Stay at home mums

poet123

I was a sahm for 10/12 years and I loved it. It did mean my husband could climb the corporate ladder, and it meant I could look after my children and my elderly parents. We all gained from the arrangement, during that time I studied for further quals in anticipation of returning to a new career when family circumtances allowed. We work as a team, all monies are "ours" and we never had any issues about me not working outside the home. He still got up in the night with our children because he can be asleep, wake quickly and then instantly go back to sleep, whereas I cannot.

Now, we both work and we enjoy that. Different stages of family life need different arrangements, the trick is to enjoy them all.

sunshinetours

treetrunks wrote: »

My fiancee is a stay at home mum. Due to child care costs we would have been £100 a month better off if she worked while someone else brought up our son. We decided it wasnt worth it. Thankfully my salary is comfortable for us to live on, if the situations had been reversed and she was the higher earner then i wouldnt have stayed at home. To be honest im fairly sure ive got the better deal, looking after our 1 year old and keeping our house together is completely shattering.

Yes my OH is SAHM also by choice. Due to various financial , political and probably other issues too many kids are brought up by people other than their parents and I personally think this has a lot to do with the general break down in scoiety we have seen over the past couple of decades.

Many people I understand both parents have to work to live, however there are also a lot who choose to do it and put their children in someone else's charge whilst they do so from a young age by choice. It is a choice to do that and c'est la vie I guess

I also agree with your final paragraph to a degree that looking after young kids and a household is very tiring and very underpaid! I appreciate my OH even if I don't tell her often enough I am sure

money_honey

I'm currently a SAHM to my 22 month old daughter, but I would really love to work part-time. Unfortunately there seems to be nothing much around that would cover the cost of nursery enough to make it worthwhile. I get fed up of the endless 'baby' conversations with other SAHM's and would love to be at work where you are seen as a person in your own right, rather than someone's parent. I miss that interaction of the office environment. I'm also not very houseproud so my idea of a nightmare day would be to spend it cleaning!!! I want to be out using my brain, at least some of the week... I got quite depressed about it all a while ago and DH put my DD in a nursery one day a week so I could have some time to do other things, I'm doing a course with the Open University and do a bit of admin for my DH (he's self employed).
Having said that I don't knock people for wanting to stay at home all the time, if it's right for them. Everyone has different circumstances and what works for you may not work for someone else.

tooldle

"Due to various financial , political and probably other issues too many kids are brought up by people other than their parents and I personally think this has a lot to do with the general break down in scoiety we have seen over the past couple of decades."

Can I ask the poster who made this statement, have you ever been to a daycare nursery? I have, my daughter attended prior to becoming school age. Our nursery was full of kids from middle class homes, and predominantly professional parents. We still see some of the kids and get regular news on others, not a dysfuntional one amongst them. The kids we have encountered at school however are a very different bunch. Just my experience. As I said in my earlier post, attendning nursery for 40 hours out of a 168 hour week, does not mean that the nursery is "bringing up the child". I feel somewhat for childcare workers if society does indeed blame them for its breakdown.

babyboysmommy

I'm a SAHM. DH earns an average wage & money is very tight but we have everything we need & a little of what we want. We have had 1 holiday in 5 years (and that was a butlins thanks to vouchers) but use Te$co vouchers for some good days out so do 'holidays from home'. DS is now in reception at school & I'm pregnant. Once the baby is in year 1 I'll be thinking about work. Much as I love being at home I would like to work part time in a pre school (I used to work in early years) as then it's a term time/school hours only job. It's not worth it now because of child care costs but in the long term I would like to go back to work.

I really enjoy home making etc & am very thankful that we have been able to afford for me to do this. We are 'old stylers' & that's what has helped to make it possible.

sunshinetours

tooldle wrote: »

"Due to various financial , political and probably other issues too many kids are brought up by people other than their parents and I personally think this has a lot to do with the general break down in scoiety we have seen over the past couple of decades."

Can I ask the poster who made this statement, have you ever been to a daycare nursery? I have, my daughter attended prior to becoming school age. Our nursery was full of kids from middle class homes, and predominantly professional parents. We still see some of the kids and get regular news on others, not a dysfuntional one amongst them. The kids we have encountered at school however are a very different bunch. Just my experience. As I said in my earlier post, attendning nursery for 40 hours out of a 168 hour week, does not mean that the nursery is "bringing up the child". I feel somewhat for childcare workers if society does indeed blame them for its breakdown.

