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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

busy,annoyed sahm

418 replies

lovelymumma · 07/03/2011 00:08

I went to childrens party today.Feel upset that uncle asked @what i did with all my spare time.Uncle is nice,but never had children,and made me feel as if because I am at home and 3 children are in school,I should have all the time in the world.A school day after u drop kids off and before u leave to pick them up gives you 5 and half hours.I probably spend half hour eating having coffee,whilst catching up on e mails or post.an hour walking dogs.An hour doing washing and ironing.Another hour cleaning house and trying to order stuff children need off internet for various activities or catching up on doing garden or clearing stuff out,or putting clothes away.another hour can be spent on shopping or cooking,which usually leaves an hour for trying to decorate our new,old house.I don't see where I'm supposed to have all this spare time.At same party dad who only has children once or twice a week asked me if I worked,and thought I was so lucky not too.aaagh,just having a rant,because they think my life is so perfect,with all this spare time for me!

OP posts:
sleepingsatellite · 09/03/2011 22:15

i have an 18m old and i work 9-5 mon-fri and am bloody knackered, its not so much that there are more jobs around the house etc than i did before, just sooo much less time to fit them in (says she whilst on mn..!) it would be nice to get to choose what to do with my time, rather than my day being dictated by my lack of time, if that makes any sense at all Smile

hmc · 09/03/2011 22:16

I could manage all that Quattro - I just couldn't be arsed!

QueenBathsheba · 09/03/2011 22:16

I always believed that women had devalued men in the work place to some extent by taking up paid work and continuing even after having children. I asumed that this was why many men could not earn enough money to keep a family.

Wrong, big corperations and businesses welcomed the womens movement in the 60's and 70's in the states because they saw it as an opportunity to devalue all waged labour. So it's now two for the price of one and double the productivity. Have living standards doubled, no.

Who still sits on boards and holds shares, men mostly and it will remain so until men grow wombs and lactate and all child care is free.

In the meantime we can either give ourselves a break or run headlong into exhaustion and guilt.

QueenBathsheba · 09/03/2011 22:23

Oh Reindeer, why ever do you think you are a rubbish Mummy.

Why are women being driven to feel guilty all the time. Why do we always feel we should do more, earn more, aquire more, be happier, cleverer. Why can't we just be happy and do what suits us.

We are our own worst enemies. Women spend more time attacking each other and do far more harm than any amount of sexism from men.

Quattrocento · 09/03/2011 22:23

I am neither exhausted nor guilty. In fact I enjoy the economic clout. I am bringing up my children to believe in gender equality, and I practice what I preach A life spent keeping house is a wasted life, IMO

blueshoes · 09/03/2011 22:28

QueenBath, I disagree with the general tone of your posts that work is exhausting and guilt-ridden.

I don't have a lot of 'free' time like the OP but I work for the joy and challenge of it. The money goes without saying. My children are thriving so I don't see the need for guilt to enter into it.

Men can stay at home to look after the children even if they don't give birth and lactate. Lots of working women express at work. In fact, I would bloody encourage SAHDs for the good of all women. I am sad that you did not give your dh the opportunity when he expressed the desire to.

hmc · 09/03/2011 22:30

Mercifully, I don't have to "keep house"

My children believe in gender equality - even at their tender age they are not so 'limited' as to think that relates to salaried work

QueenBathsheba · 09/03/2011 22:30

Quattocento, that is exactly as it should be unfortuntaly many women feel compelled to work even if it means barely covering child care costs or working part time for monkey money. Why is that? Why do women feel they can only contribute through paid work even if that work is boring, low paid and prevents them from having quality time to themselves.

hmc · 09/03/2011 22:32

Beats me!

Quattrocento · 09/03/2011 22:34

Women do not have to have boring low paid jobs. They can (and do) have interesting well paid jobs. If they choose to. Their fairly depressing choice not to. More fool them, frankly

blueshoes · 09/03/2011 22:34

The thing about SAHM-ing when children are at school and/or older is that it is really a doss. When growing up, I wondered what my mother did all day. In terms of role modelling, she was modelling to me the easy way out.

My nieces live and go to school in a town with a lot of yummy mummies. I can already see that their goals are not academic/career driven but focused on snaring that man who will be their meal ticket.

FunnysInTheGarden · 09/03/2011 22:35

If we are talking about work now, then I had to go back to work. After 18 months at home DS1 was firmly of the opinion that my job was 'to pick his clothes up from the floor'. Am a solicitor and a tad disappointed that all those years studying law had come to that!

QueenBathsheba · 09/03/2011 22:35

I am sad that you did not give your dh the opportunity when he expressed the desire to. Grin you haven't met him have you.

I am not suggesting working women feel guilty, please read again, I meant all women. Why else do you think women keep raking over this topic.

scottishmummy · 09/03/2011 22:36

i provide for my family.i am a good role model.work empowers me and makes me feel fulfilled in away sahm never could.i have never had a guilty moment.this was all planned.we looked nurseries from 8wk pg,and had nursery booked and confirmed at 12wk

i am financially autonomous and earn my own money.i really couldn't abide to not earn and feel beholden.i know everyone else doesn't feel this,but i do (strongly)

i get approbation and satisfaction from working and discuss work with the dc and emphasise to them they too will work.

magicmummy1 · 09/03/2011 22:38

What I don't understand is why so many people seem to think that WOHMs get the opportunity to sit and have a cup of tea in peace while this isn't an option for those who stay at home with kids. Chance would be a fine thing...I'm lucky if I can wolf down some lunch most days when I'm in work, and even if I do, I'm usually trying to do 1001 other tasks at the same time. Hmm

Maybe I need to change career....

