career woman or stay at home wife

lostinrates

fluffnutter wrote: »

Looking after kids is work though, isn't it? As is doing voluntary unpaid work. I tend to agree that working's very good for you, I'd just expand the definition a little.

The distinction is being drawn between sah mothers and sah wives with no small children.

Ladyhawk

I think there is a difference between having a career and having a job. For me it is career, cos I am very unlikely to ever have kids.

If I had a man in my life and this was a real discussion and I just had a job which wasn't challenging and was repetitive I would seriously consider staying at home but with the proviso that I had something else to put my time into... that didn't involve shopping, cleaning or the gym.

Bangton

Assuming you mean a stay at home wife to look after children then I'm in the working mum camp. Don't get me wrong my child would be my world but it's important to me to have a hand in providing for the family I have created.

I just couldn't imagine my partner working and providing all the money for us. Yes I know I'd be doing an important job, I know my partner would never resent me but rightly or wrongly I still just don't like the idea.

Not only that but what about my life after a child, when it's older and gone to school/college? I feel a bit guilty saying it but why should I end up missing out on the opportunity to have a career I really want because I have children.

I'll happily take the years maternity leave though and I can't actually wait for that!!

fluffnutter

lostinrates wrote: »

The distinction is being drawn between sah mothers and sah wives with no small children.

I wondered if that were the case, but VfM4meplse's post merely said 'working's good for you' and then mentioned that the money might come in handy, suggesting that the definition of work was solely paid work.

I was just pointing out that there are other types of work.

As for SAH wives, I guess it's entirely the couple's own business but I can't help think that it's a bit of a dull existence if you just 'keep house' for your husband. But if you do the church flowers and you walk the neighbour's dogs and you organise the summer fete and you hold the weekly beetle drive for charity and blah blah blah, perhaps that's work too?

Obviously you can do all that and work, but some women do seem to be able to make a complete career out of it. And why not if they don't need the money?

lostinrates

What's a beetle drive? Cars or bugs?

fluffnutter

It's some weird thing where you draw beetles - the insect. Can't remember what precisely but I recall it was done on 'charity nights'. Might give it a google.

ETA: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beetle_(game)#Beetle_drive

tattycath

fluffymuffy wrote: »

I stopped work as soon as I married. I was in a job I needed to leave and so it was just a convenient moment. I dived into self employment - tried a few ideas until a couple of them stuck and I've been having a career as a stay at home wife with two successful businesses for 20 years.
That's brilliant.:T

I'd worry about being just a wife. Even just a mother (as children grow older). As I'd have nothing to talk about to OH. Nothing to contribute financially or intellectually.

I think this is down to personal choice-if we had the means I would love to not have to go out to work but I would probably have to have a dabble in something potentially lucrative unless I could afford to be one of the 'ladies who lunch'. That said-if i could afford not to work it would give me the chance to get my house sorted out and de-richarded.

Lunar_Eclipse

VfM4meplse wrote: »

I think everyone should work, whether they need the money or not.

And most people do work. Running an efficient family home is work, raising kids is (seriously hard) work, volunteering is work and being a paid employee is also a form of work, amongst others.

Personally, I think we all have the right to choose how we live our life, including what type of work we do, if we are financially independent (assuming we are capable of being so.)

Personally, I've been a career woman and am currently a SAHM, but haven't been a SAHW. I consciously gave up my high earning job to raise my children. I wasn't interested in having children otherwise. I am lucky to have had the choice, although it was planned for (via savings) and I am currently planning a return to paid employment.

Life is short. We all need to live it according to our own rules.

jellyhead

flutterby_lil wrote: »

I go back to work in 6 weeks after Mat leave. If I didn;t have choldren I could never be a stay at home wife....there is only so much gym, cleaning, reading, watching Jezza and this morning, having lunch out that one can do.

My SAH life is nothing like that :rotfl:

I'm on a course, I volunteer 2 and a half days and I have a paper round and do some work from home.

I don't do anything on a Tuesday though, except the shopping. I pay the bills and do other chores then, or sometimes just read a book in the bath If I liked daytime TV I suppose I'd watch it on a Tuesday, but I don't like it. I watch other things that my husband and children would rather stick pins in their eyes than watch

jellyhead

Anyway, why 'career woman'? What about flipping burgers or stacking shelves?