Yes both of ours attened a few hours each week as it provides good stimulation and interaction with other children and a good couple of hour break for the SAHM in our case.

The nursery is open 7 to 7, 5 days a week and there are plenty of parents who have their kids in there for this period of time.
As the kids will also be asleep for roughly half of each 24 hour period , then those parents really are not predominantly bringing up their children are they? 50 or 60 hours in childcare out of maybe 90 lets say when the child is awake and intereacting

As others have said, circumstances for everyone are different and there will be plenty of halfway type situations as have already been mentioned. Obviously tehre is also a large proportion of single parent families where the situation is totally different again.

My "rant" is more at the many career orientated non parents I see, of which there will be plenty in every London commuter belt town I am sure. Why have children if you cannot give them your most valuable asset - time?

The lack of traditional family time, with one parent at home has uindoubedly in my mind contributed to the breakdown of the traditional family unit - but that is another conversation.

tooldle

Our nursery was open 6am through to 6.30pm. As I recall it was not allowed to have a child there for more than 10 continuous hours at any one time.
I disagree with the assumption that career orientated people cannot or do not have significant family time.
Quality of parenting is to me the most important and this is to a large part learnt from your own childhood experiences. Simply being with your child for all its waking hours doesn't not necessarily mean that you are a better parent than one who has concentrated quality one on one time. There are a lot of distractions in anybodies day.
I don't disagree that being a stay at home parent makes family life a lot easier to manage for the parents.
I do think that career type has a large part to play in these choices.
Edited to add that a lot of private schools in this area also have private nursaries, similar to that attended by my child. Would private education be considered in the same way?

JodyBPM

sunshinetours wrote: »

The nursery is open 7 to 7, 5 days a week and there are plenty of parents who have their kids in there for this period of time.
As the kids will also be asleep for roughly half of each 24 hour period , then those parents really are not predominantly bringing up their children are they? 50 or 60 hours in childcare out of maybe 90 lets say when the child is awake and intereacting

[snip]

My "rant" is more at the many career orientated non parents I see, of which there will be plenty in every London commuter belt town I am sure. Why have children if you cannot give them your most valuable asset - time?

The lack of traditional family time, with one parent at home has uindoubedly in my mind contributed to the breakdown of the traditional family unit - but that is another conversation.

I live in the London commuter belt, and have children and mix mainly with other families with children, and I don't know of a single family who has had their child in nursery 50 or 60 hours a week. Even those families where both parents notionally returned to work full time have arranged working hours around spending as much time with their children as possible, by working compressed hours or one working early and the other working late etc, to have some daytimes at home with their children.

To be honest, I have real reservations about the message that SAHMs can pass on to their children. To their girl children especially, that they should have no aspirations, that their careers will be cut short as soon as they have a family. Albeit that I only work part time, my children know that working is how we earn money to have a nice standard of life, you get out of life what you put in, and that relying on state handouts when you are capable of working is not acceptable.

I'm all for the secure family unit, but we also have to be very aware of the unconscious messages we send out to our children.

As a family with a f/t worker and a p/t time worker, I feel we are teaching a good balance of family values and work ethic, which is surely better than teaching family values alone.

poet123

JodyBPM wrote: »

I live in the London commuter belt, and have children and mix mainly with other families with children, and I don't know of a single family who has had their child in nursery 50 or 60 hours a week. Even those families where both parents notionally returned to work full time have arranged working hours around spending as much time with their children as possible, by working compressed hours or one working early and the other working late etc, to have some daytimes at home with their children.

To be honest, I have real reservations about the message that SAHMs can pass on to their children. To their girl children especially, that they should have no aspirations, that their careers will be cut short as soon as they have a family. Albeit that I only work part time, my children know that working is how we earn money to have a nice standard of life, you get out of life what you put in, and that relying on state handouts when you are capable of working is not acceptable.

I'm all for the secure family unit, but we also have to be very aware of the unconscious messages we send out to our children.

As a family with a f/t worker and a p/t time worker, I feel we are teaching a good balance of family values and work ethic, which is surely better than teaching family values alone.

That is not the only alternative to working. When I was a sahm we didnt claim any benefit, we were supported entirely by my husband, as are most, if not all, of the sahm posters who have posted here. So I am unsure why you would bring living on benefits into the equation.;)

zippybungle

wotnext wrote: »

There is an interesting article in the Daily Mail today......

I wouldn't believe anything you read in the 'Daily Mail' :rotfl:
They love to slag working Mums off!

Zippy x