than being forced by society to, then I do think this is what feminists were fighting for. They weren’t fighting for women to be forced into the workplace, o to uni or do anything if they didn’t want to, that’s no different to being forced to stay at home and have kids.
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I agree, wholeheartedly.
If I want to work, study, vote, etc then I can. And THAT is important.
But if I choose NOT TO, then that does not make me any less of a feminist.
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No, fighting for the freedom (or liberty) to make individual choices is libertarianism. Feminism is defined as “the advocacy of women’s rights on the grounds of political, social, and economic equality to men.”
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And this is where the social part comes in.
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I thought it was all about choice.
I don’t think feminism ever said you had to work for 40 years, and not be allowed the ‘choice’ to stay at home for a few years to look after your kids.
Someone has to do it. Whether its you, the child’s father, grandparents or childcare, if you have kids they have to be looked after as babies/toddlers. I am sure first and second wave feminists didn’t fight so hard just to tell mothers they shouldn’t be allowed the choice to be with their children …
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Thank you, well said. Let’s fight for the rights of mothers to be at home with their children first.
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How about we fight for the right of PARENTS to be at home with their children first?
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Why on earth would we fight for that? We’ve always had that right. In many places around the world, it continues to be the only right that women have.
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Urgh!!!!!!!!! They were fighting to do what MADE THEM HAPPY!!!!
Ideas of happiness do not all have to be the same. My God, YOU are the one who is not a femjnist if you don’t understand that.
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God no, they were fighting for the right to vote. The right to own property in their own name. The right to be considered for a job on merit, not gender. The right not to have to resign on marriage. The right to be paid equally to men for the exact same job. The right not be sacked on announcing a pregnancy. It was not about “being happy”. Stay at home if you like. Work full time part time or whatever, but don’t call the ability to make choice “being a feminist”. Women could make the same choices before “women’s lib” as it was called in the olden days (my grandmother worked!). However, they didn’t have access to the same employment rights, pay, entitlements etc as men. Not so long ago women could be doctors, but not ‘surgeons’. Women could be engineers, but did the admin. People are confusing different issues here!
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Well said, Marls. I was going to reply to the comments above, but you have said it beautifully. This whole “choice” argument is perhaps what modern-day feminists have appropriated, and that’s fine, but it definitely was not what the first- and second- wave feminists were about. And I still personally think it is stretching it a bit to suggest staying home in the private sphere to look after children and keep house is a “feminist choice.” No need to jump down my throat people! It is just my opinion after all. I am not trying to coerce or convince anyone else to agree!
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Michelle,
I went back to work full-time after my 4th child was born, I was just as much a feminist then, as I was when I was home full-time with my children. My ideals are the same. I am now living overseas and have changed careers to allow for more adaptable working hours. Still a feminist.
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So I should strive for a career, children or not, to satisfy the 1st and 2nd wave feminists? If I did so, what benefit is there? Will I be happier doing something, just because I have the right.. Even though it is not what I WANT to do? Then and only then would I feel opressed. My husband finds work a daily struggle, but he goes there for us. For our family, as an act of his love and commitment. I stay at home and do everything I can to make him comfortable as I await the birth of our child. I don’t do that as a slave to him. It is a job I do to support him out of my love and commitment to our family. Between us, our bills get paid, we eat well and live in a well kept home. Our baby will be nurtured in the way we feel is best. I don’t even care if that is feminism or not, but I wouldn’t follow any movement that denied me the choice to live the best life possible with my family.
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She’s not staying home to cook, clean and keep the home fires burning for her husband. She’s doing it for her kids! That’s why it’s called Stay At Home Mum, not Stay At Home Wife. What is so wrong, so non-feminist, about prioritising children’s wellbeing over a career for a short period in your life?
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Women who do not call themselves a feminist should be reminded of what it was like for women before the feminist movement. No equal pay (ok, still working on that one), giving up a job when you got pregnant or married, no superannuation, discrimination, segregation in pubs, want a bank loan? forget about it unless a male went guarantor, societal attitudes to unmarried or single mothers and on and on. I worked with a colleague who was divorced in the 1960s and had to support herself and her daughter. She was told by a Principal (she was a teacher) that “there was no place in society for a divorced woman”, was paid 75% of a man’s wage for doing exactly the same job much better, she had to fight to get access to superannuation after being told “don’t worry about that, your husband will take care of that” (this was in the early 1980s). Not to mention the sexual advances she had to endure because she was a divorced woman and therefore an ‘easy woman’. Modern women have a lot to be thankful for. When did feminism become such a dirty word?
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There’s nothing feminist about being financially dependent on one’s partner.
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Be assured Grace, that there is no way my husband could keep his job without the assistance of me raising his/our 4 children. He is acutely financially dependent on me. Recently when I needed to go hospital, it took a rotating schedule of 8 women to complete school drop off and pickups with outside activities.
Before becoming a writer, I was in HR, and have interviewed possibly thousands of women returning to work. I agree we have to be smart about keeping our skills relevant for our return to the workforce.
It’s a team effort. Our children. Our money.
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Until the children grow up. Or unless he gets a new wife.
There are lots of women out there who have cheated themselves out of financial options because they have been stay at home mothers since they were young and they now have no marketable skills to earn a decent wage.
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None of these SAHMs want to acknowledge this.
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Sorry but if my husband can earn four times my income and we stay married for say, 10 years before divorcing, then surely the total pool of money available to me at this time would be greater than if we had both worked in lower paying jobs due to shared family responsibilities.
Also you a assuming that the only place we gain skills that are valuable in the workplace, is in the workplace. There are many skills acquired throughout life that add to a persons ability to be employed, and maybe those skills could facilitate a change of career path.
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Why couldn’t you both work highly paid jobs? Confused immensely as to why a husband can only earn money if his wife is at home cooking…..I am home by 5 to look after my son and I earn a high wage. Husband earns very high wage. Neither my husband nor I took ‘lower paid jobs’….in fact our wages both increased last year….I don’t need my husband to ‘help out’ as I am more than capable…..still confused as to the only two options….one high wage earner or two average ones.
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oh yawn….most of us accept that you can only do one job at a time well. Something has to give and I dont want that to be my kids.
And I dont need to juggle raising my kids with working, all of the reading required to keep current and running a home.
And as for the claim that both parents can manage demanding succesful careers with parenting is certainly true if you want to delegate most of the parenting. I dont want to do that either and my husband prefers it that way too. And for whats its worth, I used to work in a very male dominated industry and the Directors and senior level guys whose wives worked as well constantly had them on the phone asking them if they could help with daycare pickup which did cause tension in the workplace and they were always telling the other guys whose wives didnt work how lucky they were – there was certainly resentment there….
And it is really sad when people say they find being at home with their children boring. Kids need quantity time with their parents too, not just a token play before bedime.
