Am I just not cut out to be a mom?

MrsTinks

pepsicola wrote: »

its an au pair you are talking about employing someone whose main experience is having little brothers or sisters and they dont need qualifications for you or anyone else to check. if you want a nanny with relevant qualifications then you need to pay for one and not expect a kid who gets pocket money of 50 odd quid for working 25 hours to be responsible for your baby. perhaps harsh but you go on to say how expensive schooling will be and yet you are prepared to scrimp on these early years when you can apparently afford better.

if you think this should be discussed on another thread like home education then im quite happy to having seen my young neice exploited by a family who wanted to pay au pair rates but have a moorland nursery nurse instead.

Actually if you searched my other posts you'd find I have said I would "Happily pay double that to get someone that fitted in and suited our family"... I posted here in relation to the OPs position. The figures posted on all the sites are the "recommended minimum" I believe? That doesn't mean it's what I would end up paying someone.
I think it's still a viable option for someone like the OP. But ultimately HER and her husbands choice.
Yes I can afford better as things stand - bully for me - do you really think I'd "scrimp"??? Just because your niece had an unfortunate experience does not mean that if I had an aupair they too would have. In my previous posts on other threads I have also stated that I would provide a vehicle for the au pair although not for transporting my child/children - purely for the Au Pairs personal use - other people can't afford to do that and I respect that! I know that although I have debt I am very fortunate in the fact we have good incomes.

This thread is about choices - I'm just pointing out that this is A possible choice - it might not suit everyone. If we can't find an Au Pair that I would feel happy leaving a young child with then either because they are not adequately trained etc or because they don't "feel right" then do you HONESTLY think I wouldn't pay more and get someone who not only fits in but also has the right training or qualifications and that I felt was capable of safely looking after my child???

Don't have a go at me because you think your niece got a bad deal - I am not that family so don't take it out on me!
I could write the full list of what I am and am not willing to pay, not pay, provide, not provide, allow etc but I don't see why I need to justify why I recommended a certain possible solution to the OP? And DANG I have gone and done most of anyway

Seriously though - I'm sorry your niece allowed herself to be exploited - I can only assume she didn't have the suppport from her Au Pair agency to leave or set proper terms early on with the family in question and that is wrong I agree.
Au Pairs, Au Pair Plus'es, mothers help and nanny's are NOT house slaves and should never be treated as such - they should be as far as possible considered part of your family - and I wouldn't leave my child with anyone I didn't consider as such.
Also they are not the right solution for everyone - I think they would be for ME, but that's ME. That isn't everyone else And that doesn't mean that come that time it will still be the right thing for me, us etc. Things change and what I feel is right now might not be in future.

mrcow

MrsTine wrote: »

Guys... if you want to discuss home education then maybe starting a different thread might be in order?

Who said I wanted to discuss it?

I'm just despairing of the state that future generations are going to be in if this is all they can aspire to, that's all.

KellyWelly

cupid_s wrote: »

But what have you sacrificed to be a SAHM? You fully intend to return full time to work when the children are old enough but if I left this field I’d have to find something else entirely different to do at a later date. Not easy when I love what I do and am not qualified to do anything else. If I had a job that I could leave and just find another similar one 5 years later then I wouldn’t even be asking this.

After going through what I have to even get this job I think I’d be sacrificing more than just a career to stay at home full time. The thought that I went through all that for nothing is enough to make me want to throw myself out of the nearest window!
And it was said it wouldn’t be for nothing because I’d be showing my children they too can go to Uni and get a good education. But what for? So they can never use it? My mom had a good career and gave it all up for me and my sister. I am eternally grateful but feel incredibly guilty because I saw her going to work, part time when we were young and at school and then full time when we were slightly older, to a job she absolutely hated and paid rubbish money. She ended up retiring really early because she couldn’t cope and now her and my dad have to manage on very little money. Her original field of work had changed so much in the time she took off she could never have gone back and that would be the case with me. If she’d have gone to Uni and given up her career I’d have been put off going to Uni myself.

What did I give up?

I gave up my career. I won't be able to go back to what I was doing or to earning the money I was earning (or would be earning now if I had continued).

I gave up a very comfortable lifestyle and a very good wage and my financial independence. This was the hardest thing for me.

I gave up being selfish (not directed at anyone or meant to be judgemental at all, despite what others have been reading into my previous posts). By that, I mean that I couldn't think of me anymore, my entire life was about my children and their needs and their care.

