I wince when women refer to being a mum as "a job"

[CQuin]

It's so mimsy ish, so martyr and yet at the same time.

Our parents would never have said this, is it just the heightened expectations everyone has for everything thee days ?
Would dads say this?

Eg I have two jobs, I'm a mother (or worse "mummy ") and a hat maker." (or whatever )

Fuck off.

rainrain my interpretation is that it stems from SAHM not being happy with the way they are perceived....they want to qualify what they do as 'a job'...

if i cared for a parent and someone asked me what is my job. I would reply that I cant work as I take care of my mum/dad

But this thread wasn't started by a SAHM (or whatever!) getting angry at what a mother in paid employment called herself, was it?

i dunno....is CQuin a SAHM? I have no idea

I think it stems from both SAHMs and WOHMs feeling unhappy about how they are perceived

I dont actually care what other people call themselves TBH. I just find it mildly weird that you would describe relationships as 'jobs'...

In RL, i dont know anyone who gives a fuck how others perceive them, SAHM or WOHM/WAHM....

Do you really find it 'weird'?

I find it a little bit weird if someone says it's their job

Or maybe just a bit inaccurate

But IRL it rarely comes up and it's not something I give a lot of thought to

Stuff like that website makes me boak though because it's so bloody twee

if i cared for a parent and someone asked me what is my job. I would reply that I cant work as I take care of my mum/dad

So next time someone asks what "I do" I will say, I can't work, I take care of my kids

That will go down very well I am sure.

Calling it a relationship is very abstract to me and doesn't relate atall to the substantive work involved in being a SAHP in the average working day. Like in a job there are things you have to do, should be doing to do the job right. To say it is just a relationship awards nothing to those efforts and so it is a completely inaccurate description.

Utterly baffled that this would bother anyone. Really?! Gosh some people must be terribly sensitive/insecure if how another adult describes how they spend their time causes so much upset.

I cringe whenever someone vociferously insists that SAHP is a job (the hardest one ever, indeed), no breaks, no time off. Why bother? When you desperately try to justify your existence by exaggerating how difficult it is, and conveniently forgetting the advantages, you come across as a pathetic martyr.

Don?t compare being SAHP with your pre-children working life. If you?re going to compare the worst of staying at home, compare it with the worst of being a working parent. The latter is often described through rose-tinted glasses about how you can go to the toilet in peace, or browse the shops in your lunch hour.

Whereas for many people, it?s actually very stressful to be the only breadwinner. You don't switch off from being a parent while you're at work, you still worry about them and think of them. You bust your arse to meet targets to keep that job, and that lauded lunch hour is actually spent paying bills or working through so you can leave on time. When you get home, all that stuff that SAHP can do leisurely through the day ? cooking, cleaning, washing, admin ? it?s all waiting for you, but you want to see your kids too.

Being a parent is not a job, just as being a wife or a brother or a son is a job. Being a parent is a role and a relationship - important ones, if you strive to do it well.

You are not a cleaner/chef/taxi driver/nurse. Your labour is not valued at 100k. You do not meet the professional standards for all of these occupations, you don?t have anyone scrutinising your work or managing your time. You did not have to apply for the job, maintain professional skills or meet development targets. You are not accountable to any professional bodies, nor are you bound by any particular guidelines or rules. In the vast majority of cases, you can concentrate fully on childcare, knowing that your needs are being provided for by someone else.

It is hard work ? but you have considerable freedom to do it as you see fit, so recognise and enjoy that fact. And if it sucks so badly, do something else.

I have never heard anyone doing this though. All I hear is SAHMs being ashamed of what they do and bigging up the bits and pieces they do that is not childcare/keeping the home fires burning. Which I find abit sad and further evidence of how society really doesnt value looking after your own DC. IMO the anti SAHM vitriol is misplaced.

Also - a job is something which has or creates value for someone other than you & yours. Nobody pays us for making our own dinner, doing our gardening, washing our clothes or cleaning our houses. Nor should they.

To all the people saying paid childcare workers have a job, so SAHM is a job - let's be generous and leave aside the fact that you don't apply for the job, nobody's supervising you, you can't get fired, you don't need any training or qualifications.

Paid childcare has a value to you, because your child is important to you and you presumably care about their wellbeing. The actual childcare worker gets no benefit from it. So you compensate them with a salary.

