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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To hate the label 'full time mummy'

389 replies

ilovenautical · 28/08/2016 08:42

Have 0 tolerance for mums that put down working mums & label themselves full time mummy's - seriously?! Does that mean working mums are part time? So when we drop child off to day care/family/CM we are no longer parents? We no longer think about DC and if they were unwell we would just wait till non working hours to see them? Grrrr infuriates me!! am I the only one?

OP posts:

Stevefromstevenage · 28/08/2016 18:53

If you work, you do not parent your child 100% of the time needed. You pay someone else to look after your child while you are elsewhere. Therefore you do not parent full time. Of course you are a mum, you love your child, but you are not actively parenting them in this time. You are parenting them part of the time. Part time.

I work as does DH. We are lucky that we no longer use as form of childcare now our 3 children go to primary school. I am off school holidays and DH works from home and does before and after school and catches up during holidays. Who is the part time parent in our situation? Are we both because the teachers are acting parents during the school day. am genuinely flummoxed.

Brokenbiscuit · 28/08/2016 18:57

Please dont say things like that its not only SAHP you are insulting but all mothers. It IS a job, it takes time and effort and if you werent doing it someone else would be paid to do it. The more you add into this assumption that it isnt something that should be as valued as paid work is but should just be something that it is assumed women will do as their duty without payment or acknolwedgement, you are adding to the oppression of all mothers.

The interesting assumption that you make, hedgehog, is that if mothers don't do the childcare, someone else will have to be paid to do it. I find that assumption to be one that contributes to the oppression of women.

When I am at work, my DH cares for our dd, and vice versa. Why do you assume that fathers have no role in this?

I spend far more time looking after my daughter than I do in my so-called full-time job. For me, it's a hugely important aspect of my life, and yes, sometimes it's hard work, but it will never be a job for me, and I'd be really sorry to look at it that way.

motherducker · 28/08/2016 18:59

I've noticed there's always just a certain type^ of person who puts "full time mummy" as their "job" position.

It's not a job. You are not paid for it, you do not accrue holidays, parenting is just a way of life if you have children it's not a fucking job.^

Fucking hell chill out, isn't it more a way of saying "this is why I'm not working", like saying you're studying, or travelling, or something. I think most people are aware it isn't an official "job".

FRETGNIKCUF · 28/08/2016 19:08

Broken

There will be the extremes where SAHM accuse WOHM of providing less care for their children and WOHM accusing SAHM of not financially providing. Both are bullshit.

Binkybix · 28/08/2016 19:08

Who is the part time parent in our situation? Are we both because the teachers are acting parents during the school day. am genuinely flummoxed

Yes, I would define you both as part time parents in this scenario. Because you spend a fair chunk of your time not doing parenting.

Brokenbiscuit · 28/08/2016 19:10

Fret, you've missed the point. I am not accusing anyone of not providing for their children.

Rather, I'm seeking to clarify whether those who insist that full time parents cannot work outside the home believe that parents have a responsibility to provide for their children or not.

Providing is either a part of parenting or it isn't. Don't see how you can have it both ways.

FRETGNIKCUF · 28/08/2016 19:16

So single mothers who have to care for a disabled child aren't providing therefore not decent parents?

Not black and white is it?

bibbitybobbityyhat · 28/08/2016 19:22

Wish Mumsnet could have a sort of newbies corner where those of you who haven't been around for the eleventy million previous threads on this tired old subject could thrash it out in private.

NavyandWhite · 28/08/2016 19:23

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

UmbongoUnchained · 28/08/2016 19:23

Well the title is fairly obvious on what the theads about...

OldGuard · 28/08/2016 19:24

writer thanks for clarification - so to answer your question ....

Yes I feel guilty every single day - I work because I have to because if I didn't there would be no income - I also need to earn a certain amount for all the needs my son has who has significant special needs (medical) - I hate being away from my children although acknowledge that being away from them does allow them to develop a certain independence from me which is not a bad thing (I've never seen my children as "mine" to do with what I please but rather entrusted in my care to guide them and give them tools to make their own decisions when they are adults)

Because I have to work I take the attitude that I may as well make the best of it - and it turns out I'm quite good at it - so I've risen to a level where I have a great deal of flexibility - I drop the children to their school, I watch after school activities, I volunteer where I can - I spend time with them, I can leave and get them if they are ill - but I also have help in many ways because I can't be everywhere at the same time

I am lucky in so many ways - not every working mother is as fortunate as I am - but yes guilt is something that is attached to my soul as much as if I was born with it

Brokenbiscuit · 28/08/2016 19:24

So single mothers who have to care for a disabled child aren't providing therefore not decent parents?

I'm not sure if you're wilfully misunderstanding my question or just not very good at interpreting written text.

I'm not accusing anyone of not providing, nor am I accusing anyone of failing to be a decent parent.

I am asking if, as a general rule, you believe that parents have a duty to provide for their children.

I am not talking about the relatively rare situations in which, for whatever reason, parents are not able to provide for their kids. Obviously, in those situations, the state should step in to help, just as they should step in to assist parents who cannot care for their children without some external support. But that's not what we're talking about.

FRETGNIKCUF · 28/08/2016 19:29

The only general rule I have is that most of us are doing our best. I have loads of judgemental wankery opinions on what other people do with their lives tried to reconcile the way I do things world best for my family and is no reflection upon how anyone else should do it.

