To be a traditional sahm ??

Okay OP, you wanted routines (though why you didn't just ask in the first place I can't imagine), here's ours.

7am alarm goes off. DDs come into our bed for 20 mins cuddles.
7:25 up and dressed
8:00 downstairs for breakfast (all of these stages accompanied by much arguing and whining)
8:30 leave house
8:45 drop DDs off at school and drive to work
9:10 arrive at work
5:30 leave work
6:00 pick DDs up from after-school club with compaints and occasional crying that they have to stop playing and leave their friends.
6:10 arrive home for some play and catching up on the day.
7:15 DH does bath time, I walk the dogs/clean up downstairs and we take turns to read stories
8:00 lights out
8:10 DH and I finishing cleaning up the house and cook dinner

On Fridays I get up at 5am, walk the dogs and get to work for 7am, so I can pick the DDs up from school. We spend the afternoon doing something fun. DH takes the DDs to breakfast club at 8am.

On Tuesdays I work late so DH does the evening shift and I get home hopefully in time for a story before the DDs go to sleep.

On Mondays DD1 has karate at 6:30, and I attend the adult class at 7:30 so DH stops by on his way home to collect the DDs.

On Wednesdays I leave work at 3:30 to get the DDs to a 4:30 ballet class and get in another hour of work in the car while they're there. And in the evening I have choir (and/or another karate class).

And on various days, whenever time allows (ideally Wed and Fri morning and on weekends I go running through the mud with my dogs).

I do not consider myself first and foremost be a wife and mother. I am a scientist, an ex-skydiver, a karate-ka, a singer, a marathon runner. Any fool can get married and have kids, it's hardly and achievement. Okay, being a good mother is something to be proud of, but I would hate for that to be all I have to define myself by.

What it all boils down to is that as long and you and your children are happy that is all that matters isn't it. Op - be happy and don't worry about what others think.

What OxfordBags said. I am constantly amazed at the number of friends and family who insist they are 'feminists' or believe in equality and so on, yet sneer at women choosing to stay at home to look after the children.

Can they not see the hypocrisy?

My DB and SIL are always bringing up my stay at home status. Yet they are ardent 'feminists', both left wing and very liberal thinkers, but can't help asking me when I will go back to work to 'earn my own money', and 'don't I feel uncomfortable spending my DHs money...?

Carry on love - you sound like you are getting annoyed - oh and do you know any other word but priceless? I know you desperately want to but people like you don't rile me, people like you amuse me. Carry on carry on!

Oxford - why do you not want to be called a housewife but prefer the SAHM tag - genuine question. Do you see one as superior to the other? It never occurred to me they were different - just a new title for the same role? Nothing wrong with the role - so why object to the title?

am clear on what that particular poster thinks
you however seem incapable of original thought
when you can c&p someone else. priceless

Oh Scottish you don't bother me you amuse me love so keep trying love. Yep. She said it so well I didn't feel the need to add anything - she has got you down to a t.

Thank you, that is really well put.

Of course it is up to the individual what they want to call themselves. But nevertheless the fact remains that SAHM is a relatively new term. And for many years these women would be termed as housewives. But then it was decided a more upmarket term was needed. The Americans came up with Homemaker which I think is pretty pathetic. And in the UK the SAHM is now what people seem to prefer. Fair enough. But it's the same position.

seeing you're so sharp Oxford you'll know my anecdotal preference have no rl impact
I certainly do have opinion that housewifery is outdated patriarchal
i certainly don't expect you to renounce your housewifery life based on my pov

lol you've quoted someone else to substantiate point,because you cant fink of owt
so gimee you're so lame,you've cut &paste someone else post to make your point?
priceless

VivienneMary, as I said previously, I am a SAHM but not a housewife. DH and I share all domestic chores 50-50, save those that naturally require doing in the course of a day at home (light washing-up, tidying, etc.). We agree that my job is mothering Ds whilst DH is at work a d then eerything is shared upon his return. Doing all or the majority of the housework is not an inevitable part of being a SAHM.

