<p>JHS, while it’s true none of my Harvard friends (or even my real life friends) are SAHMs, quite a few stayed home, worked part time, or shared jobs while their kids were small. I stayed home for a year and half with the first. (Which included 6 months paid leave in Germany, and moving to the US and finding a buying a house, and studying for the architecture registration exam in my downtime.) I then worked half time for about six years before setting up my own architectural practice. It was very, very parttime at first, but has slowly grown as the kids have gotten older. Pizzagirl’s point about flexibility being important is a good one. It’s a huge benefit if one parent can make their own hours and if their hours don’t have to be the same as the spouse. I often have to meet clients evenings or weekends, but I could nearly always count on my husband to be around. I could visit job sites during school hours and be home or volunteer at school basically anytime I wanted to.</p>
<p>When my kids were in elementary school I knew many Moms (and a few Dads) who were at home a lot, though many of them were keeping their foot in the door in their professions. They all work full time now. I miss them, we can’t get together nearly as much as we did back then.</p>
<p>It’s interesting that zoosermom’s area had so many more SAHM’s. I wouldn’t have thought the demographics of where I live and where I believe she lives were that different. :)</p>