The analogy would be that you have sex with your partner because you both enjoy it, hence neither charges the other. But if one of you wanted titillation from a third party who wasn't doing it for their own enjoyment, you pay for it, aka. prostitution. (NB: An industry I emphatically do not support, used only for illustration!)

I'm guessing nobody charges their partner for sex, so why would you for childcare?

A person who raises decent well brought up citizens who pay taxes has created a a value to society. I wish we didn't live in a world that only valued money, You sound really bitter fenix makes me sad.

But attempting to place a monetary value upon a voluntary role is equally sad. It doesn't increasde its value to society.

In many ways society has every right to expect, nay demand, that wll we parents raise good citizens. We can't expect a reward for it in terms of respect.

No need to feel sorry for me! I agree that raising children adds value for society, if done well.

I am saying that all parents - working or otherwise - can add value in this way. Being an exclusive SAHP doesn't mean you're doing a better job that any other parent who does outside work as well.

When people push it too far and act like SAHP have the hardest job in the history of mankind, they risk losing sympathy and respect for the very people they are trying to support.

Well, I still refuse to say I do nothing, I certainly don't do "nothing", I don't have a career or a paying job, but I work bloody hard raising my children, one of them with additional needs who I actually get paid to care for, I'm disabled with multiple illnesses, doing day to day stuff is actually bloody hard for me, raising kids is hard, I don't want a medal or anything, I just don't want to answer people asking me what my occupation is with "I don't do anything" or "I'm disabled" as if that's what my day's work entails.

Fair enough, by definition I do not have a job. I do not collect wages (barring carers allowance, but that again doesn't really qualify as a job because I am a carer for my daughter.

I am not a nothing, I am not a nobody. My career is not Disabled. So what can I say other than I work hard at being a mum. At raising my children well. Maybe it seems insignificant to you, but to me I feel useless enough having a body and mind that let me down so often, without being told that my role is not worthy of being considered work, or a job. And that I am wrong to consider it so.

Except the monetary (paid or unpaid) bit of defining mum as a job is bothering a lot of people here.

All I can say (apart from kerala, I appreciate what you are saying but you sound really unhappy with what you do - I hope you get happier in whatever you do next) - is that as a self employed breadwinner, I don't object to any way mums describe themselves. how you self identify is up to you and good luck with it.

If you are an employable adult and not currently employed purely because you are with your children all day or whenever they are not at school, then surely 'sahm or 'full-time mum' is your employment status?

You would otherwise be 'employed' or 'actively seeking work'.

How else could you describe your status? 'Unemployed' is very misleading.

I worked for 13 yrs up until my 1st child was born and will return to work when childcare will no longer be needed.

It does not mean that a mum who works is a part-time mum, it's just a way to describe your employment status, or am I missing the point?

Sorry! i didn't mean kerala, I meant Fenix. Fenix, you sound tired and unhappy. I hope things get better.

Rabbits, you work harder and have more on your plate than me, at least. i take my hat off to you. You can call it a job. that's what I mean by self- define.

Of course you don't do nothing.

I'm a full time mother= 5 words people trot out occasionally and often without much thought. If a wohm doesn't like it or is offended by it, this says more about her and perhaps underlying issues she has. I often say this cos it's a pretty accurate description of what I do. Don't care if it offends.

Sorry I don't mean to be miserable like that, I just had a very difficult bedtime with the children, and I am emotional. Questions like what do you do for a living, or what is your job/occupation make me feel inadequate because I can't do anything but feel like a burden.

I am looking for something I can do from home around my life, but I have to adjust to this life first, it's not easy. Right now I face homelessness due to not qualifying for an extra room for my daughter, who needs it due to being a risk, and so I couldn't afford my rent after a silly mistake stopped my benefits. But because I have worked up debts over the years trying to cope with my health issues, it's all complicated. I have to fight to get my daughter diagnosed, fight to get the money I need and she needs, fight to make sure we don't end up in a bed and breakfast which will do neither me nor her any favours. Phonecalls, letters, appointments, meetings, I do them all, along with medical appointments for me (arthritis, kidney disease and mental health) my DD (non-diagnosed behavioural disorder, most likely ADHD) and my son (partially deaf, suspected ADD). I have to prioritise food and keeping a roof over our heads over finding education I can do and that provides me with an opportunity to find a work from home career.

But it's not a job, it's not work. :(

just because something is not 'a job' doesn't mean it isn't tough. or tougher than a job