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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To be shm after children are at school

921 replies

Notthinkingclearly · 05/02/2017 17:45

I have 2 dc who are 6 and 9. Since my first child was born i have been a stay at home mum. My DH works away alot abroad so I am often on my own. My Dc's have not been the most robust and have both had quite a few weeks off school with legitimate reasons over the last few years with hospital appointments. I have felt that if I had been at work I would have been a rubbish employee. I seem to be really busy all the time but feel I am constantly justifying to everyone why I don't have a job. I look after a relations 2 year old one day a week, help in school one day a week and I am a member of the schools PTA. I don't go out apart from supermarket or a walk during the week and only ever sit down to eat my lunch during the day. Am I as spoilt and lazy as I am made to feel?

OP posts:
WizardSally · 06/02/2017 19:35

No I don't have a term time job. We have a school friend mum who does childcare for her DS's friends so will use her. We save up all of our annual leave to take off with the kids and arrange a lot of activities for them that can include things like football camp. I can sometimes take my work home with me if needs be too.

Bambambini · 06/02/2017 19:36

Wizard - I think you're a bit jelly - unclench a little. You seem a little over invested.

StealthPolarBear · 06/02/2017 19:36

Former our breakfast and after school club is really cheap, plus we are both lucky enough to be able to shift our hours around. I often pick up a couple of times a week, or if they do go to after school club it might just be half an hour.

Believeitornot · 06/02/2017 19:37

*Today 19:19 elektrawoman

No-one had yet answered my question - honestly when you are working, how do you manage children being sick (one of mine has just been off school for a week), school holidays, INSET days, school meetings, appointments?
Do you have to take the time unpaid?*

I share leave with Dh, we have flexible jobs and can work at home. Plus we still have a nanny.

We basically pay for someone to be at home just in case so we can work.

However I'd never want to be a SAHM because financial security is so important to me. My mum was a single mum and didn't have many skills so ended up in benefits. I prefer to retain my high earning potential.

Saying that I'm thinking of taking a big pay cut but it would still enable me to keep my professional qualification up.

I find SAHMs who judge WOHMs and vice versa really sad. We all want the best for our dcs and neither option is the best one imo.

mambono5 · 06/02/2017 19:37

My kids are in school so we don't need childcare

Are you working term-time only? My kids are at school, and we definitively need childcare!

It's horrific to have such a narrow minded view of a SAHM: she cooks and she cleans. Having so little interests in life yourself doesn't mean that other people are the same. It's also very naive to pretend that every worker in this country has a fascinating job that they love and have been dreaming of since they were a child.

It's fine to make your own choices, but raising your kids with such a narrow-minded view of the world is not something to be proud of. You might "do nothing" if you stay at home, , thankfully other people are more interesting.

Bambambini · 06/02/2017 19:38

Wizard - what will you do when you retire? Are you worried about how you will cope?

NataliaOsipova · 06/02/2017 19:38

Having my DC think I do nothing and that it is ok to do so is not worth any amount of enjoyment I would get from doing hobbies/interests/seeing friends all day every day.

And having my DC be able to tell their friends "Oh, my mummy works for a big swanky bank in Canary Wharf and drives a Maserati" is not worth missing out on being at home with them when they were tiny and being able to take them to school and spend holiday time with them while they're still little.

As I say - your setup works for you and your family. Good for you. Ours works for us. Good for us.

mambono5 · 06/02/2017 19:39

My kids are in school so we don't need childcare

followed by

We have a school friend mum who does childcare for her DS's friends so will use her.

brilliant. Grin Grin Grin

NoMoreAngstPls · 06/02/2017 19:40

I love the way the minute you explain how you manage holidays,people jump in to say they couldn't do it. Of course it wouldn't work for everyone, but the vast majority of people would be able to sort something out.

Also, for all the people who can't afford after school care.....really?! After school club can cost less than £10 a day, so even if breakfast club cost 10 too, you'd have to be earning way less than minimum wage not to be able to manage. And even with school hols, at least a third could be covered with basic stat leave plus BHs.

Specu1ation · 06/02/2017 19:41

Wizard - FYI I have an Msc and was working in a professional capacity (which I'm sure you would have approved of) before becoming pregnant with DC1.

My priorities changed when I had DC and It was a simple as that really.

My DC are growing up in a home where they are very much loved and with two committed parents. DH and I do not need to be fulfilling the same role, or juggling roles, to be "equal". He has the utmost respect for what I do and vice versa. He has paid for their education and I have done 95 per cent of homework / school / extra-curricular support. My DC will grow up to be whatever they want to be but I hope they don't grow up to be as narrow minded as you.

NoMoreAngstPls · 06/02/2017 19:41

If I was a WOH single parent, i would be boggled by this thread....

Bambambini · 06/02/2017 19:42

"And I still don't see how spending every single day doing hobbies and essentially just pottering about is anywhere near as fulfilling as doing a job that you might not particularly enjoy but it's what the rest of the world have to grin and bear. "

That doesn't sound very fulfilling though- doing a job you don't particularly enjoy and have to grin and bear. Why the race to the bottom?

