Stay at home mums

[Astrid]

I keep on wanting to post in this thread, but don't get a chance to. I know if I was at work I would be able to easily

I swing between wanting to be a SAHM and a working mum. I see the benefits of both, but at the moment I am leaning towards SAHM. Whilst it does mean less money, it means a lot of flexibility. It is nice to know only one of us is tied down to work hours, if we need a long weekend, only DH has to organise the day off as I am always available. No stressing about missed work and who takes the day off for sickness and school holidays. We are looking at being semi self sufficient, well that takes time, some one has to tend gardens, preserve fruit etc. I think it is better done with time on one's side, rather than rushed on the weekends when we are trying to do so much else or just rest.

I grew up letting myself in the house from the age of 7. It really was not much fun, it was pretty lonely. I rarely got encouragement or help to do homework, which was one of my problems with school, trouble finishing assignments and studing for tests. I envied the kids who came home to a drink and biscuits. I came home to nothing. My mother would come home tired and yelling as I had not done the washing up (silly thing was she never once asked me to wash up ). I do not want to do that to my girls. I know I get stressed easily, I would hate to see me after a full week of work and kids.

Agree with Trillian on the country/city thing. I have just moved from Melb to a major regional area with a large farming community. There does not seem to be the pressure/expection of returing to work. It seems many mums do some part-time work, full time seems rare, even amongst those which kids who are almost adults. No-one is shocked by me not working at the moment.

[fionas]

Yep, I agree there's pros and cons to everything. My mum didn't work at all after she had her first baby - so she hasn't worked at all since she was 24 and is now 67.

While it was nice to have someone there when we came home, my abiding memory of my mum is of her staring into space and having zero to talk about apart from who she saw at the supermarket.

I don't think that was good for her or good for us.

That's obviously an extreme example and a balance needs to be struck.

[BekZ]

oh thankyou ladies for this discussion. In the last few months I have been fighting with my inner thoughts regarding going back to work or staying at home. I am a SAHM who had a busy stressful job prior to having DD1. I never ever want to go back to that type of job/situation. Although I do find myself wondering if I am going to be left behind by my friends who are re-entering the workforce. Most of which have school age kids now.

With DD 1 I had 8 friends pregnant at the same time. All were having their last baby and me my first. Most are getting ready to go back to work and I am thinking of another baby. But will I be lonely, will I be the only one that does not get out of her pj's because she is too tired? Will I be the only one who can't meet for coffee and a movie? All these questions seem trivial but they do cross my mind.

With Loren I was the only one to go through a pregnancy and I am the only one with a little baby and yes I am lonely but I love my little family and I really want just one more baby to complete us. How can I combat these feelings of being left behind and loneliness.

[Hollybolly]

I'm as close as I can get to being a SAHM and still working.. so I am as lucky as can be I guess!

I teach piano from home - work for myself - and work in the afternoons from 3pm - 6.30pm Mon to Fri. (And 3 mornings a week I go to some elderly peoples houses when Luke is at school)

I was lucky that I started back with students when Luke was 4 months old... he had a bouncer and a bassinett next to me, next to the piano

Everyone says I have the dream job, but there are pros and cons to everything

My dream job is to be a SAHM where I'm not teaching... not because I don't love it, but because the hours are really the worst possible ones for raising a 10yr old!!!

Between 3 and 6.30pm is when soccer training happens, homework, baths, dinner, guitar lessons, etc etc - I may be here, but I'm absolutely no help to him - I'm downstairs and concentrating on other kids (ironic really!!!)

I love teaching, and I love the kids (well most of them ) - but I have started to drop a few because as Luke is getting older, I feel he needs my attention more - homework is harder, and I hate relying on other mums to pick him up and drop him off at training etc.

Last term was a real eye opener for me... I was working solidly from 3 til 7pm during the week, and Luke got chosen to be in a special training program for soccer that is coached by members of the Mariners soccer team (The A league team for the Central Coast for those non football fans )

It was a brilliant opportunity for him, but since opening our business in April, & DH going back to working nights, I no longer had him to take Luke where he needed to be.
The place where they train is about 25mins away, so for Luke to have the opportunity, I had to drop a few kids, move a few kids and take Wednesdays off.

I didn't hesitate to do it, but I tell you it was very strange for a while.. I'm not sure if it was guilt or what, but it felt 'wrong' to not be working at 4pm on a Wednesday afternoon after always doing so!!!

