AIBU to have never felt degraded by the fact I don't earn "my own" income?

[Incognit0]

I'm fairly new to MN, but recently have read a lot of threads which seem quite judgemental about women who do not work outside the home, particularly once the DC are at school. I have never come across this attitude in real life, so wonder if MN is an anomaly, or if I'm actually missing something?

Mistress 'Nausebox' I wouldn't change my life for yours.
I cringe at your 'toe curling' description.
I'm practically a SAHM to be honest. I've worked once this month. Just popped to NYC and back and been paid a nice sum for it. Had a lovely break actually.
But of course because I cringed at your 'kiss on the head' in car seat I'm jealous.
You give SAHM's an awful vibe
Eeeuuuu

"And SAHM whilst I won't judge you - you will irritate me beyond belief if you tell me how busy you are!! Believe me - you're not!!"

How do you know how busy people are?

When we were young (in primary) my mum didn't work, but was always doing something. She did charity work, had a lot of family and friends over for meals, she studied a bit part time, made really good meals for us, went to a book club, visited friends and elderly neighbours, took us to and from school. What out of these activities doesn't count as an activity? Is every activity other than paid work invisible or something?

I couldn't care what people do tbh. I work part time but I could imagine staying at home, loved my leaves.

I have known a few people that have split with their partners when the kids have grown up, and so it's incredibly important to sort this all out properly if one person is the wage earner.

She did charity work, had a lot of family and friends over for meals, she studied a bit part time, made really good meals for us, went to a book club, visited friends and elderly neighbours, took us to and from school. What out of these activities doesn't count as an activity? Is every activity other than paid work invisible or something?

I do all that. I am also a single parent. I also work full time.

I deeply resent the implication that working parents don't feed their children properly, do charity work, care for the elderly, study to improve their lot etc. None of what you describe is the domain of the SAHM exclusively.,

It's the British culture I'm afraid. The Victorian stiff upper lip combined with 2 decimated generations of men (WWI & WWII), with movements like suffrage & the sexual revolution thrown in means we have a unique culture that basically expects women to be superhuman. We've been raised by strong women, women who do everything because they were raised by women who do everything all the way back to our grandmothers & great grandmothers who had no choice because their men were off fighting a war, many of whom of course never came home.
Sons watched their mothers do everything & grew up expecting that, daughters felt they were lacking if they couldn't & the pressure of all this expectation caused rebellion when women stood up & said NO, we do not have to conform to what men think we should be (60s) but all that got us is was we're now expected to WANT everything too Lol
Add stuff like social media's distorted reality of other people's perfect lives, the rise in environmental awareness & the economy & we're basically screwed.
We're supposed to want children, a career & to be a homemaker. If we're 'lucky' enough to get it we're expected to work until we pop during our pregnancies & then be ready to go back to work at some arbitrary time later. We're supposed to cook everything from scratch (from responsible sources), take our children to a nurturing, yet still top of league tables schools (walking, not driving) & ensure that they excel in pointless mandatory testing by taking them to museums & teaching them to be creative thinkers comfortable with technology but with 1940s manners & world class sporting prowess which we mothers must nurture by attending, transporting & understanding. We're then supposed to go to work which must be emotionally fullfiling and make us financially independent (although we don't do it for the money obviously). Success in our culture is measured by how much we earn so we must get promotions & payrises without sending our children to child carers & being back at 3 to pick them up from school, walk home carrying whatever hand made project we helped them create which we absolutely did not buy anything for, make homework fun, cook (from scratch) a healthy yet delicious tea, bake cakes for cake stalls, read them a book (not television) & then pop them into bed before getting on with the the cleaning & ironing & greeting our man home from his hard, hard days work where he earns more than we do (or he's a kept man) with a blowjob & kinky sex that we enjoy as much as he does because we're sexually liberated. Our evenings should be filled with reading news & current affairs, watching popular shows, keeping up with social media, family phone calls, paperwork, bills & holiday planning and we're also somehow supposed to do all the shopping - which we have been told by society that we women enjoy a bit too much.
All of which we do on our own with no help from grandparents because our mothers also did this & are now too bloody tired to help but that's ok because if we do get help we're cheating anyway.

