Are stay-at-home-moms too dumb to know why they are staying home?

Parent Cafe
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<p>This is still a “woman’s issue” because, despite all the progress that has been made, raising children still is considered primarily the mother’s responsibility. IP, if you’ll even notice your own language, you still talk about the father “helping.” That puts the onus right back on the mother: the mother “does,” the father “helps.”</p>

<p>Ever notice the kudos that are heaped on single fathers raising their children, particularly daughters, alone? Yet they are the exception rather than the rule. There are fewer kudos for single mothers who, to paraphrase a line from Ginger Rogers, do everything fathers do except backwards and in heels. Fathers who ask for time off from work to attend school events are considered terrific fathers; mothers are considered lousy employees. </p>

<p>And yes, I have been and continue to be in the workforce. I am not a SAHM, my home is not beautiful, we didn’t travel, we drive older cars. We could not afford for me to stay at home (and frankly, I’m one of the women who probably would not have been a fabulous SAHM since I’m missing the domesticity gene). But I still see the double standard every single day, even at my more flexible workplace.</p>

<p>Even those of us who stay in the workforce make compromises. I left a high-powered, high-stressed job requiring 80-100 hours per week for a less stressful job with flex hours that required only the occasional overtime. And my salary suffered.</p>

<p>I have also seen what “part-time” means for professional women - generally, it’s part-time pay with full-time hours since if you’re a professional, you work until the job gets done. Much of those other hours are done at home. (Remember not too long ago, a NY law firm touted the “part-time partnership track” requiring “only” 5 days a week, 8:30-5:30?)</p>

<p>Our culture has not yet progressed to the point at which parenting is presumed to be a split responsibility. In many families, such as mine, it is. But if the father refuses to carry his burden, it falls back by default on the mother. And she is expected to carry it fully, and without complaint or fanfare.</p>

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<p>and frankly, I’m one of the women who probably would not have been a fabulous SAHM since I’m missing the domesticity gene)</p>

<p>Oh me too.
However my Hs schedule ( swing shift & often forced overtime), made me being the go-to parent mandatory, since " we didn’t have household or other help".
Not that I didn’t love my kids, but with all our challenges ( regarding needs of the family) we couldn’t have functioned even as half-a$$ed as we did, if there wasn’t one person backstage.</p>

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Oh now I see where I went wrong. I should have married IP, so that my life could be planned down to the T. And here was me, thinking I actually planned to stay home with my kids. I guess I’m just to dumb to know that I’m too dumb to know why I really stayed home.</p>

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<p>That makes me wonder, IP, was your marriage a planned/arranged marriage? Not meaning to pry- but rather that this would help to understand your perspective.</p>

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<p>Actually, I think this is less true now than in some previous generations.</p>

<p>Families are increasingly mobile. Grandparents may live in another state or even another country.</p>

<p>And many people, particularly those with high levels of education, are choosing to have their children later in life. This means that the grandparents are older when the children are born and probably less capable of helping out with childcare. </p>

<p>I’m only 56, but I already have a bad knee and cannot run. I could not safely supervise a toddler except in a childproofed indoor environment. I could not safely supervise more than one young child in any environment. Who knows what kind of shape I will be in by the time my children have children of their own – which is not likely to be for another five to ten years, at least.</p>

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<p>I know quite a few grandparents who help with child care. My neighbor has her own preschool and does that in the mornings and then cares for her two grandchildren, ages 4 and 1, from 12:30 to 6:30 every day and full-time in the summer. And the parents don’t pay her anything! She even provides all the diapers and food for the little ones. And she does an amazing job with them. It’s like having private preschool with Grnadma!</p>

<p>I also know two grandmas who work but do grandchild care one day a week, another in my neighborhood who does full-time care, and have a friend who does three full days a week. That seems like a lot of grandmas doing child care just in my little circle.</p>

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<p>marian-
Am confused-- I think you are saying that the extended family are LESS likely to live nearby, which is what was initially said. Also agree that many of us are older parents, and not only would our parents be older when we had kids, but as you say, we will be old grandparents too. I have many friends who have been grandparents for many years. My kids arent even married yet.</p>

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<p>Even my sister who married when she was 19 & promptly had 5 kids, is still waiting for grandchildren. ( of course since she is LDS, she would like them to be married first) ;)</p>

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<p>My husband and I have always been 50/50 in terms of parent involvement, but we both have demanding jobs. In particular, he is a physician who is on-call, who has to rush out in the middle of the night, who could not have just interrupted a surgery or delivery to pick up children at childcare at X hour. Therefore, we started out with a live-in nanny as our approach and have had the same one since our twins were a year old. (Her role has morphed to housekeeper as they’ve gotten older.) Having said that, we have been INCREDIBLY fortunate that we had the means to have that type of help, and we’ve been fortunate that we’ve had the same person from the very beginning. I recognize that is very unusual.</p>

<p>As for your “answering the cell phone” scenario, IP, that still normally fell to me, since women delivering babies aren’t usually sympathetic to their obstetricians taking personal phone calls :-). I’m also the one who felt guilt, and made extra effort to be room mom, Brownie leader, etc. that my husband didn’t feel.</p>

