To think this colleague could be a SAHM if she wanted to be

[doingthesplitz]

I work part time and a woman I work with is always sighing and saying 'Oh you're sooo lucky you get to stay at home with your children.' Oh, I'd love to be a stay at home mum', 'oh sigh' 'oh woe' etc.

I have every sympathy with mothers who would love to stay at home but can't afford to, and equally no problem with mothers who would go demented at home and prefer to go out to work.

But this woman, constantly moaning about 'having to go to work' is taking the whole family to Florida this Summer, drives an expensive car, arrives in every monring with a takeaway latte in hand, buys her lunch every day at a costly deli down the road, and thinks nothing of spending a hundred quid on a hand bag or a pair of shoes. It's her money, she can do what she likes with it, but I'm fed up of her doing a martyr act and making out I'm much luckier than her. No, I'm not. We will be sharing a house in the country with my sister and her family for our Summer holidays; we drive an old car; I make my own sandwiches for work and have never owned a really expensive bag or pair of shoes. That's why I can afford to work part time.

AIBU to think this woman enjoys coming to work but just wants to make out it's a huge sacrifice to get sympathy and attention?

BigBoobiedBertha I get it. You've been on MN a while then ?

becertainstar they are lovely stories.

However, whilst I do agree with some of points you make. I would argue against you believing in bad luck but not good luck. You say your Dad (who sounds amazing btw and I feel slightly bad using him as an example when I don't know him at all and you know him so well as I am arguing about your terminology not his experience), had really bad luck to have the childhood that he did, but then cite his intelligence and capacity for good work as 'glimmers of chance'. Surely that's just another way of saying good luck that he had both of those characteristics and was able to turn his life around.

I do however completely agree with you that it is incredibly hard to do well in life without hardwork and that people who sit around waiting for good luck to happen to them, whilst moaning about their lot and doing nothing to change their own circumstances will have a very long wait.

What's the famous Gary Player quote 'The harder I work the luckier I get'

arabesque are you the thread police .

I did nothing but answer the question that the OP posed in her thread title, she dismissed me because she didn't agree with me and because I assume my answer made her feel uncomfortable with some of the preconceived ideas she has about life.

Glad you liked the stories they are both people who inspire me a great deal. I guess some of it is just terminology... But surely we all know plenty of intelligent failures, who are full of self-pity and 'oh I just never got the break' attitude?

I think my dad's capacity for hard work was the deciding factor - his intelligence would have counted for nothing if he hadn't been prepared to carry bricks on a building site all day and study all night. And can that be called 'good luck'? My sister sent me this link recently with 'Remind you of anyone???' in the subject line. My dad might not be a genius but that HL Mencken quote - it's about halfway down - ?Looking back over a life of hard work ? my only regret is that I didn?t work even harder.? - that should be on my dad's tombstone!

Whilst I don't know your colleagues situation I do know people used to think the same about me but what they didn't realise was that whilst me working afforded us some luxuries, me not working would have meant we couldn't pay the bills.

I disagree with you too MrsLynam. Not because I have 'preconceived ideas about life' but because the OP was quite right - different people make different choices. Most choices involve give and take. In the OPs scenario the OP had decided to 'give' on some of the factors that can make life more comfortable and to 'take' more time for doing things she wanted to do. The colleague had decided to 'give' of her time in the home in order to 'take' more money to provide a comfortable lifestyle for her family. OP was happy with her choice and getting on with it. Colleague was moaning and telling the OP how 'lucky' she was while ignoring the fact that OP had made certain sacrifices also.

Anyway, I must be about the tenth person to point this out and you seem to assume you're in the right and everyone else is in the wrong. So I will take it as read that you disagree totally with me.

Whilst I don't know your colleagues situation I do know people used to think the same about me but what they didn't realise was that whilst me working afforded us some luxuries, me not working would have meant we couldn't pay the bills. [quote]

But I bet you didn't go around telling people who were working part time and not having luxuries that they were 'very lucky'. I think that's the crucial difference.