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Oh yawn is it chillax?? My point is that you choose to be home not because your husband needs it. Someone else does not raise my kids, I do. They play with them whilst I work. I work in a male dominated industry too and I manage a professional job brilliantly thanks very much without needing to call my husband for pickups. I got both a pay rise and promotion last year. I get brilliant quality time with my kids after work and not some token time. Neither my career not my kids give so I find your rigidity strange. I don’t delegate any parenting so this is pretty hilarious. How is a playmate during the day considered the parent? My brain simply needs more than being a stay at home parent. Perhaps it is just easier for some than others to juggle everything because they are more enthusiastic about achievement.
Don’t know what men you work with but my colleagues are the kind that expect their women to work and be the intelligent capable people they are. They don’t want to come home and discuss poo.
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Lia,
Most of the men I worked with were highly educated professionals who wanted the best possible childhood for their children.
And like me agree that having our kids spend 40 hours of their week, most of their waking hours, with someone other than a parent isn’t compatible with that. Children being raised fulltime by their university educated mothers have the best outcomes. Fact.
And seriously people who spend most of their time caring for and raising children, their own and other peoples have more conversation than the childrens toileting habits – that’s a really pathetic opinion of the people who care for children.
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Sure marriage break up is a harsh reality for many, however I dont intend to live my life and cut corners just so I can maintain my career too (and actually reduce our families income because my husband would have to step back to a lower paying, less demanding job to help out) on the assumption that my husband, who is a good loyal man, will turn into a cheating, lying a@@hole and leave us. I dont know why I would bother getting married if thats what I expected from my life.
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My husband is a highly paid professionaland so am I. I manage to work, raise kids, clean, cook, pay bills and buy food. I don’t know any professionalmen who suffer because their wives work. I work in a male dominated industry and listen to men complain all the time about womens reluctance to work after kids. women can choose to stay at home but it is hilarious how some think the only reason their husband can work is because they went to the supermarket or pushed the button on a washing machine. It takes me 4 hours a week to do all my chores including cooking dinner for the days I work. You want to SAH then great but I think it is so funny when people describe parenting as a job. Pulease, it is a privilege and an so much easier than working as a professional. Having been made redundant I am bored out of my mind all day as I am used to being exceptionally busy at work, then coming home to play with little ones.
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Dear Anonymous,
You’re absolutely right, it’s very important to either find a more adaptable career, or to keep you skills up to date for your return to the workforce. I’m not suggesting otherwise. I know very few SAHM’s who aren’t thinking/worrying about what they can do to balance career/children.
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[Mamamia - this is the second time I've tried to post this comment. While I understand it may be controversial, I really don't think it violates the Dinner Party rules.]
Kirsty, my brother hires a nanny to do the work you described. She ‘allows’ him to work. Does that make him financially dependent on that particular nanny? Maybe, but they’re nowhere near in equal positions. Or maybe not, because babysitters are easily replaceable. If a stay-at-home partner is willing to do this work for free, it makes the working partner lucky, but hardly truly dependent.
The way I see it, your husband is not ‘acutely financially dependent’ on you, per se. He is dependent on having someone to take care of the kids while he’s at work. This could easily be a 20 year old uni student. You enable him to earn an income, but you’re easily replaceable in this role. That’s why I don’t think you’re in equal positions.
An exception would be a working partner who genuinely couldn’t afford the equivalent of a nanny. This is co-dependence – while it could be described as an equal relationship, it’s hardly ideal.
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Tell that to the kids!!
How can you possibly suggest that a nanny is a direct swap for a parent!
You are really missing something
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I’m considering the situation in financial terms only, in response to the comment that Kirsty’s husband is ‘acutely financially dependent’ on her.
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Well Grace, with children there is something else involved called emotion which no amount of money can buy. I know some now teenagers whose parents left them in the care of an assortment of the cheapest pass the parcel nannies/au pares they could find, and these kids are pretty messed up.
Compared with kids whose parents paid a lot of money for fabulous stable nannies/childcare or who had a stay at home parent. Offering your children a stable carer/carers when they are growing up sets them up well for life. To me money cant buy that. So yes, in terms of financial dependance, any man whose wife is caring for his kids, he is dependent on her.
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Are you implying that feminism cannot exist in a family environment where only one partner works?
Also I didn’t see any reference in the article to being “financially dependent” – is that an assumption that has been made in reference to the writer moving for her husband’s work?
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Err well who’s to say she hasn’t invested wisely into a share portfolio or property? If you can, you ought to not rely on a JOB as your only means of income. It can be gone in a flash!
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I have a very good friend who is a very strong feminist. She is also a SAHM to her 3 young children. She earns enough in her very very successful professional career to invest in numerous properties shares etc such that she retired in her late 30s and looks after her kids full time and manages her portfolio a bit on the side. As I have pointed out a few times, being a SAHM has nothing to do with being a feminist or not. She is a SAHM and a feminist. She believes in and truly does fight in a number of ways for the equal rights of women and men.
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I agree that it is better for woman to be financially independent from her husband but isn’t it Kirsty’s choice? Isn’t that what feminism is about – a woman making her own choices not being forced to because of society’s expectations? It also mentions that Kirsty is a writer – maybe she is earning an income from that.
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Really? How so? Please, please, please explain to me a trailing spouse, mother of two, staying at home because working is not viable, volunteer working a couple of hours a week, instilling behaviours and beliefs in my daughters that they can and should expect to be able to participate in any sport/activity regardless of their gender and me fighting for that right in a female repressed country. You tell me how because my husband is the one being paid to work, why im not a feminist.
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Are you serious?
Raising your children, who also happen to be your husbands is a family effort, and on many occasions one that involves one partner forgoing their income to allow the family to function and actually earn more money. There is no way on earth my husband could maintain his career at his level (and earning ability) if I wasnt at home to do everything that he is too busy to do. And to give him the freedom to be able to stay at work for a late overseas call or take his hard working dedicated staff out for a drink after a 16 hour day. If he was a single dad, believe me he would be spending a fortune on staff to do my job! He is often away for work for a week at a time, who would take in our children if I wasnt here? There is no way I could juggle a career of my own with our childrens needs and a husband who is regularly overseas. Most working couples share the pick-up drop off, with a husband who is away that cant be shared.
And like Kirsty, I was sick in bed for 2 days recently and both my mother and mother in law and a babysitter had to juggle our kids. A job I normally do alone.
We are a family. They are our children and it is our money.
And single parents – I worship you!
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Thank you Chillax. That is exactly the thoughts of my husband and myself – it is our family and our money. I’m a SAHM right now. My husband works in emergency services in rural & remote areas and last year spent about 150 nights ‘out bush’. Without me looking after the kids (toddler & baby) and doing all the other day to day stuff he wouldn’t be able to do his job.
I’m a feminist and will raise my girls to be too, but at the same time my husband and I have a partnership and we make the choice together the best way to make it work. This is simply the way we’ve chosen.