ScottishMummy, I have a PhD from Oxford. Does this make me being a SAHM acceptable under your rules? I don't need exterior things to make me feel whole, feel like 'me',or to make me feel good about myself. Getting those things from working is just as rubbish as getting them from being a super-trad housewife and mother.

I am a SAHM because I am a Feminist, btw. Because feminine skills and talents (note: these can be inherent in and undertaken by men) need to be respected and seen as equal, valid and worthy. Denigrating women who do not work for however long whilst parenting is anti-Feminist and holds back true equality in society, because it's feeding into androcentric bullshit about what equals worth and status (or that status even matters, etc., etc.).

I "popped in" to share my disbelief as I still don't understand the OP. There is no AIBU question in it for one thing!

OP says she's happy. Good for her. What else is there to say?

Avuncular: "I have sometimes reflected that being a busy mum is one of the best preparations for management that there is, if you and potential employers can see the skills as "transferable" if/when the time comes!

[Screaming child or sulky staff? Plans, deadlines, budgets, disasters, overtime]"

No, I don't really think so. It is nothing like working in senior management in a corporation where you need technical knowledge, general knowledge of the business and area of discipline, strategic nous, combined with people (adults) management, motivational, project/change management skills, all done to objective standards and targets.

It is somewhat reductionist twee to say that a busy mum would have these skills. Maybe if they were running a flower shop or a market stall?

I am a good all rounder I have passing interest in many things
do i consistently post on housewife threads. hell yes. do keep up
thing about consistent opinion is one expresses them consistently

Add message | Report | Message poster cannotbelievehowexpensive Fri 04-Jan-13 20:28:03
Can't believe some of the attitudes towards SAHMs here. How can staying at home to care for your children possibly be setting them a BAD example? There is no right or wrong - some mums work, some don't - why is there this eternal quest on MN to prove one is better than the other?

scottishmummy, it is abundantly clear to anyone with more than a passing interest in this debate that you have issues around the whole SAHM thing. You appear on every thread I have seen on this issue with depressing regularity and trot out the same tired old nonsense about setting a good example by working/bad example by staying at home.

On the face of it you have massive contempt and disrespect for SAHMs but there's definitely more to it than that. It's pretty obvious that you are not happy in your choices because if you were you wouldn't' feel the need to constantly justify them on every thread and constantly berate women who are able to stay at home with their children.Your obsession with this debate is not healthy - think you need to face up to your issues with SAHMs and ask yourself where all this contempt and vitriol for them really comes from.

PS I'm also willing to bet that you have a far less important job than you think you have, which you have bigged up to yourself to justify not staying at home with your kids, and that you bully any staff who have the misfortune to work with you - you sound the type.

...........

Couldn't have said it better myself! ;)

Op - ignore ignore ignore all the cattiness. You sound very happy and there is nothing wrong with how you feel or want to live your life. Please don't let anyone make you feel anything other than how you want to feel.

As far as I see it a SAHM is more or less the same as a housewife. What's the difference.

"traditional housewife is post war construct"

No it's not. English women who could afford to do so have stayed at home and reared their own children from the 18th century onwards. Middle class housewifery was a well-established Victorian lifestyle.

what springs to mind?what examples you thinking of

seems its ok to be as rude as you like on here, so long as you tell someone else to be polite at the same time

you popped in to say that?if it's so irksome go peruse another stimulating thread

Oh dear God, is this thread STILL going?

Have a poke into Proverbs 31.

That SAHM seemed to run not just the household but the family business as well, while her DH went off to Parliament, or the Old Bailey or somewhere.

I have sometimes reflected that being a busy mum is one of the best preparations for management that there is, if you and potential employers can see the skills as "transferable" if/when the time comes!

[Screaming child or sulky staff? Plans, deadlines, budgets, disasters, overtime]