It felt like other people were judging me - crazy, but I guess you slip into a way of thinking after doing the same thing for such a long time IYKWIM????

I love my Wednesdays - and DH & I have already made the decision that when I finally fall pg from any future IVF cycles, I will be a SAHM once I have more than one... its always been my dream to have lots of little ones to look after - and I really should have been born decades before I was - the idea of keeping house, cooking everynight (& baking), running kids around & being the SAHM sounds perfect to me!!

My SIL is a SAHM to a 3yr old & a 1yr old... and has been DYING to get back to work since giving birth to her first... BIL wanted her to stay at home as DH & BIL grew up with 2 parents that ran a restaurant & were basically at work 24/7.
She's starting back a few days next week after months & months of negotiation with her DH.

SIL thinks my situation is perfect - I think hers is

Who can say???!!!!!!!

[~clover~]

BekZ - I know what you mean. When I was having DD1 NONE of my friends had kids. They didn't realise after I had her that I couldn't just drop everything & do what ever they were doing. There was only one friend that really got to me though. She insisted every night that we go visit them, but never came to see us, yet we had the new baby & they didn't.
I now have 3 kids while all my friends only have one. I don't have any social life out side of the house, but I'm loving my babies too much right now to care. If I'm having a hard time I go visit my SIL, or ask her to come over - she is more than happy to come here, coz I have 3 & she only has 1!
I've lived in this town for 7 months & have only been out once when DS was 5 weeks for a few hours. Without any kids & to the pub.
I am happy this way. I have felt left out & that its not fair that everyone else can get drunk & carry on when I hadn't had a dring for months - while pg, but it does end. They do get bigger! Freedom can be yours again.

Fionas - My mum was a bit like that. She did go between work & SAHM, but for some reason had no friends. It was her choice though. Dad's friends wives used to come around when they did & they'd talk, but mum was never really friends with them. Never really went to their place, even when we all did. I don't know why, but I wouldn't be able to stand it. I need people around.

Astrid - I was the same. Only I was 11 when I had to get my DB & sister up & off to school. We went to a babysitter after school, but the next year we were doing corrospondance & I was with my sister all day everyday on my own. She's 6 years younger than me. I often had my brother too. 2 years younger than me.
I wish my mum was there then. I often had them alone through high school coz baby sitters wouldn't show up, or something. I think mum gave up on them coz I was usually the only one she could guarantee home every arvo.
When I was in year 11, my sister was 10 & my brother 14, they used to be home alone from after school til around 6.30.
I think it's too much for a child that age to be reponsible for themselves, let alone anyone else.

[smiles4u]

FIONAS ... Yeh, my Mum too was similar ... though sadly for us those moments turned into frustration which she often took out on us ... My Mum dreamt of a career but fell pregnant at 17 ... & was a SAHM since (even though all of us children left home years ago). She is now 68.

I think how wonderful young Mum's today are given opportunities to do courses, etc for their choosing ... so different to my Mum's days in the late 50's/early 60's when there wasn't 'single parents' pensions ... my Mum was forced for financial reason to marry my Dad. It was just how it was back then.

And yep, they are still together after all these years. Dad never stopped loving her but Mum has never felt that way about Dad yet stayed for security reasons ... I think she was just scared to be on her own

She still talks about her dreams ...

[sirenz]

i don't like to leave my ds with even my parents, I couldn't imagine having to leave him at daycare everyday. Unfortunately there are ppl who don't have the option and have to go back to work, but dh and I are in a financial position where I don't have to work!

I love spending time with ds, although challenging at times, I couldn't imagine it any other way.

[Glamourcide]

I'm really lucky that DH and I are in the position to have options, and that he agrees with my personal beliefs and values on parenting. One of the biggest ones is that kids need their parents, especially in the first few years of their life, so even before we fell pregnant with DD it was just never even a question of whether I would stay at home or go back to work.
Our plan, such as it was, was pretty much 'knock out the two kids before we're 25, career/mortgage/debt/travel will still be there when we're done taking time off work to have babies', and it's worked great for us. We were renting, which allowed us a fair bit of flexibility (ie much cheaper than mortgage repayments, and we could always get a cheaper place if we got really desperate), had no loans to pay off, basically it just made a lot more financial sense for one of us to be a stay-at-home parent - we worked on the basis that, seeing as neither DH nor I have any awesome qualifications or work history (I've only ever worked part-time stuff in retail and hospitality, DH never even finished high school and just worked manual labouring or lowly office jobs), the cost of day care etc would put us worse off on two incomes than if we were to live on just one, kwim? My entire weekly wage would go on daycare fees and things like nappies etc, whereas right now my parenting payments cover most of DD's stuff, her one day a week at daycare (instead of five) is subsidised (which means I can actually afford to send her), and I have the added benefit of being there to see her reach those milestones and just be her mummy full-time.