<p>I was cared for as a child by my grandmother when my mother worked for a few years, and I was the apple of her eye. But I don’t know that grandparent-care is always the best. My husband’s parents wouldn’t have had the temperament to care for small children, and my mother would have spoiled them too much (which is her absolute right as a grandparent, but it would have been harder if she’d been their primary caregiver).</p>

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<p>I agree that fathers do little in this country to raise their kids. But that is easily fixable. Mothers should demand that their spouses pitch in equally. However, it seems that some mothers here are saying that they don’t want that either. They truly want to be the one to raise their kids. In that case, they can’t complain about anything, really, as they are making a choice and refusing alternatives. I can’t complain that my body hurts after a workout session. I didn’t have to have such a session in the first place.</p>

<p>If you have certain needs that you must fulfill to become happy, like having many kids and being at home to raise them, then you can’t ask employers to be flexible and care about such needs. You and you only are responsible for your happiness.</p>

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<p>PG, My wife has a clear set of expectations from me. I have to be able to do certain things, and if my job prevents me from doing it, I need to find another job. I have similar expectations from her. It’s a matter of prioritizing.</p>

<p>What really helps the two of us is that we have absolutely no guilt from societal expectations. We do what we feel is right and that’s that. I have no idea what a brownie leader is and neither does she.</p>

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If you are referring to me, please get it right. I made it very clear that there was no equality in our situation. In fact, I used the word “exclude.”</p>

<p>And, yes, many women actually want to raise their own kids. What a concept!</p>

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No. Spouses are responsible for each other and making sure that their choices aren’t made at the expense of the other. And parents are responsible for the happiness of their children.</p>

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<p>I don’t think you are understanding. My husband is an obstetrician. His job means that he might be called out in the middle of the night and be gone for hours, or run from the dinner table to an emergency CS, or whatever. Therefore, he could not be counted on to be at daycare at 6 pm to pick up the children, or whatever. Not because he’s not reliable, not because he’s uninvolved, but that’s what an obstetrician is.|</p>

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<p>Are you familiar with Boy Scouts or Girl Scouts? A Brownie is simply a younger level of Girl Scouts, so it’s just being a Girl Scout leader, essentially.</p>

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<p>I and I alone am responsible for my happiness but I am not the only one who benefits from my well being. Nor am I the only one who benefits when my children and elderly parents are well cared for. Many people benefit from my work, not least of all my employer.</p>

<p>Other countries have wised up to the fact that well cared for infants and toddlers are better prepared for school and, eventually, for being workers and contributing to the betterment of the country. And knowing their child is well cared for increases worker productivity.</p>

<p>Some countries have even wised up to the fact that workers continually stressed out about caring for elderly parents will perform better when their minds can be at ease about their parents care. </p>

<p>In this country, we basically continue to treat each newborn as the first one born to a worker and each elderly parents as the first one whose care has fallen to a worker. That’s a system that does not work for the majority of people.</p>

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<p>How frequently do people have triplets? How frequently does a spouse become gravely ill? Let’s not argue by exceptions here. I would move if there were not good job opportunities in my area. I did so when I was in my early 20s and came to the USA.</p>

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<p>The nanny. The grandparents. The summer camps. Us, on vacation. Now he routinely goes to camp, so it is not an issue any more. We pretty much had the same nanny who now has more of a housekeeper role.</p>

<p>Any other questions? Oh, the marriage was not arranged.</p>

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<p>PG, I have changed jobs when I couldn’t meet my wife’s criteria. Marriage is very important to me. I have no idea what Boy/Girl Scouts are, but there has been no requirement on us to do anything like that.</p>

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<p>Kate, What’s your suggested solution? Just for the record, I believe in Universal Health Care and free childcare from birth. I would vote for any politician who wants to do the same.</p>

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Is your family involved in any community or social groups? PTA?</p>

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<p>No. I also don’t think there is a PTA in my son’s school.</p>

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<p>Sure you can. If the job market is such that employers can’t hire enough competent employees because a lot of them are mothers who will only work if they are offered flexibility, then it becomes the employer’s problem. No?</p>

<p>To give you an example, the majority of students majoring in accounting these days are women. Women, who by the way, get married and have kids and then have zero interest in working 60+ a week. So, they quit. Then the big accounting firms can’t keep their senior positions staffed with good employees. So they end up having no choice but to be flexible. It’s called supply and demand. Considering that the majority of college graduates in the US are now women, I would say most employers have little choice but to be accommodating in certain fields. Though I’m sure this recession has given the employers a little bit of an upper-hand for the moment.</p>

<p>Four years ago I went back to work in a high demand area. Even though I was out of work for 10 plus years, I was hired into a senior position. Two years ago, I decided I wasn’t willing to work full-time (my entire salary goes into savings, we have always lived off hubby’s). I told my employer that if they didn’t let me go part-time (3 days a week) I would quit. They willingly agreed with no fuss. AND I really don’t work more than 3 days a week though I do occasionally go in for a meeting that can only be scheduled on my days off. They knew that I was more valuable to them part-time than someone else with less experience would be full-time.</p>