I think you're right a lot of it is terminology. I decided about 10 years ago that I wanted to career change, but before I could do this I had to work very hard to pay off debts, and try and fit in some study around this. Whilst I was in the middle of the hardwork getting where I wanted to be, I may have seen someone who was doing a job they loved, or having holidays I couldn't afford and thought (or even said out loud), that they were really lucky.

When I said this, it wasn't doubting that they had put in lots of hardwork and had it all handed to them on a plate, often I may have had no idea of the full details of their everyday life, all I meant was that at that particular moment in time wasn't it great for them that life was treating them well.

vintageclock but I agree that the colleague is annoying, what I don't agree with is the assumption that just because the colleague wants to become a SAHM or be part-time she can be.

Well, if someone was working with me and moaning about how they'd love to work part time while at the same time booking really expensive holidays and buying new fancy cars and designer shoes and handbags and expensive lunches I too would be thinking 'Well work fucking part time then and stop whinging'.

I work full time and have a good paid job and a good lifestyle.

I genuinly couldn't afford to be a SAHM though as I am the sole breadwinner in the house and pay for all the essentials, the fact that my wage allows for extras on top of the essentials says nothing about the underlying necessity to work.

I could afford to take a lower paid job I suppose, but that is not the question

(BTW I dont want to be a SAHM, as a personal choice, but still)

Well, if someone was working with me and moaning about how they'd love to work part time while at the same time booking really expensive holidays and buying new fancy cars and designer shoes and handbags and expensive lunches I too would be thinking 'Well work fucking part time then and stop whinging'.

BUT IT ISN'T ALWAYS THAT FUCKING EASY!

Honestly, the lack of any concept that a woman may be in circumstances in which she doesn't have a choice over the hours that she works really is completely alien to some of you.

They are not people who have to work, they are people who choose to work because they like buying the things they buy

Dont see whats wrong with that personally. I do it, but wold still love to work parttime.

MrsLynam

The OP has said that part time work is available to anyone who wants it so the colleague does have the option of reducing her working hours.
We are not being dense (despite your rude shouting) we are taking the various facts into consideration.

vintageclock but we know nothing about the colleague's home life.

We also only have the OP's version of events. The holiday could have been paid for by someone else in the family, the latte's and lunch from a Deli owned by her brother and she gets a massive discount.

It's the assumption that lots of you are making that she isn't the primary wage earner in the house, that there must of course be a husband at home earning enough money to support them both that I find so completely objectionable.

MrsLynam

I work with this woman, we sit side by side and she talks a lot about her life.
She has a husband who also works in the public sector but is more senior than either of us - and going on the public sector pay scales would be earning a good bit more than dh.

The holiday was not paid for by family and the deli is not owned by her brother.

She did not win her new Honda Civic in a raffle etc etc.

I don't care if she buys herself the Taj Mahal; I just don't want to listen to her banging on and moaning.

Inspired by some of the responses on this thread, when she was moaning this morning about missing out on the lovely weather because she was 'stuck in this kip' I said 'have you ever thought of going part time?'.
She replied 'Oh God, I dream of it. I couldn't afford to though'.

So I said 'no, I used to think that and then I sat down and really looked into it and I worked out that without a holiday, and by hanging onto the car instead of changing it and blah blah blah, we could just about afford it'.
She said 'yeah, my mum's always telling me that. But I'm a creature of comforts. I just couldn't live like that - no offence splitz, not criticising your life or anything'.

So I just smiled and left it at that.

Good for you for asking her and letting us all know. She clearly is just one of life's moaners

I can go away and get on with my life now, although I'm still disappointed with the misogynist assumptions so many posters make about women in the workplace but hey ho.

the op's colleague does sound a bit annoying but with high house prices, high rental prices, low wage increases and paying for your degree, she does seem to be exception to the rule.

surely most people work because they need to pay the bills?

I think really you don't get to have it all. You can be pleased with what you have, you can strive for more, or you can moan about the thing you can't have.

Many people work because they want to and they have great childcare.