Huffymuffy · 09/03/2011 22:38

Quattrocento not a life spent keeping house is not a wasted life. Just read every other thread about husbands not helping out, wives not having enough time because of work and pressures at home. You are wrong. It is not a waste, it's just not right for you. Even if I had the ability to earn 100k I would still feel guilty to be away from my children and I have worked part time in highly pressured jobs most of their childhoods. There is no worse feeling Moseiesley am I right, than lying in bed wondering if the payroll was correct? Wondering if you gave the right advice ti someone? And still going home to be mummy. Give me SAHM any day. It will change, I'll work again. But even not working....paid...I'm still doing it, organising tots groups, pre school, library trips...all the stuff you'll get your nanny to send your kids to. Smile

blueshoes · 09/03/2011 22:38

Queenbath, I only know about your dh what you yourself said about him: "I used to earn more than DH and he wanted to stay home. I said that was fine if he could just give birth and feed baby, he could be my guest."

Sounds to me that you denied him by playing the biological trump card.

dementedma · 09/03/2011 22:39

In my time I have been a full time SAHM, worked part-time, been self-employed and worked full-time.
The SAHM was by far the easiest and by far the most boring!

blueshoes · 09/03/2011 22:44

QueenBath, I don't even agree that in general all women feel guilty. If you are happy with your choices, there is no issue of guilt.

The guilt of motherhood is a media induced concept. I could not for the life of me squeeze out a drop of guilt. I know I have done the best I can for my family and my children, not just on the childcare front but also finances, both long term and short term. I am busier than I would like to be but I know it is not forever, and my retirement is sweet.

TandB · 09/03/2011 22:44

I think SSD and Littlesez have hit the nail on the head by pointing out that the WOHM vs SAHM that has inevitably developed is a red herring.

The OP isn't a SAHM caring full-time for small children - she is caring for older children outside school hours.

It is completely illogical to suggest that, overall, a SAHM whose children are in school does not have considerably more time available for necessary tasks and leisure activities than a WOHM or a SAHM whose children are at home. It would be nonsensical to suggest otherwise.

The things that the OP does with her time are entirely her business but it might well be that she is getting so upset and defensive simply because she does not feel that she is making full use of her available time.

Some of the things she talks about are things that WOHMs and SAHMS with small children have to do anyway, but have to squeeze them in as and when they can. Some of the things are, quite simply, leisure activities - I am trying to do some decorating at the moment and I do all the gardening. These are things that I do in my spare time. I would love to have more time to devote to them. I think this is the reason why the OP has not had as much sympathy as some think she should have done - there doesn't seem to be much acceptance that the things she is filling her time with are things that are potentially enjoyable, and which plenty of people would like to spend time doing.

Some people are busier than others - that is just the way it is. Busy people without much free time are inevitably going to find it hard to be entirely sympathetic to a less busy person who appears to be complaining about their lot. The OP's day could be presented in two completely different ways:

  1. I have no time. After I have done all the chores, the gardening, the decorating, walked the dog, read emails, done the shopping, I have no time left for myself before the family come home.

  2. I love my life. I have time to get the essential stuff done, do some gardening and decorating, go for a walk with the dog, check my emails and have a coffee and do a bit of shopping and then we have time together as a family in the evening.

TandB · 09/03/2011 22:47

Also agree with all of Scottishmummy's posts.

QueenBathsheba · 09/03/2011 22:48

I am not just keeping house either, I run groups, I teach from home and I home ed two sons.

If being at home consisted of empty hours in an empty and quite house I think I might go mad.

In fact DH gets home and gets stuck into helping. We parent differently so he's happy to help with domestic stuff. Both boys know that domestic work is to be shared and isn't just womens work.

Thing is though, I chose to have kids and like every job I have ever done I put in 150% and get it right. I couldn't commit myself to my job once I had children and still maintain the same attitude towards calls at silly hrs, staff blubbing at 10pm that their kids are sick! hey what about mine I might think.

I used to work 80 hrs plus in a very stressful job and perhaps one day I will again but not before I've achieved what I set out to do, raise my kids.

itsalarf · 09/03/2011 22:51

Bravo, kungfu! A sensible post. Grin

Quattrocento · 09/03/2011 22:58

I dunno, Kungfu. I read the OP and thought, Blimey, the OP needs to get a life. It smacks of the lifestyle where people make an expedition to buy a postage stamp.

In the world of work, postage stamps are things you buy when you remember in the middle of other things. You don't need to make expeditions to buy them. In the same way that cleaning house, buying stuff off the internet, shopping and cooking are all things that are infinitely elastic and can be squeezed down if you're doing more interesting stuff.

hmc · 09/03/2011 23:36

"Thing is though, I chose to have kids and like every job I have ever done I put in 150% and get it right. I couldn't commit myself to my job once I had children and still maintain the same attitude towards calls at silly hrs, staff blubbing at 10pm that their kids are sick! hey what about mine I might think.

I used to work 80 hrs plus in a very stressful job and perhaps one day I will again but not before I've achieved what I set out to do, raise my kids."

What you said Bath - right down to the 80 hours per week, with the exception that I am NEVER going back Grin

Quite honestly I think it would be morally reprehensible for me to work (quite apart from the fact that I don't want to! Grin) - they already have one parent who is absent from 7 am to 8pm every day, it wouldn't be right to factor in another one. Given that dh thrives on his work and I really didn't, it seemed the logical choice that I should quit, and quite frankly I am glad I did. Not only do I get a lot of time with the dc, but when they are at school I get to do stuff for me (am studying history atm and learning piano)....also we have a calm olderly leisurely life and don't have to deal with much pressure (because there aren't two adults run ragged). I know I am very fortunate and this isn't an option available to everyone, but I am not going to be told that it is a poor choice for boring women who are surrendered wives - because that's just Envy and [stupidity - insert an emoticon there isn't an appropriate one] talking