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Chillax, I am thoroughly enjoying all of your comments on ths issue. You’re saving me from having to weigh in myself. Thank you for expressing opinions I wholeheartedly relate to and share.
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When I first got married, my husband was studying full time and completely financially dependent on me – our choice. We bought a house at this time. Then we decided to have kids and I wanted to stay home. I am about to go back to work whilst my husband cuts back to part time to stay at home. We are a team who do what we think is best for our situation. I don’t see making your own choices and qualities such as being team-oriented, dedicated, considerate of others’ goals/dreams and at times, humble being mutually exclusive to being feminist.
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Grace, isn’t that the same thing as saying that there is nothing masculine about being a stay at home dad?
I am also a trailing spouse who, although I am currently on maternity leave, will probably not be going back to work. I have a successful career myself but with a husband who is frequently travelling or on late night conference calls, one of us needs to be there for the children and for the time being, that is me.
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Grace, two of my friends have moved overseas because He was offered a job with amazing money and benefits, and She took voluntary redundancy from her high paying job to go with their son and be a stay at home Mum for a while. The way they look at it, they’ll have their house in Sydney paid off, they get an awesome time overseas that not many people get the opportunity to do, and this is “his time to shine” so to speak, while she has a bit a recharge and decides what her next step is. His high paying job overseas allows her to do that.
Isn’t shared money a thing when you have a family anyway? I agree women should be able to support themselves and have their own money, but I totally agree with Kirsty, having grown up with travelling family members, that the working partner is more dependent than you might realise on the partner that goes with them with regards to their actually being able to do their job.
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Grace I completely disagree with your comment – my husband may be the one who goes out to work but I’m in charge of all our finances and I’m not sure he even knows the log in to our internet banking. If anything were to happen to our relationship I think he would be the one that would be financially dependent on me – I’m the one who does all the banking and who has set up the term deposits, banking accounts and share portfolios and I would challenge any family court to say that his job of earning the money is less than my job of raising our two beautiful children, managing our finances, and maintaining a happy and secure home for our children. The fact that I also worked two jobs up until I had my first child, saved furiously so I could be at home with my kids and know that I am easily employable as a teacher, tutor, life coach, nutritional therapist… I have never once felt that I am financially dependent on him.
I love him and consider our relationship completely equal – there is more to a marriage than who earns what. His most valuable asset is his wife and kids.
As for the people that say that wokring mums teach their children a good work ethic and set up a good working role model – well my my mum was at home with us and I have always believed I could be anything I wanted to be. She was always there for her four children and took the time to talk to us and teach us what a good work ethic was – just like I’m sure working mum’s do. When we had all grown up and when she was just about to turn 50 she found what she loved and set up her own business and is a wonderful role model, teaching me that being at home and seeing your kids grow is important, and that when the time comes you can follow your dreams no matter what age. I am so proud of her and she often tells me that she is proud of me, that in today’s society when money is glorified and revered, that we sacrifice certain things to be there for our kids. I don’t care what people think of me because I love being at home with my kids, it can be hard work, monotonous and sometimes lonely but it can also be rewarding and priceless .
Anyway, I’m off to give my husband his pocket money for the week…
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I often wonder what the male equivalent of a feminist is? Feminism has begun to liberate men as well. In the past men had no choices, they were effectively obliged to go and work. Depending on what that work was you could argue that in the bad old days men had it better or worse then women, neither had choices. Nowdays my wife and I make decisions about who is the primary breadwinner based on who can win the most bread. We both work, but, recently, she became the “primary” breadwinner. What I find interesting is that a lot of my male friends, whose children are now at school, and who are encouraging their wifes to return to the paid workforce to contribute to the ever mounting cost of living, are meeting a lot of resistance. So effectively it is the woman in the relationship who is exercising her freedom to chose and the man who has no choice!
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Don’t tell anyone, but it’s … ‘a feminist’.
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I’m a stay at home mother because I work to live, and not the other way round. Yup, my partner and I can afford it, but mostly this time in my life is best served for me by caring for my little one and running the house.
I don’t care what other people do, just as when I was younger I didn’t care that I was working while my friends went to uni, and later, that I was at uni while my friends were all finished and working. Or that some of my friends had children young, and others don’t want kids at all. Their decisions have no bearing on mine.
I believe things always turn out just as they’re meant to, and that my career – or perhaps a different one – will be ready and waiting just when it’s meant to be. I am not going to go back to work out of some fear that I’ll go backwards by not doing so. For me, going backwards would be working at this time when my instincts tell me I should be living through the early childhood years with my baby.
And I think everyone should just follow their instincts and do what they feel they need to do, not just when it comes to raising children, but with every aspect of their lives.
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And I am a working mum who works to live. I agree with everything you wrote. We all see the world differently.
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*stands up and applauds*….exactly!
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A career will only be ‘ready and waiting’ if your skills are up to date.
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SAHM has become the most loaded acronym ever. I vote for CDOO (Chief Domestic Operating Officer) or DSP (Domestic Services Provider).Or UVUPBBM (Under-valued, under-paid but bloody marvellous).
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rather than under-paid, shouldn’t it be un-paid
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I loved your comment!
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Of course the first two acronyms would apply to most working mums as well – which I guess is the point
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THANK YOU!!
Too many people forget that access to choice is the crux of what feminism is all about.
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Agree, choice doesn’t equal a feminist, there’s more to it then that, a good article by the awesome Clementine Ford, http://www.dailylife.com.au/news-and-views/dl-opinion/the-myth-of-empowerment-20130128-2dghy.html
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Great link, thanks
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In our culture you aren’t really worth anything unless you are in paid employment.
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I agree. I hate the term ‘participation’ when applied to employment & workforce. And those who do not ‘participate’ are somehow lesser. SAHM participate and contribute to society on a whole other level. I am a mother in paid employment. No, it doesn’t make me a ‘working’ mother. All mothers (and fathers) work.
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I never really counted myself a feminist until I became a mother. I am now a out and proud raging feminist who finally understands the demands and projected images that society has always placed on us. As mothers and women in our current generation I consider our selves fortunate that societies view of us as mothers is changing, slowly but still changing. I understand my parents despairing of my decision to go back to work, even though I have made massive career changes and regression to make sure that I am still around my children full time. They are of a generation where a ‘good mum’ completely totally and utterly put her children (and husband) first. Not all leopards change their spots. But what really winds me up is when mothers are judged by others (especially by those of our generation) for the choices they make. A good mum can stay at home. A good mum can work full time. Different strokes for different folks. How dare someone judge our choices because they are different from their own, and lets be honest here, mothers can be the worst offenders. We have the choice to live the life we choose to, parent the way we identify best with. There is a million different ways to raise a emotionally healthy child. You choose your way and I’ll choose mine.
