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Original poster

SAHDs during lockdown

32 replies

peekaboob · 11/07/2020 00:00

Where can I quickly find figures that would point to how many men are SAHD and have had to deal with homeschool etc during lockdown?
We have a dad, who for background works pt opposite his pt wife and so shares the homeschool, has cleaners and gardeners, no money worries - in our class chat. Someone was struggling with wfh and doing homeschooling and how lockdown has made them feel inadequate. Another mum posted a message of support straight away saying that mums do have it hard right now as the menfolk are off doing their big important jobs and we are left to do the rest as well as homeschool. Dad came back with: and Dads. Whilst I do acknowledge that there are some dads out there doing this, he's not one of them BUT where can I find figures that would let me know how many? I'm guessing maybe 1/100 households may have the dad as the non-breadwinner/homeschooler?

OP posts:
DuDuDuLangaLangaBingBong · 11/07/2020 14:14

There is 1 dad in this position in my daughter’s primary class of 32.

(In a rapidly gentrifying part of greater Manchester, for context).

Choconuttolata · 11/07/2020 11:28

My DH is one of them too, he has been a SAHD for years though. I am a keyworker and although I do help on my days off he does most of the homeschooling, cleaning and cooking. His friend is a SAHD too, wife a keyworker. Both of our families have 3 kids and children with disabilities. Another male friend has still been working nights and managing his kids in the day more too as his wife has had more shifts in ITU. It has been tough for them just like it would for the women who are the main caregivers in a family, dealing with the changes in lockdown. More women are in this position than men though. A lot of people have been struggling.

Gwynfluff · 11/07/2020 11:15

This might have some. The guardian still have many articles about impact on sex based rights - I am quite imagine there are 2 camps among the journalists

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2020/jun/23/the-coronavirus-backlash-how-the-pandemic-is-destroying-womens-rights

Kaiserin · 11/07/2020 10:23

I don't expect you'll find much official stats at that stage. Anecdotally, in our household we both work from home, and made sure to split the homeschooling/childcare duties roughly 50/50, but it was a concious effort... And in the end I've been much more proactive re: liaising with the school... But using my husband's account, because it was more convenient than login into my own! So if the school was tracking that (I doubt it!) it would distort the final picture.

MrsTerryPratchett · 11/07/2020 01:42

My DH is one of these men too. He can WFH and I can't (both key workers). It's very rare the men are homeschooling in our group.

WombOfOnesOwn · 11/07/2020 01:29

I don't know the figures. It must be very low. My husband is one of these men; I earn about 95% of the family money and he does 95% of the children's home education, but that was our arrangement even before lockdown. For us very little has changed, but we were always in a very tiny (and privileged) minority.

stumbledin · 11/07/2020 00:07

I thought Fawcett or the Women's Budget Group had done some work on this but cant find it!

However this article implies not many men "took the lead" on home schooling metro.co.uk/2020/05/06/mums-are-homeschooling-lockdown-teaching-still-considered-womens-work-12663148/

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