To get cheesed off with people telling me I should 'get a little job'?

[LukewarmBath]

My youngest child is due to start school in September. I am getting very fed up with people telling me (totally unasked for advice btw) that I need to 'get a little job'. One of the mums at school, who is a total busybody and doesn't know me very well at all, even printed off details about a lunchtime supervisor job that is going at the DC's school because she 'thought I'd like to get a little job as mini Lukewarm is going to school soon'. People constantly ask me if I'm going to get a job. Even family do it.

The fact is, I don't really need to work financially. DH has his own company and I do a lot of his admin work for him as well as lots of cold calling and dealing with invoices. But because it's from home, no one seems to think it's a proper job. I go to the gym, meet up with friends regularly and go on lots of nights out, so it's not like I need the 'adult interaction' from a job either.

I just wish people would mind their own business!

[fedupofnamechanging]

I do not like the phrase 'kept woman', when used to describe a sahm. I contribute as much to my family as my husband does - I consider that I do work, but my job doesn't directly generate money.

It does however, enable my husband to do his job. He would be unable to work as he does, if I was not here to cover child care etc.

[AdoraBell]

My sentiment exactly karmabeliver

My OH would earn much less and the family wouldn't have the lifestyle he likes to maintain if he had to be available to collect DDs from school mid afternoon and then bring them home and feed them each day. And that's just the normal child care, it doesn't allow for days off school.

[garlicagain]

Fiddlesticks. There are such things as nannies.

I'm not saying SAHPs don't work - you do - but there's no need to inflate the role, especially when you're talking to a poster who both parents full-time and works full-time.

There's some smug snobbery on this thread. It's unattractive.

[HappyMummyOfOne]

"kept woman" is true to a certain extent though. If you dont work then somebody else is paying to keep you in food, clothes etc.

Being a SAHP is not a job in any shape of form no matter how you dress it up and childcare options nowadays are so versatile that most professions can be covered. Given that so many believe their partners cannot work without them staying home to assist its hard to believe that so many others manage to both work

[fedupofnamechanging]

garlic, it depends on the jobs that the parents do, the number of dc they have etc. The OP works from home, in her dh's business - there is no difficulty for her to stay home with her kids if they are sick etc and to prioritise their needs. If you work for someone other than your husband, it can be a bit more tricky.

I think you need to earn a serious amount of money in order to pay for a nanny and if you need one to live in, then you also need a big enough house to provide room and she will need a car. A family needs to earn a serious amount of money imo, for that to be realistic.

I'm not saying that my dh couldn't work if I did too, but he couldn't do the type of work he does, unless I was here. Doing a job with fewer hours/less travel would result in a lower wage, so me working too, would just bring us to our current income.

I think what often happens is that women end up working full time, and doing most of the other stuff too.

For us, it is division of labour - we both do the thing we are best at, but I definitely believe that each of us needs the other equally, in order for it to work.

[Jan49]

"kept woman" is true to a certain extent though. If you dont work then somebody else is paying to keep you in food, clothes etc.

The person who is 'paying to keep you in food, clothes etc' is probably dependent on you to do the childcare and housework, so it's an interdependent relationship between the 2 parents where earning money, doing childcare etc is all divided between them.

[fedupofnamechanging]

Happy, you have one child? You might find it not so straightforward if faced with massive child care bills for more than one. Child care is not as versatile as you seem to believe.

As much as my husband is 'keeping' me, I am 'keeping' him. He is free to focus on his work, while I take care of the kids and the house and everything else that needs doing while he is working. He doesn't have to worry about anything here.

[fedupofnamechanging]

The HV overstepped the mark by offering her opinion that GoodTouch should be returning to work. Beyond her remit imo. Health visitors should confine themselves to weighing babies and sorting vaccinations. Few people want HVs telling them how they should be organising their family life - the exception to that being where there are concerns for the child's welfare or the parents have actually asked for help from the HV.

[propertyNIGHTmareBEFOREXMAS]

I think most of the fussing and trying to cajole you into a 'little job' are motivated by jealousy. The people bothering you would probably love to be you. In particular there is resentment towards SAHMs in receipt of child tax credits (which they would lose if they returned to work). Enjoy your SAHM lifestyle for as long as it is viable and makes you and your family happy.

[garlicagain]

Karma, HVs play a pivotal role in identifying domestic abuse and other deep-rooted problems. OK, that's not what you were talking about, and some do better work than others, but it's unfair to persist with the patronising comments.

Maybe the HV was on the alert for a "husband won't let me" type reply. Maybe she wasn't. No need to be supercilious.

(I am not a health visitor.)

[squoosh]

The HV was trying to give what she thought was encouragement, nothing wrong with that. And good on her for retraining in her forties. I'd be proud of myself if I was her.

[popupdrop]

I'm 33 and I've been a sahm since my DS was born 14 years ago. I was a single parent for some of that time and I've remarried now, in financial circumstances which mean I'll never need to work again. That is the main reason I've given to most people who ask (which is true), but the other reason is that I have some health problems and so does DS, but that is personal information that I wouldn't disclose to most people.