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Sure it’s nice to have choices, but why should we have to choose? Why are women so polarized, at the school drop-off it’s the SAHM’s vs. the working mums, each demonizing the other group for their choice. Can’t we all just be friends?
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Genuine question- are women polarised and demonised at the school drop off? Really? Perhaps I just live in a bubble and am completely oblivious to all the snide remarks, barbed comments and loaded glances that go on, but I can honestly say the only time I’m ever aware of the SAHM vs working mum dichotomy being debated with any kind of nastiness is online or in the media. I guess if I really dig deep I could come up with a couple of instances of mums who work outside the home making comments like “I couldn’t stay at home all day, I’d die of boredom” (to me, while i was a SAHM) but I’ve always been happy and comfortable enough in my own choices – and disinterested enough in theirs – for it not to bite.
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See Evelina, why can’t we all just go our own way? I love your attitude! Maybe (hopefully) it’s just the school my kid used to attend, but I’ve also heard comments about a woman’s tattoos (it’s a Christian school, and this woman was labelled as BAD). Here’s hoping this year’s better, new school new friends?
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The only thing I’ve ever noticed is when I’ve spied one the working mums gorgeous handbags or new shoes and asked where she got them from and they were from a shop the city..and I get annoyed because I dont shop there anymore
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I’m not a mother yet but I love the way you put it. My mum was a little of both, she worked for the telephonist bureau so would work during the holidays. I loved my working mum but then I liked the convenience of her at home. Funny thing is I often wonder what people in offices do all day. I’ve never worked in one. Curiouser and curiouser.
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I have no doubt that SAHM’s can be feminists. However, I think it’s a bit of a slippery slope when we use the ‘I choose my choice’ argument to justify actions that would not ordinarily advance feminism as feminist. I just don’t think all choices are empowering for women. Women’s lives are so often relegated to the private sphere, just as women are so often portrayed as sexual playthings – would you say becoming a stripper and taking your clothes off for money is empowering? Of course being a SAHM is not the same thing, but it is living out a woman’s role as designed by men, with no financial remuneration, barely any work/life balance and in most cases, no appreciation for the work they do. And before you slay me, I am also a SAHM while I finish uni. I just don’t think it’s a feminist decision.
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And this is where I will disagree with you. I think in the push for feminists to have it all and do what they want to do, there are often people left behind with all of that ambition. And that is their children. Of course, not all SAHMs are brilliant mothers and not all career women are selfish mothers, but you will find that most women who choose to be SAHMs, do so because they want to give their children the absolute best childhood they possible can and share that with them. If that wasnt a given, why else would so many women who dont have the choice feel so damn guilty? I cant think of anything more empowering than caring for my own children and have them benefit from my education and life experience. My choice to be a SAHM was certainly not decided by my husband, it was decided by me and my husband supported that decision. As he would have if I decided to instead resume my career. Some decisions are more important than being a feminist decision and are a decision motivated by what is best for the family.
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That is all fair enough, but where I think the line becomes fuzzy is that the woman is most of the time assumed to take that step back from her career and her ambition ‘for the good of the family’. Feminism has it’s roots in women advocating for their right to participate in the public sphere. I’m not denying that in some circumstances it is a legitimate choice, but in a lot of cases it isn’t. Further, if the children are being left behind, where is the push for the fathers to pick up the slack? It just raises so many questions – why is the sahm/working mother debate exclusively relegated to women? If being a sahm is a financial decision – why is it that most of the time women are the ones earning less? It just doesn’t sit right with me
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Erin do you think it’s assumed the woman will do it in general? I am not commenting on society as a whole, just my own personal perspective – I had a great career as does my husband but I didn’t want to be at work all day and night while he gets to be with the kids. I think it’s a decision to be made by not only the woman but the man. I will always want to work but not to the same stress level as I did before kids.
Sometimes I feel sorry for my husband for not being able to be there and I think he feels the same. I look at it as he agreed to let me be there while he kept up with his career because we earned similar wages at the time.
He does now say that he could not be a stay at home dad but I think it’s because he wasn’t right from the start as I was and you grow with your kids.
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I think yours is a pretty unique and fortunate set of circumstances. The ‘I choose my choice’ argument to me just seems to be an answer and a justification for every single thing women do, and therefore doesn’t really provide much of an answer at all. Plus the ‘having it all’ argument really irks me – I don’t want to be living on a private yacht in the bahamas with ryan gosling – I just want the same work/life choices that men have had for centuries, and not just get a job and then come home and have to do all the housework on top of that. It’s really not that much to ask for
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My experience as a SAHM has been different than the picture you paint. When I made the choice the stop paid work and look after my children I had no idea of the opportunities that would open up to me. I have become involved with community organsiations, volunteer groups and school committees. I now work part-time from home, in a job that offers me great flexibility and for a company that knows my children are my priority.
When I was working, I went from home, to work and often home again. Sometimes we went out for dinner, or caught up with friends, but our lives were centred very much around us. By taking the time to dedicate my energies towards my children, I have found that I have developed different interests, and new skills, all of which were a factor in getting my job.
I do know that it is not like this for everyone, but I do feel empowered by my choices. I feel like I live my life on my terms, and that I could change my mind about those terms if I needed to. For me being a mum has turned out to be my calling – I love being with my kids, and taking all the time, energy and brain-power I used to dedicate to what was actually fairly meaningless stuff and directing that into my children, who are absolutely spectacular little people. I absolutely consider myself a feminist, and hope that I am showing my children what it means to be a strong, proud and capable (most of the time) woman who makes her own choices.
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I too have been a stay at home mom for longer than I care to realise. And I too, though I still consider myself a stay at home mom, was given new opportunities because of my children, and the life choices I made around them. Now I have worked part time in different countries, at different jobs, some self-employed, some for an employer. And I also am an active volunteer in various organisations, including my children’s schools.
I am glad I had the opportunity to be there for my children when they were little, and to still be there for them now they are getting older. And I am glad for the work choices (paid or unpaid) being a stay at home mom gave me.
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I have to disagree. I am yet to have children and am currently studying and working, but I know when the time comes for my husband and I to have kids I will CHOSE to be a stay at home mum. And I feel so lucky that I am able to CHOSE this.
Many women, whether they would like to or not simply cannot afford to stay at home with their children and have to return to work. That is not a choice. But I am lucky enough that my husband earns enough money for me to be able to have that choice. I feel so privileged by this because I know deep down if I did not have this choice I would forever regret not spending that time at home with my kids.
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Well said Emma!
However, as a SAHM when people tell me how lucky I am to be able to afford to stay at home I correct them. We’re not lucky at all, we just didnt get ourselves into so much debt before having kids that we actually had a choice. I think a lot of young couples make the material things and the debt to pay for it the priority.