I gave up being taken seriously by my peers, I became a second class citizen and an outsider no longer included in the socialising that is part of being a member of the adult social circle working women are.

I gave up being a part of mainstream 'grown up' society, I became a taken for granted non-person because 'all' I do is look after children - and we all know that's easy and any moron can do that, right?

And as for going to Uni being worthless unless you get some sort of high powered well paying job - !!!!!!? Are you only special and successful if you get a 1st at Cambridge and go into AIDS research and find a cure? NO! I used to think this way tbh. I was very career driven and very successful in my education. But now, if I died tomorrow, I would not want to be remembered for anything other than doing the best for my kids and being the best mum I possibly could. I want my legacy to be my children and the time and energy I have invested in them.

All that being said, I know that working mothers don't have it easy. I have worked during the past 6.5 years and I have friends who work and have children the same age as mine. I'm not judging any of you, I always say that mums should stick together because nobody else gives a monkeys about us!

When I said I genuinely didn't understand why women have babies and go back to work full time when they don't have the financial need, I meant just that - I don't understand it, the mentality of it. I'm not making any kind of judgement, I am just saying I don't understand it. I understand that we all need time to be us, to be a grown up woman and not a mummy with sick and food all over our tops and messy hair you haven't had time to brush never mind wash, but how that equates to baby in nursery 8am to 6pm 5 days a week from 6 months old is what I don't get. Surely there is a happy medium?? I'm not saying we should all be home 24/7 365 days a week with our children - far from it, I don't think that is healthy at all.

cupid_s

Kellywelly: thanks for explaining this further. You obviously have given up a lot to be a SAHM and I would be the last person to say that you have it easy. I applaud your decision and am sure it's right for you. Though I would say that any parent, stay-at-home or not, gives up being selfish when they have kids. Even working moms have to think primarily of their children and not themselves.

But I do think you've misunderstood me with some of that post. Firstly IF (we're still not decided yet) we had a child I would take maximum maternity leave so I'd be with it full time until it was around 11 months old. Then I would start work at 7:45 and my husband would drop the child at childcare just before 10. I'd leave work at 4 so pick up child at about 5 past 4 and DH would work until around 6. So I'd have from 4 every day with my child. And both my husband and I would really try to get reduced hours at work. Also we'd both go and see the child during our lunch break as the nursery is only just around the corner.

KellyWelly wrote: »

And as for going to Uni being worthless unless you get some sort of high powered well paying job - !!!!!!? Are you only special and successful if you get a 1st at Cambridge and go into AIDS research and find a cure? NO! I used to think this way tbh. I was very career driven and very successful in my education.

I had to have a little giggle about this - mainly at the suggestion that my job is anything like high powered and high earning! I wish lol! My wage is never going to be high, that's not why I chose to do what I do. I genuinely want a job which I feel makes a difference. I don't give a stuff about the money it pays or the power it comes with. If I did I would never have become a scientist that's for sure!

I just hear people moaning about their work etc etc and know how lucky I am to be able to work in a field I love. It's that that I don't want to give up. Everything else you mention that you gave up I'd be quite happy to manage without.

galvanizersbaby

KellyWelly wrote: »

What did I give up?

I gave up being taken seriously by my peers, I became a second class citizen and an outsider no longer included in the socialising that is part of being a member of the adult social circle working women are.

I gave up being a part of mainstream 'grown up' society, I became a taken for granted non-person because 'all' I do is look after children - and we all know that's easy and any moron can do that, right?

KellyWelly - I think it's a shame that you feel that you are not taken seriously and treated as a 2nd class citizen just because you choose to stay at home and look after your children.

I don't think any mum should feel that way

KellyWelly

I think it's sad as well, and I think it's a major factor in the depression so many mums suffer with.

In 6 and half years I can think of only two people outside of my family who have said to me 'wow, you're doing something great and I admire you' (paraphrased, obviously). Everyone else thinks that you are either a jobless benefits scrounger, too thick to get a 'proper job', or lazy and that you do nothing all day.

I consider what I do to be a full time job and I am proud of what I do.

Of course there are days I wish I could go to work and dress in something other than flat shoes and jeans and not be sat there gluing bits of shiny paper to something or not be changing bedsheets or wiping snot off the windows (don't ask). But I defy anyone in any job who says they don't have days like that.