I have a rather bitchy neighbour though who seemed to revel in the idea that I'd be left destitute if my DH died or ever left me because I didn't have my own career, so I was more than happy to let her know about the various properties and investments he's transferred into my name

[MorganMummy]

Because I work evenings and weekends (teaching) one of my mummy acquaintances persists in saying 'oh well, maybe it will build up to something later' or 'well, it's really for YOU, isn't it?' (I.e. not financial/as valuable as DH job). I want to hit her. I work 0.5 and I do the times I do as it allows me to only have DH in childcare a bit and mostly be looked after my me, and to keep my employability up for when he's older. We could just afford for me not to work (with strict budgeting) and in fact I did quit my full-time role after ML when flexible working was refused. But personally I want both the career and extra money when DS is older, hence my 'little job'.

If I could afford it easily I might do as you do,nothing wrong with it at all, but people can't seem to mind their own business whatever you do (SAH, WOHM etc). So rude. And it is a cliche, but I suspect they are just jealous.

[MorganMummy]

The mummy acquaintance in question works 0.6, BTW, so half a day more than my 'little job',but it's 9-5 and in London so I suppose that's why it's a 'big job'.

[MorganMummy]

DH DS!

[VixZenFenchell]

My DH gets this constantly - when I finished mat leave, I returned to a high stress job (but decent salary) and he stayed at home with the babies, then toddlers. Now DS2 has started school everyone is asking when he's going to get a job.

Like the OP, he does all the tax/invoicing/admin/stuff for our small business. But because it's from home and he's free to take the boys to school, pick them up, walk the dog, be there for school holidays / interview days / sick days etc - it's not counted as proper work. I pay him a salary from the business, we pay tax and the NI equivalent on it, it's money the family would lose in my tax bill if he didn't do the work (& I'd have to do it evenings and weekends) - but it's not out of the house, in an office, so it's not working.

Nobody has yet had the temerity to ask him when he's going to go back to being a proper man though. Thank goodness, or I might have had to kill them.

I couldn't do the job I do (long hours, high stress, on call frequently and unpredictably) if he was not the fab sahp that he is. So he's not a "kept man" any more than a sahm is a "kept woman". Without him I couldn't work, we'd be on the streets. You might as easily say he's keeping me in employment!

Anyone who asks DH when he's going to get a job gets met with "I have at least 3 on the go already, that's enough for now thanks".

[ChubbyKitty]

I don't even have children yet and people ask me when I'm going to get a 'real job'.

That's right. 30 hours a week of being on my feet non stop, whilst sharing housework with DP is all fun and games and doesn't go towards keeping a roof over our heads or feeding us at all. Really.

This 'pin money' they all talk about - is it for sewing pins or hair pins, just out of interest...?

[ChubbyKitty]

Sorry I got a bit agitated. But I work as much as the company can afford to have me and I work hard and so does DP and people think that we are 'lazy student types' because typically we start later in the day and therefore have a different sleeping pattern, and occasionally on a day off, we might have a lie in the horror

[ravenAK]

I wouldn't like to be financially dependent on dh. I like to be wearing one leg of the trousers, on the basis that I've paid for that leg.

& if I were in the situation of not working whilst my partner did, I'd worry about some sort of cataclysmic break up where he ran off with a winsome milkman & cashed everything in to pay for plastic surgery & exotic pharmaceuticals.

I've seen too many apparently sane contemporaries (male & female) abruptly take it into their heads to push the 'Fuck It' button on their relationships to be overly complacent that it could never happen.

That said, nowt to do with random mums at school etc. If you are managing financially as a family, you've weighed up the risk of being left skint should you separate, & you're enjoying life, they can bog off & worry about their own lives.

For that matter, you could make a plausible argument that if you don't need or want to work, by taking work outside the home you'd be denying a scarce job to someone else who needs it more?

[BigBoobiedBertha]

Just tell them you don't know how you would fit a 'little job' in around the job you have already along with a face like . I expect most of them don't realise how much you do, not that it is anybody else's business.

I work for my DH too although I have the advantage that he has an office so I can get a little bit dressed up to go to work and I have to physically leave the house. I don't do that many hours though and I don't work in the holidays unless I can do it from home. It works for us, saves a bit on his tax bill and keeps his salary bill down. Dh also employs another woman on a term time only basis, and another one works part time so she can walk her dog, so nobody bats an eyelid about me not being there every week - it is normal and if any of the other staff need a bit of flexibility they can have it, so long as they do their hours. I think more places should do that if they can. Perhaps there would be more acceptance of those who don't do the traditional 9-5 in the office with 4 or 5 week holiday.

I don't know who all these judgey people think they are. It is none of their business what the OP does and it is none of their business if she has found a flexible way of working that doesn't require her to be out of the house all day and have to use childcare.

If you could be arsed, type up what you do for you DH as an official looking job description, and say you've recently got this job and don't think you could fit a 'little job' around it.

[GoodTouchBadTouch]

"The HV was trying to give what she thought was encouragement, nothing wrong with that"

Rubbish, she was poking her nose in to our finances. I wouldn't have asked her if the reason behind her re-training was because her husband left her for a younger woman. Or tell a working mother that I wouldn't dream of marrying a man who couldn't provide for his family. I don't know why I have to put up with it.

I think jealousy does come into it to be honest. Its as if they hope Ill be left with nothing.

[minibmw2010]

I work from home, about 25 hours or so a week so only 10 hours off full time (did a35 he week in my last firm) while DS is in Nursery. My DH's friends always make jokes about me watching Cash in the Attic or similar shit. Really gets on my nerves. I'm busier than I ever was working FT in the City.

[whiteandyellowiris]

Regardless if you go to work or not, there's always some fucker that will try n have a pop at you

So.might aswell.just do whatever you want to do
That's the way I see it