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this kind of comment always gets me riled up. there are a billion different reasons people do what they do, end up with bigger mortgages and more financial duress than other people. surely the lesson in all of this debate is: JUST DON’T COMPARE. i bought in an expensive neighbourhood because i suffered terribly at school and i wanted better school options for my kids. i don’t regret it, even as i drop them off at vacation care etc. that’s just one “for instance”. not everybody with a big mortgage is an avaricious idiot.
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Sure Anonymous, we all make choices and live with those choices. But I too get riled up when I hear women complaining about the cost of childcare and that they ‘have to to work’ …when they have a house in a prestige suburb, European cars, annual overseas holiday and designer handbags. Its Yr8 Economics here, wants versus needs.
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YES! Thank you Chillax – glad someone else feels the same way as me. I can’t stand the “its ok for you – you’re lucky – i HAVE to work” comments i constantly get from people. I am certainly grateful and proud to be a SAHM but as for lucky – there was no luck involved. We have not won lotto or fallen arse-backwards into a big pile of cash. We have however worked VERY hard in the years before having our kids to pay down our mortgage as quickly as possible. We have scrimped and saved and made the choice to remain in our “starter home” rather than upgrade to a McMansion and put ourselves into further debt. We made a choice, set ourselves a goal and achieved it. Please don’t dismiss all our hard work and sacrifice by calling it “luck”.
End rant
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I agree to a certain extent, I’m not much for the word ‘lucky’ in general, most of what I’ve got is because I worked and was sensible with my money. But in some ways I am lucky because I was born in this generation where I was able to get a higher education, be paid the same as my male peers, get maternity leave and work after marriage.
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How come your husband doesn’t get the choice to stay at home?
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I am a SAHM. My husband had a choice to be a SAHD but I won.
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I am lucky enough to be a SAHM because both my partner and I are able to earn enough to save up enough money for me to stay at home and have a decent lifestyle. This is because of previous generations of feminists who fought for my right to get a higher education and stay in the workforce after I was married, therefore allowing my husband and I to get some financial stability before we had children. My choice to stay at home is not provided by my husband income but by the access I’ve had to higher paying and longer lasting employment.
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i am declaring this one of the best articles on being a SAHM i have ever read.
this totally explains how i feel. THANK-YOU!!
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Can we change the language please? Choosing to stay at home to raise children is a great choice BUT it is NOT a job, it’s a lifestyle choice. You don’t have to have children, you CHOOSE to have them and then CHOOSE to stay home with them.
I have a job because I have to have a job because I need money. If I didn’t HAVE to work, then I wouldn’t.
I’m all for people having children and staying home with them but it’s a choice they’re choosing, it’s not a job!
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Ohhh, boy. Sometimes it feels like a job. A 24 hour one.
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You could choose not to have a job. They are not mandatory neither is having money.
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Really Moose? Money isn’t mandatory? It is if you want to eat, have a roof over your head just to name two reasons why money is pretty mandatory but then I don’t believe in letting the Government fund my life, so actually YES money is mandatory for me.
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“You could choose not to have a job. They are not mandatory neither is having money.”
Well, there’s the whole *living* thing which kind of does make it mandatory …
VA:F [1.9.18_1163]
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You may not like the word “job” however as a SAHM I find the term “lifestyle choice” to be incredibly patronising.
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Why? Did you not CHOOSE to have children? If so, then it was a choice you made which you knew would change your lifestyle. It’s really not a difficult concept to grasp.
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The point of your post seemed to be that you didn’t like the language being used however I was arguing that the language you used was pretty offensive.
I have three children under five including a baby. I am sleep deprived. I spend approximately one hour a day cleaning up poo. I am definitely not doing this for the lifestyle. If I wanted a change in lifestyle I would have bought a caravan and a surfboard and moved to Byron Bay not elected to have children.
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Lol! Love your reply. So true.
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And yet by having children your lifestyle changed. I don’t know how you couldn’t think that having children was going to change your lifestyle?
And again, sorry that you’re sleep deprived but again 1. You chose to have children and 2. You chose to have them close together.
And I still don’t understand how the truth can be found to be offensive. Before you got together with your partner you were leading a single lifestyle, then you became attached and entered a coupledom lifestyle. Motherhood brings a new lifestyle. All choices, decisions you made.
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Tone – not language appears to be the problem here
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Of course I knew before I had children that my lifestyle would change once they came along. My husband and I decided that one of us would stay at home to look after our children were born not because of the lifestyle choice but because we believe that this is the best for our family and our chidren. I work very hard to give my kids the best start in life. I have worked in what you would call a “job” and I have been a stay at home parent and I can tell you that (while it is worth it a million times over) I have never had a role that is more demanding, difficult and exhausting. It is the reason that I get up in the morning (and at 2am and 5am) and in fact in fact my children’s survival is dependent on me getting out of bed. I don’t understand how I can’t call this a job? Is it because I don’t get paid? Because they are my kids and not someone else’s? Because you don’t believe that it is important enough?
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No it doesn’t sound glamorous being up to your elbows in poo!
But I have a genuine question… why, then, are you doing this? (i.e. having and raising children)
Because you said that ‘I am definitely not doing this for the lifestyle.’ It kind of reads like you were made to have kids, but that can’t be the case.
I’d appreciate reading your answer about it. I don’t have kids but plan to in the near future. Well maybe one child. Undetermined as yet.
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Some Other Person, I do this because I love my children more than I can begin to explain. I have no regrets about becoming a parent. My point was that it is bloody hard work.
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What you are living right now is a lifestyle. You chose to have kids. Therefore this is your chosen lifestyle. Someone who chooses to have a Byron Bay surfing lifestyle would choose to do that and not have three kids under five, and that would be their lifestyle.
Having kids means your lifestyle is generally adapted around them for yeaaars, so by choosing to have them you have chosen that lifestyle.
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Lifestyle choice? Are you seriously saying that being a mother who stays at home to look after her kids, as opposed to going to work, is a lifestyle choice?
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No. I’m saying having children in the first place is a lifestyle choice. No one forces you to have children, people decide to do that of their own free will.
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I think it is a lifestyle choice. I think working is a choice too. If one needs money and is required to go back to work, there is a choice to keep your life as it is and work or live off less and stay at home. My sister was a SAHM and lived off the government and always whinged how she had no money. She had plenty of money to go out and buy clothes though and no interest in working. Even after they started school she refused to get a job and spent her days drinking coffee. I worked 80 hour weeks. I choose to work now after having a child. It doesn’t give me much after child care but I choose to be in the workforce so I don’t lose my career. In many other countries without a safety net, people have no choice, work or starve. I think we are lucky to have social support in place for those most vulnerable and for others who are just lazy. Otherwise we couldn’t be having silly arguments about choice as we would be worried about starving Seriously, live your lives as you see fit, whatever choice that is!