I'm using the time as a SAHM to do what I probably wouldn't have had the opportunity to do if I'd put off having kids - I'm just waiting until this new baby is born and we're in a routine, then I'm enrolling in TAFE courses in order to get qualifications that I need so I can get a job that I truly want to be in when the time comes to go back to work (whether part-time or full-time, we haven't decided which or when). I figure I have the best of both worlds - I achieved my goal of becoming a mum before I hit 25, and the bills are looked after while I do my studies, rather than turning my life upside down and having to budget every last cent in order to have kids because I've already got a career on track and then have to interrupt it, kwim? I'll be brutally honest - I'm one of those people who just hates to work, unless it's something I have an interest in. I could have become a secretary or continued working in retail and hospitality... but it's a pretty miserable existence when you're only going to work because you *need* the money or because you never had the opportunity to get into the field you truly have a passion for. DH agrees - he hates work, too, and despises the job he's in, but he knows one of us has to provide for the family and while he can earn over $20 and hour doing manual labour, and I can only hope for $16-$18 an hour working retail, it just makes sense for him to be the breadwinner. He's also doing TAFE courses to try and get more qualifications, so thankfully there is hope for him It's just that he's more restricted as he has to do night courses as he's at work all day.
So, that's another thing that works for me - yes, while being a young SAHM can sometimes be quite lonely (and, dare I say it, boring!), I'm lucky in that I don't feel any particular need or want to go back to work. I hear a lot of mums say, 'Oh God, I can't WAIT until Jaxon is old enough for kindy, I'm going out of my MIND not being around other grown-ups!' etc, and I just can't get my head around it! I just never had those great relationships with colleagues, and I never gained much satisfaction from working - more just a means to an end ($), so I don't feel that pressure to have that part of 'myself' back. If anything I'm much happier being in my pj's at 3pm and watching DD sit on her potty than I ever was at work!


As far as being applauded or looked down on by other people... well, I have to say that the majority of the time I feel like I'm looked down on for being lucky enough to stay at home with my babies.
Some people, I think, are resentful because they need the money so badly that they have to go back to work, others see a woman in her early 20's staying at home and instantly think, 'Lazy baby-bonus grabber', a lot more just think that I have it soooo easy because I'm not going to an office every day and getting b!tched at by my boss. A lot of the time I'm made to feel like my 'job' (and I feel that it is a job) isn't worthy, somehow, or that unless I'm a slave to my employer, I must not 'have it hard' the way *they* do. It's understandable when it's coming from people who don't have kids, as I know I never truly understood the trials of running a household and looking after kids until I had them (and DH to this day doesn't, because he's only home on weekends when I take the chance to do extra work around the place because DD is supervised by him), but I feel like I *really* cop it from working mums - again, whether that's resentment/jealousy because I have an option they don't, or that they feel I've got the easy end of the deal (and fair enough, they go to work and THEN come home to run a household, yikes!)... either way, it can be quite hurtful and isolating at times.

I don't think there's a 'right' or 'wrong' way to do things when it comes to SAH vs working parent... I just hate that SAHMs constantly feel derided, and have to justify themselves to others. Working parents, I have no doubt, suffer 'mummy guilt' and probably feel vilified by other people for 'dumping their kids' in daycare in order to chase the money. It's so hard no matter which way you look at it.
I'm just thankful that I have the options that I do, the opportunities that I do, the support from my family to follow my heart and my gut and do things the way I intended to since childhood - well before I understood anything about debt, career opportunities and life in general!

[rubibaby]

i absolutely love being at home with both my boys. i would not have it any other way. i would hate to miss out any stages of their development. it would truly devastate me if someone else got to hear their first word or see their first step and then tell that is what i had missed today because i'd gone to work.