FRETGNIKCUF · 28/08/2016 19:31

Most SAHMs I know are married and do provide for their kids, those that are single and broke are usually stuck with the most shitty non choices. Do a low paid crap job in order to pay other low paid people to look after their kids when they don't want to leave them or stay at home and be dirt poor. Either way they're dirt poor.

SparklyShinyThings · 28/08/2016 19:32

Broken, I'd say providing for a child is a very basic of parenting and responsibility. Those that claim they can't parent and work usually don't actually want to work so it's a convenient excuse.

A SAHP isn't providing for a child unless they have a private income or mass savings. A WOHP doesn't necessarily do less care than a SAHP. Children go to school, have activities, play dates, have babysitters regardless of a parents employment status.

Parenting isn't a job, it's a chosen role.

FRETGNIKCUF · 28/08/2016 19:33

And many WOHM Mum's are overstretched doing a full time job, all housework, no time, or part time hours with a full time job.

A few of us get exactly what we want. Professional women usually afford help and love their jobs. And the pay iMac job satisfaction overrides any down side.

FRETGNIKCUF · 28/08/2016 19:35

Erm iMac was and!!

amprev · 28/08/2016 19:38

I think pretty much everyone can agree that it's the mummy part of this title that induces the urge to puke. I don't have a paid job - I stopped my paid job when I had our first DD ten years ago. I have yet to find a title that I am completely happy with tbh. A tradesman came to the house on Friday to quote for a job and he asked me what I did, and off guard I told him that I didn't work . I have no exerience of doing a paid job whilst I have been a parent. I do 20+ hours voluntary work a week for a charity and for my children's school (as a governor and a classroom volunteer), but unlike a paid role, I know deep down I could drop the voluntary work at a moments notice (even though I wouldn't, people rely on me). I 100% feel the SAHM title is disrespected. I think that the parents I know do feel they have it harder than me. I feel resentful at the hours of free before school and after school childcare favours I do that affects the time I have with my own children. I can't shake the feeling that I shouldnt say no to these requests purely on the basis that I don't want to look after someone else's child. I think it makes me look mean so if I can help out, I will.

All I can compare is my experience of working in a paid role before I had children and my role now, and my role now is much more challenging. Of course the parents who work remain parents for the hours that their children are in childcare, but surely in paying for care they are not, for those hours, the child's primary care giver, which is why I think, those people give themselves the full time bit on their title. I do think the unrelenting, full time-Ness of parenthood is the hard bit and so I can understand why some feel it gains them kudos to refer to themselves in this way.

I know an equal mix of parents who say that they go to work for a break and those who make the snide comments to me about having the life of Riley. I think annoyance at these titles just reflects how individuals feel about their role. I don't think I could be happy with holding down a paid job while I am a parent - I'm not good in shades of grey/juggling situations. When I worked I was in the office til 9 most nights, same when I was at Uni and same as a parent - I am at my best when I focus on a single task. This is perhaps my weakness but we have made our lives work around our strengths. In saying to the tradesman that I don't work though suggests to me that part of me still thinks that the role of SAHM isn't 'enough', which makes me sad. It means I put pressure on myself (volunteering etc) and has meant that I do struggle to ever properly turn off.

Brokenbiscuit · 28/08/2016 19:44

OK, so you're not going to answer the question, Fret. Fair enough.

For the sake of clarity, I'm not arguing that parents who are unable to provide for their children - either because they choose to look after their kids full time or because of circumstances beyond their control - are somehow "less" than parents who do provide. I'm not arguing that at all.

What I am saying is that I think it's quite perverse to argue that providing for children is not one aspect of parenting, and actually quite an important one. And that I therefore think it's absurd to argue that parents who work in order to provide for their children somehow stop parenting while they are at work. They don't.

Brokenbiscuit · 28/08/2016 19:47

amprev, if they chose to describe themselves as a full-time care-giver, then I would have no issue with that. Full-time parent and full-time care-giver have rather different connotations.

FRETGNIKCUF · 28/08/2016 19:59

It's not perverse.

I think it's indicative of how our society is geared up to think usefulness is only possible if its financial. Full time is a working term. I simply don't see that saying one is a full time mother instantly means that if you work you're not, it's preposterous, same as not working means not providing. My children are provided for by our family unit, I don't work. It suits us and we are lucky to make a choice.

amprev · 28/08/2016 20:02

Broken I agree, bit I would have felt a dick saying that to the joiner

Brokenbiscuit · 28/08/2016 20:10

I think it's indicative of how our society is geared up to think usefulness is only possible if its financial.

Nobody is actually saying that though. What I am saying is that providing financially is a part of parenting, not the be-all and end-all. You provide for and look after your kids via a particular division of labour within the family unit. My DH and I choose to divide that labour differently. That's no big deal, and it just boils down to personal preference.

My point is merely that childcare is only one part of parenting, while providing financially is another. And yes, it is perverse to argue otherwise, because kids need to eat and to have somewhere to live.

Brokenbiscuit · 28/08/2016 20:11

Broken I agree, bit I would have felt a dick saying that to the joiner

Yes indeed!

FRETGNIKCUF · 28/08/2016 20:18

I'm not sure what purpose a thread like this has aside from being critical to mothers.

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