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Ofcouse it is. How is it not? You have kids and don’t work then you choose the lifestyle of a stay at home mum. You have kids and work the you choose the lifestyle of a working mum. You chose not to have kids, then you choose a child free lifestyle.
Those are all choices that are going to decide how you spend your life, what you do with your time and what your priorities and responsibilities are going to be. How is that not a lifestyle choice?
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I’m assuming, then, that you work just enough so you can pay your bills and get some basic food on your low rental, government housing table. No? Then money, in the context that it was put forward by Anonymoose, really isn’t mandatory. We all make choices, but that doesn’t lessen their need.
You didn’t have to choose the home you live in, or the brand of clothing you buy or the steak dinner or your broadband connection or the magazine you bought last month or the car you drive – you chose those, and they all came with a price tag. That’s why we work, for a certain quality of life, right?
I chose to have children to enhance my life and, yes, that also came with a price tag.
Being a stay at home mum is a job. It’s usually underpaid and very often undervalued. It’s misunderstood and misinterpreted.
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Language! But of course it’s a job. It’s unpaid work. You have a job that’s paid, that’s your ‘lifestyle choice’. You chose that way to live too. It sounds to me like you resent anyone who doesn’t have to work for money. That’s fair enough. But let’s just agree on the definition of ‘work’ here – child rearing is ‘work’, that’s why child care and early childhood education is a profession. By your definition, it is a service and a skill when provided by others, but a lifestyle choice when done by a parent. No, it’s work in any case.
Your other gripe (you have to work for your money and others don’t) I don’t have a problem with. But your definition of childcare I do.
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Having a job that’s paid isn’t my “lifestyle choice” it’s what I need to do in order to put a roof over my head and food in my belly. I imagine that’s the reason why most people work, no?
Where have I mentioned that raising a child isn’t work? I haven’t because it is but it’s not a job, that’s my point.
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I agree with you. Staying home and raising my daughter isn’t a job, it is work but I wouldn’t define it as a ‘job’. I get paid to do a job and while I enjoy my job I wouldn’t do it or free. I gladly take care of my daughter, unpaid (why should anyone be paid to take care of their kids), because the intrinsic rewards are greater than money.
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Love this Kirsty and going to print it out for my teenage daughter. We have many different ‘titles’ or roles throughout our lives but we always remain a feminist. I want her to know that at all times she is strong, capable and FREE to make choices that suit her and her future family.
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That’s a great idea about printing it out for your daughter – will copy.
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At home is so much more fun then working. I have to clean the house either way.
In the last week ( all with my little girl) I have gone to beach, had three park n coffee dates, gone to movies, had a cooking day – which resulted in having a tea party with scones, played countless board games, created many works of art and wrote/ delivered letters to her friends.
When I was working( finished at Xmas) I would wake her up throw her in car and drop her at my mothers. Return to pick her up in time for tea. Feed / bath her hurriedly and play a game whilst doing a thousand other jobs, then fight with her over going to sleep.
My point is people who bag out stay at home mums are just jealous. I know I could do other stuff. But I’d rather spend it enjoying with my kids
Right now … My little girl is sleeping at the moment so I am watching the morning show, which has manpower on it at the moment..
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Were they a bit plastic or was it just me??
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I don’t bag out SAHMs, but I am certainly not jealous. My mother was a SAHM and she quite freely admits the mind-numbing boredness that comes hand-in-hand with it at times so I’m not silly enough to think that it’s all fun and games, all the time. Each to their own.
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I don’t know how anyone can get bored spending time with their kids. There are a million and one amazing thingd to do when you’re at home!
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Um…because changing nappies, preparing food, cleaning up after meals, doing washing etc are repetitive tasks. It’s not all rainbows and sunshine! Anybody with any intellect would find aspects of being a SAHM boring. Sure, there are fun, rewarding, interesting, loving, imaginative, inspirational, hilarious parts of the day but it’s not like this all day, every day. To suggest that it is and too belittle anyone who is honest about how it can sometimes be mundane and boring is a bit unfair!
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Well said…I simply have more to offer society than lying on a bed for 3 hours a day while my son sleeps on my chest. My brain turned to mush after a year of maternity leave. That was enough thanks. I love being at work, my husband respects we more and my son has a great time playing all day. Oh and the intelligent adult conversations!!!
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Good for you to take time to play with your girl. I wish I had allowed myself to do that more with my own children. In the end, this is the most important job we can have : as long as there is enough money to provide for basic needs, enjoying the time together is really what life is about!
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Great article! Feminism is about equality and being able to choose how you live your life!
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Excellent article! Your feminism is not the same as everyones else’s, it’s about choice.
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I don’t get the whole SAHM bashing. Being a mother is a job. A full time job, without weekends off.
If I was in a position to have kids, I would be a SAHM. That would be my choice.
Hmmmmmm can I be the SAHM of two cats? Does that work? No? Oh alright then …
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Ah Cupcake. I love you. And frankly, my cat also takes up a fair amount of my time, so I say yes, being a stay at home fur mum.
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I grew up with a stay at home mum who was (and is!) my own image of feminism. She decided she’d rather stay with her three kids and teach them at home than teach other people’s at a school. I don’t remember a lot of pie baking, but there was a LOT of reading, a lot of talking, and much watching of period dramas to make the ironing bearable. I’m in my early twenties now and could not be more proud of her.
The thing that infuriates me is how little things have changed. What scares so many people about women making their own choices?
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“I grew up with a stay at home mum who was (and is!) my own image of feminism. She decided she’d rather stay with her three kids and teach them at home than teach other people’s at a school.”
I’m in my early 40s & I also grew up with a SAH mother. What I learned from her experience was that there was no way in hell I’d ever want to do it. For a whole range of reasons – starting with the lack of financial independence and ending with the lack of adult company / mental stimulation. Some of this I picked up from observation, but others were said to me by her directly. I appreciate what she did for us, but jesus, there are pitfalls.
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Sure Lulu, there are pitfalls for many choices in life. Especially if the choice we make is one we’re not really suited to or happy with. I grew up with a mum who worked fulltime and she was always stressed and cranky and it made life for us at home rather unbearable. She has since told me she feels our whole family would have been far happier if she wasnt always working but she was too scared to give it a chance and was worried about what message she would be sending us. I told her the message she sent us was not to take on more than you can cope with because it makes for a horrible home life!
All we can do is be happy with what we choose and if not be able to make the necessary changes. We only get one life and I want to enjoy mine
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I love it. I’m feeling particularly violent towards a friend of hubby’s who EVERYTIME we see him says “But what do you do all day? Don’t you get bored?” I wish I had time to get bored.
I don’t see why we can’t just respect each other’s choices in life. I’m happy at home. It works for our family. You do what works for yours. Let’s leave it at that, hey?
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This question is ALWAYS asked of me too and a few times I have found the best option is to TELL them what I do:
5:00am Morning walk
6:00am Shower, make up and clothes. Husband leaves for work.