I just feel like these years I am giving as a gift to them and I have got my time to come. I still have 30+ years that I will be able to work at a paid career and I know I will look back in all those years and be glad I did this. Note the I - not the you.

Paparika

cupid_s wrote: »

I’m 26, have been with husband for 7 years, married for 4 ½ We have recently been thinking about starting a family. Everyone we’ve spoken to about this just assumes I’ll give up work to be a SAHM and when I say I don’t want to give up my job they say they don’t agree with putting kids in childcare.
And part of me agrees with that viewpoint. We could easily afford for me to give up work. After being at Uni for 8 years we are used to living cheaply and could survive very well on DHs wage so money isn’t the issue at all.
But if I give up my job I have to give up any chance of me having a career I enjoy. I have worked so hard and been through so much to get the job I have but the company is so small that if I leave there is no chance of me being able to come back in x years. And getting another similar position elsewhere after time out is pretty much impossible.
I do really want kids but can’t help thinking that if I’m not willing to give up a job I love for them then I’m maybe not cut out for parenthood.
Please just throw your viewpoints at me.

As others have said, it's your choice if you want to use childcare, not others.. see how things go, you can have your cake and eat it, just needs a bit of working out

galvanizersbaby

KellyWelly wrote: »

I think it's sad as well, and I think it's a major factor in the depression so many mums suffer with.

In 6 and half years I can think of only two people outside of my family who have said to me 'wow, you're doing something great and I admire you' (paraphrased, obviously). Everyone else thinks that you are either a jobless benefits scrounger, too thick to get a 'proper job', or lazy and that you do nothing all day.

I consider what I do to be a full time job and I am proud of what I do.

I'm not a SAHM but I've never really thought of it like that - surely this must be how people who haven't got children view it! and if so what the hell do they know!
When I was a SAHM it was bloody hard work - mind you my children were very young and I would imagine (I don't know from experience of course that it does get a bit easier eventually - this is what I'm told anyway but not convinced myself!):rotfl:

As I say I couldn't imagine many mums being of the opinion that looking after children rather than going out to work somewhere else is not a proper job - but then again perhaps I'm naive?!:o

nzmegs

I haven't read the whole thread - but at any point has anyone questioned wether there is any chnace of the husband taking some of the responsibility. Perhaps after maternity leave is over he may consider (or want to) take a year off too. Why is this option never even considered?
In my case my husband always earned more than me (there's another whole thread in the making!) and so i stayed home. i was at home for 7 years and now work part time. I have a degree and was in a very good job. Now I am a receptionist and paid a very low wage.
it is not realistic to think you will go back to work after so much time away and just slot right back in where you left. Something needs to change in society and the way families are structured for that to happen. In other words childcare needs to be a shared experience between a man and a woman both of whom should take time off their careers (perhaps rotationally) to avoid long career breaks and if men and women were paid equally this would no doubt be a more relaistic option. Children could only benefit from more time with their dads!

cupid_s

nzmegs wrote: »

I haven't read the whole thread - but at any point has anyone questioned wether there is any chnace of the husband taking some of the responsibility. Perhaps after maternity leave is over he may consider (or want to) take a year off too. Why is this option never even considered?
In my case my husband always earned more than me (there's another whole thread in the making!) and so i stayed home. i was at home for 7 years and now work part time. I have a degree and was in a very good job. Now I am a receptionist and paid a very low wage.
it is not realistic to think you will go back to work after so much time away and just slot right back in where you left. Something needs to change in society and the way families are structured for that to happen. In other words childcare needs to be a shared experience between a man and a woman both of whom should take time off their careers (perhaps rotationally) to avoid long career breaks and if men and women were paid equally this would no doubt be a more relaistic option. Children could only benefit from more time with their dads!

I think this is a very valid point. In our case this has definately been discussed. DH actually could quite easily take off a few months between grants and he has said that when he's writing his next grant he could write it that he only works 60% of the time. But as he needs to write it within a year or so it doesn't give us much time to decide! Once he writes a grant he can't change the hours, and can't leave until it's complete (well he can but no-one will give him money again!).
I agree children benefit with more time with their dads but unfortunately when I tell people that DH will do more of the childcare than me once my maternity leave I get even more unwelcome comments and get told that's a womans job! It annoys me that I can have 12 months maternity leave but DH gets 2 weeks of something stupid like that. Maybe when they give equal paternity and maternity leave things will be fairer.