GetAHaircutCarl · 06/02/2017 19:43

We never used child care.

We just kinda worked it out between us. I'm free lance ( so make my own diary) and DH is super senior in his role, so makes his own diary mostly.

I certainly don't need to work. TBH we could probably both give up. But we don't want to. We like our work.

I very much doubt I'll retire. Most people in my line continue.

grobagsforever · 06/02/2017 19:44

Jeepers this thread is doing my head in. Everyone is fully entitled to make their own choices. But please stop insisting it's impossible to work with school aged DC!!

I am a widowed parent with a demanding job and a two and six year old. I bloody make it work because I refuse to live on benefits. And there is only ONE of me.

No I don't make it to school activities much. Who cares really? DC1 understands that's mummy works to provide for us and she's proud of me. Children can get their heads round thus stuff.

And yes, I'm able to work because my salary covers childcare. Because I didn't quit after DC1 and preserved my earning potential.

You think divorce or death will never happen to you. But there is a fifty percent chance one or the other will.

So sure, be a SAHM. But acknowledge the risk and stop pretending you have no choice.

GimmeeMoore · 06/02/2017 19:45

Yep you've nailed it grobagsforever

lizzieoak · 06/02/2017 19:46

Natalia and Mambo Flowers

People in jobs that pay well/they find fulfilling at times seem to grapple with the concept that childcare plus transportation costs plus work clothes can come quite close to your take home pay. At which point you may wonder why you're so knackered and never see your kids. Or that it's just crap dragging yourself to a boring job when you find a domestic life a lot more intellectually stimulating & fulfilling.

I'm not sure why they grapple w these concepts, they do not appear tricky.

NoMoreAngstPls · 06/02/2017 19:46

Well said!

lalalalyra · 06/02/2017 19:46

What I find really weird is that I know a couple who are the same age as my DH and I. They are in a similar financial position, but have no kids. She's retired and he works one day a week. They go on a lot of holidays, have beautifully fancy cars and have a great lifestyle and no-one asks them questions like "what do you do all day?" People accept that she does voluntary stuff, she lunches and she shops. He plays a lot of golf and books lots of holidays. People envy it and praise it and think it's great that they've worked so hard they are in that position.

We are in almost the same position, but with kids and somehow I'm a lazy failure because I don't show my kids that I work for the sake of working - how does that work?

We don't need me to work so I don't. We don't need my husband to do his long hours/lots of trips away job so after this contract he won't. If my children, boys or girls, are in the position of being able to chose their work status in terms of staying home with kids or going on holidays at my age then I'll be delighted.

Me staying in my previous learning support job working schools hours and term time earning a pittance just because most of the rest of the world does would teach my children what exactly? Because me working 9-5 in a job and sending my kids to childcare just to make some sort of point would be absolute madness.

NoMoreAngstPls · 06/02/2017 19:47

That was to grobags!

GetAHaircutCarl · 06/02/2017 19:47

grobag there's a narrative that goes, man must have complete flexibility to be successful, and needs to be excused all domestic duties or the 'stress' will get him.

One wonders why these men bother having DC at all Wink.

autumnglow · 06/02/2017 19:47

I think the older the school child the more attention and time they need with homework, taxiing, councilling etc never under estimate your presence. The fact that they can come home to home cooked from a mum who's shopped for the nicest food, to a house that's clean, tidy and comforting is so special. My eldest is in yr 6 and I've gone back after 5 yrs - only because it's pt flexi and the pat is amazing- but I'll give it up if anything changes

BitchQueen90 · 06/02/2017 19:49

Meh. I have one of those jobs that is like gold dust - a flexible hours job. I choose my own hours, so I usually work when my DS is at his dad's house. I'm lucky.

Of course, I'm a lone parent so if I didn't have this job I would have to get another one and probably have to use paid childcare. If I don't work, we don't eat.

I really couldn't care less what other people do. What works for your family works for you. No one else's business, nobody has to justify their situation.

I'm not quite sure why these threads descend into arguments. Maybe we should all concentrate on ourselves instead of other people.

GimmeeMoore · 06/02/2017 19:50

I most certainly don't struggle to understand working ft for low wage.scraping by
Having been raised in a household with low salary,parents didn't have a pot to piss in
What my parents did have was work ethic and belief that work is important, they set that role model

Foxesarefriends · 06/02/2017 19:50

I don't see any posters claiming that it's impossible to work with children. I see lots of vitriolic attacks on SAHM by posters who apparently think that their way is the only way.
What do they care? They aren't claiming benefits or affecting anyone else.

NataliaOsipova · 06/02/2017 19:51

So sure, be a SAHM. But acknowledge the risk and stop pretending you have no choice.

I'm not pretending I have no choice. On the contrary, I fully accept very lucky that I do have a choice. But it is my choice and it is just as valid as anyone else's....and I'm not the one criticising and denigrating the choices of others.