6:30am Child and baby wake
6:45am Coffee!
7:00am Breakfast for us all
7:30am Clean kitchen and do some washing or folding, vacuuming etc
9:00am Head to supermarket, post office etc. Plan dinner.
10:00am Baby has a bottle and goes to bed. Toddler watches TV. Mummy’s sanity time!
12:00pm Baby wakes. Lunch for everyone. Clean up afterwards.
1:00pm Some sort of activities. Either visiting friends, playing in sandpit, running in the backyard, swimming, going to the park etc. More housework!
4:00pm Arsenic hour begins! Baby has dinner.
5:00pm Bathtime and getting dressed for bed time.Baby needs LOTS of cuddles and patience during this time!
6:00pm Husband gets home from work. Child has dinner.
6:30pm Baby goes to bed. I cook dinner.
7:30pm Husband and I eat dinner.
How on earth could anyone possibly get bored doing that? Obviously this is just a rough idea of what I do. It changes everyday and I love that! That has not even factored in the numerous nappy changes and snacks that need to happen during each day! I feel blessed to be able to spend SO much time with my children. I really feel like my time at home is important. Ever since my husband and I decided that I would resign and make my “job” the house and the children I have absolutely relished it! I take a lot of pride in what I do, I feel an equal to my husband, the only difference is that his job earns us money and mine earns us a gorgeous space in which to live, delicious food to eat and wonderful children being raised with our morals and values. I feel just as important now as when I headed off to paid employment everyday
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I love the way you have described yours and your husbands roles – what each job earns etc. Brilliant and accurate!
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Amy I love you, let’s be BFFs. Your routine is similar to mine, except one less child. This week though, I’ve barely left the house as the little has decided solids aren’t for her so she’s permanently attached to my boob. Luckily, I live in a low traffic area.
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Ha ha
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Sounds like my day except from 8 – 4 I do the school run, work then school pick up………
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Brilliant
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I have found those comments usually come from people who are jealous but dont have the option to make such a choice. Or who have no idea
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I am an interim SAHM as I was made redundant at Xmas so am looking for a new job. I am bored out of my mind. we can afford for me to stay at home but I don’t want to as it means losing my career. So I choose to work, am not jealous of SAHM and I have lots of clues. Not phased in the slightest by others decisions. My mum was a SAHM mum and gave up her career. She took a job in admin the day her youngest started school. Having been divorced and left with nothing, she is about to retire with almost no super as someone who rents. No way will that happen to me. I want to be self sufficient. That is why I choose to work. I think anyone who bags someone else for decisions they make is just a bully. Do they have NOTHING else to do in life? Seriously who cares what other people think. Do what you need to, don’t you reckon?
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I was a SAHM for three years, and I still have no idea what I was meant to do all day. Pre-kids I already cleaned, cooked, shopped and did all those other errands whilst working a 80-100hr week and having a very active social life. Post kids I had 7 days a week to fit that that stuff in, whereas pre-kids I had to do 90% of the cleaning and cooking Saturday morning and deal with shopping and errands during lunch breaks. There was much more washing to do with the kids, but I have a washing machine so let’s be honest, basically I just had to push buttons more often and hang stuff on the line, which took up maybe 20 minutes a day. If anything things were easier because people’s expectations were drastically lowered. Pre-kids I dressed fantastically, post-kids people were giving me props for having washed hair. Pre-kids my house was immaculate, post-kids people just seemed pleasantly surprised the place wasn’t a scary hoarder nest. Pre-kids I cooked pretty damn fantastic meals if I do say so myself, post kids I’m pretty sure I could fed people cold tinned soup and they wouldn’t have complained.
I read a lot, I did a ton of online courses just for something to do, I joined clubs and made friends with people I didn’t really like that much just to fill up hours. Then there was the whole DIY house reno phase. I always wondered if I was skipping some crucial activities that keep other SAHM’s so busy, but the house was sparkling, the kids were busy with library/park visits and play-dates and the boring stuff (bills, grocery shopping etc.) was always taken care of. When I went back to work it took me a while to get used to the pace.
I can’t help but roll my eyes when mums describe what they do and it includes things like pay bills and go to the supermarket. Did you not do that when you worked? Do you think working parents don’t have to pay their bills and buy food? And why do you act like paying bills is such a chore when I know for a fact you have everything direct debited?
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I like (and admire!) your honesty
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I was just thinking the same thing when I read the SAHM routine – my kids are older, I work full time but I’m lucky enough to finish early and be home in the afternoons most days. I do all that and work as well. I just had 5 weeks off with the kids during school holidays and really the only thing that changed it that I went to the beach for 8 hours in stead of work. I’m not dissing SAHM ( I hate that acronym anyway) but I have to grocery shop, cook dinner, make lunches, pay bills- the only difference is i just pop along to my paid employment for 8 hours a day……
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And I’d say you are lucky to have a job that allows you to take 5 weeks off in the summer… Most working people in the states only have 2 weeks a year.
And when you say you work full time and have your afternoons off, how do you manage that? Do you start very early? Or do you work from home and finish working in the evening?
I’m really happy for you that you found a job that allows you to enjoy both aspects of your life as a mother. However, it doesn’t work for a lot of expat moms, as their husbands often travel abroad. It then would become very difficult for them to arrange for child care and deal with all those things while working full time. Though I know some who made that choice, are happy with it, and manage to live that life, it also means that they had to find someone else to do the job the stay at home mom does (prepare the kids in the morning, be there to pick them up at the end of their school day, be there when they are sick and so on). Again, it is a choice each of us makes, none being better than the other, they’re just different!
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believe me Coconut I know I’m lucky! I’m a director of a preschool, and the hours allow me to be there most afternoons for my kids. I also do some work in the evenings and stay late when my husband can pick the kids up. I’ve been a SAHM and I’ve done the manic management role but now I have a great balance. I really don’t think any of should have to feel that we need to justify our choices to anyone, but in my personal experience (especially at my kids school where the line of working mums and stay at homers shall never be crossed lol!) either side gets narky with the other- we all whinge about how much we have to do! But I would just like the SAHM at my kids school to think before they come up with comments like “Fancy seeing you here” “Oh that’s right, now I know why you never help with (insert reading, canteen, school banking)” and the best one of all that was said to me “It’s a shame that you spend your day looking after other people’s children but can’t be there for your own” – That was a stab in the heart!
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@Mrs M – if you’d like to hire me to dropkick the person who made that last comment to you, just let me know. Mates rates = free of charge in The Land of Beans.
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I love you. Spot on.
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I want to say good for you! However, I have also two other things that pop to mind :
1) before kids, what exactly did your husband do? From what you write, it looks like you’re the one who did all the cleaning, cooking, grocery shopping, and bill paying. This post was about feminism. It looks like your idea of it was to choose to do all the work that was expected of a woman a century ago, while also doing more than was expected of a man in the same era (after all, no one is expected to work (as a paid work) for 100 hours a week, that is a life choice).
2) You might be right on a lot of things regarding the SAHM’s job, though I would say laundry takes up more than 20 minutes a day for me (well, we ARE 6 of us, and aside from sorting, loading, pushing the buttons, drying, there is also folding, ironing, putting away…). However, comparing my lot to that of my grandmother, I’m oh so grateful for progress and washing machines!
I also want to say good for you for reading and taking online courses, it means you actually spent some time thinking and working your brain, which always makes us better persons, now and later in life. And that is something we can then hopefully pass on to our children. That is probably not something you could have done working 100 hours a week, I’ll grant you that. You were also probably able to use those skills when trying to return to work.
However, when you wonder what do moms do with all this time… Well, some of us do all the non paying jobs required to make your kids’ school not only good but great. Or volunteer in hospitals to help sick children (whose parents have to work to afford the medical bills) survive a very stressful time. Or simply welcome other uprooted families, so that they feel less alone and are able to settle and function faster in their new environment. The possibiities are endless!
You said that you stayed at home only 3 years. I might be wrong, but I’ll assume that you went back to work when your oldest wasn’t quite in school yet…
Those of us who stay longer in that job also take time to help our kids with homework (if you work 100 hours a week, do you really have time to do it? or is it the nanny’s/tutor’s job?). We also take time to teach our kids values, including the value of spending time together.
So would it be wrong to wonder if you were a stay at home mother, or just a working person who stayed at home for a while and also happened to be a mother… Not that there is anything wrong with that, again, it is a matter of choice!
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Not even sure where to start with this. You’ve made an awful lot of assumptions.
I’ve always done the cleaning, cooking and shopping because I’m extremely picky about the how the former get’s done and very much enjoy doing the latter. The fact that my partner and I live in a house I owned for a decade before we met probably contributes to my attitude about the cleaning. My partner takes care of our finances, which due to our investments is pretty much a second full-time job and if he didn’t do it I’d have to pay someone a small fortune just to deal with my half. I take care of my personal errands, my partner takes care of his, we both take care of anything relating to the kids.
Maybe I didn’t make it clear, but the washing in it’s entirety took me 20 minutes a day. I can fold like a demon. The courses I took were just to keep me from losing my mind. None have any relevance to my occupation or any other career I might want to pursue, they were just a bit of fun that filled in the hours. My former employer gave me my old job back when I wanted to return to work, so I was never in the position of looking for work and I never thought I would be.
I’ve volunteered for the past 30 years. Two days a month I work with a nonprofit, I’m involved in a few mentoring programs and each year my partner and I take turns volunteering for 3-4 weeks at an orphanage we support in India (we usually take 1-2 of the kids with us). That continued when I was at home. I’ve never volunteered at any of my children’s schools because they don’t need help, all the usual volunteer jobs are paid positions. My partner does the lighting for school plays, concerts etc. but that’s a passion of his. He just appreciates the opportunity to show off and doesn’t consider it volunteering.
During the 3 years I was at home we had five children living with us, my two bio kids and 3 of my step-kids (I have 5 step-kids, all of whom once lived with us full-time, all of whom have now left home). My partner and I always found time to help the older kids with their homework when we both worked, I’m sure we’ll manage when the little ones are old enough to have homework. My partner had a part-time nanny before we met, once we combined forces we didn’t need one. Before the older kids went off to uni they took turns babysitting maybe 8-10 hours a week while we were working and/or having a date night, these days we hire a babysitter (a neighbour) once or twice a week. A few times a year we have a weekend away and my brother takes the kids, we do the same for him. We take advantage of in office daycare and now that we both work we have a rotating schedule. I’ll go in to work super early one day and leave early while my partner goes into work late and leaves late. Neither of us are big sleepers so we have no trouble making time to spend together with the kids.
I also teach my children values, and that’s not something you have to be around 24/7 to do. Thinking back to when I was a kid, some of the people who had the biggest impact on me were relatives I saw a few times a year and teachers whose classes I only had for a few months, so in my opinion it’s about quality not quantity. I spend plenty of time with my kids, and the fact my partner and I have a fantastic relationship with the older kids tells me what we’re doing is working for us.
I’m not sure what you’re getting at in your last paragraph. How long do you have to not work before you can say you were a stay at home mum? I would have thought 3 years was more than sufficient.
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Everyone is different I guess. Some like to spend their time at home busy busy busy with every day planned and scheduled. Some of us like to stop and smell the roses and enjoy down time with our kids.
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I like to do that to. But I’m generally awake at least 20 hours a day, and the older kids were at school, doing afterschool activities and hanging out with friends for a huge chunk of that, and being teenagers they also liked having some alone time. The little ones favourite activity was sleep, so I had an awful lot of time each day when all my kids were otherwise engaged and I had nothing to do.
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You really only sleep 4 hours every night??
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Often less. My partner is the same. Just about everyone I work with is the same. It’s not uncommon, and I’ve been like that since I was 15-16, so it’s nothing to do with my kids or my job, it’s just the way I’m built. I wake up feeling sluggish and dopey if I sleep more than 6 hours.
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I actually think alot of the women who stay at home and are smug about it are usually the ones that find it too stressful to do more than one thing at a time.
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Well Olive, it could also be as simple as some people just couldnt possibly cope handing their children over to someone else 40 hours a week while they return to work. And they are sick of defending their choice and being belittled for it by others whose choices are different.
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Ha! Thanks for being SO predictable! I knew someone would have to make a big point of trying to belittle (this mere snapshot of) my life and make theirs sound SO much busier and more important!
Luckily I am truly happy with my life and our choices so I won’t lose any sleep over that.
Just for clarification though I was responding to the notion that staying at home with kids is “boring” NOT “difficult”. Read that again if you need to. There is a big difference.
Also I assume that you are being sarcastic towards my comment in regards to the paying of bills? Assumptions are always risky. I don’t go the the Post Office daily to pay bills sweetheart, I go to, you know, collect MAIL. If you figure out a way to get that direct debited you be sure to let me know won’t you?
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Most people get mail delivered to their home – you guessed it – daily.
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I know!!! What are all these ‘errands’? I pay all my bills in one go, once a month upon arriving at work…takes 5 mins. Honestly can’t think of others…..oh wait that phone call to the plumber, another minute of my day gone.
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Yet another incorrect assumption Eliza. In the country mail is delivered a few times per week. Since we have a business, and therefore a post office box, it requires collecting, daily. It is always nice to have the facts before one comments
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Great post, Kirsty! Very succinct. For me, feminism is all about choice and equality – having a choice and making the right one; being on an equal footing with my partner, my male colleagues at work, my friends. While I’m not the bra-burning type, I am thankful for those that did so in the ’70s to lead the way.
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