The only SAHMs who can slightly irritate me are the ones who brag about their lifestyle when it is their husbands making the money. Yes, they contribute to family life and to his earning potential, but so do a huge number of SAHMs whose husbands earn so much less. To be honest, people who brag in general annoy me. But somehow it seems worse when the person doing it hasn't actually earned the money themselves.

Apart from that, I really don't care whether women choose to earn or not if their husbands are happy for them to stay at home. I do find that some of my SAHM friends have become more insular and less intellectually curious. But there are others who study or volunteer, think about the world outside their immediate family units, and frankly make much more interesting and stimulating company than many boring workaholic men who I know.

For society and community to function adequately requires us all to care for each other - whether that's caring for our own children or caring for the elderly - generally caring for those who cannot care for themselves. For me caring also means contributing to the local community by volunteering and such like and enriching the lives of others. Otherwise the state has to meet this responsibility - which we all recognise is not currently being met and putting undue pressure on those who do earn and pay taxes. Social worth should not be determined solely by how much money one earns as there are other ways to enrich society and contribute.

You don't have to justify yourself to anybody. It's your life, your choice.

I usually work but have stopped recently to have a break. Lots of people have regularly asked me have I got a job yet. I have school aged dc. And then why haven't you, what have you applied for.

As it happens dh wants me to have a rest. What's his has always been mine and mine his since we agreed to have dc together.

My friend has always been a SAHM. She's very busy. But that's because she has built a life for herself - friends, charity work, various activities. She takes her dc to more after school things than me because she has the energy to. I suppose the difference is these are things she could stop doing if she needed to. When you're working, the things you're busy with can't be stopped/not done. It can be overwhelming. Life is definitely more relaxed for everyone if there's one at home. I think a family that has that is lucky.

will irritate me beyond belief if you tell me how busy you are!! Believe me - you're not!! what a ridiculous assertion. A SAHM with numerous kids, volunteer roles, providing family support wit little back up from family may well be busier than a WOHM with one child in school, lots of family support etc. Neither one is better but working doesbt give you rights to being busy.

I'm busy with one, its a different kind of busy to my WOHM friends with one. I'm tired with one, its a different tired to my WOHM friends whose child sleeps through through the night and neither of us are as tired as the friend on Mat Leave whose child wakes every 2 hours for a feed. When she goes back to work I honestly can't even imagine the tiredness but she woukdbt never tell us we can't possibly be tired. Just as my friend who works and had one child with SN and one younger child would never tell me I can't claim to be busy because she's busier. Z

Op by the way I think your situation is fine because it sounds like it works pretty damn perfectly for you and your family. Who cares as long as you are all happy.

Have just asked my 10 year old if she would want me to give up,work and stay home all day and she replied no,way because I'd be really annoying and grumpy! She is also rather proud of my achievements at work.

My mother stayed at home with my brother and I when we were young and she hated it and we hated it. I don't understand this 'making memories' shit because the way our brain works that happens automatically - but we don't have good memories of our childhood and we're both very relieved to go to boarding school at 10.

I don't need to work. Not because my DH is a mega earner (there's no such thing in academia) but because I have a trust fund and that could cheerfully keep us all in a good life. However, I like working. I like working far more than being at home with the babies so I went back after 3 months with both of them. I like being able to work abroad and travel widely with my job. My DH is retired now, but when he was working and the kids were younger we employed au pairs and also his grown up children from his first marriage helped out with the younger ones when they were around. If that hadn't been possible then we would have explored other options.

Working makes me a more interesting person to my children and a better role model than my mother was to me.

"I deeply resent the implication that working parents don't feed their children properly, do charity work, care for the elderly, study to improve their lot etc. None of what you describe is the domain of the SAHM exclusively."

I didn't say they were.

I absolutely applaud your ability to fit 20 hours activity into the 16 hours or so waking hours in a 24 hour day and still achieve a good quality of life and some chance to relax for yourself.

You are an example to us all.

What each individual does is quite frankly nobody else's business. After selling a successful business i am at home and have been for a few years, and couldn't care less what people think. I encounter alot of people who seem envious of my ability to have the choice, but my decision not to have to deal with all of the crap associated with running a business certainly doesnt make me feel unfulfilled.

And the snuggest post of the year goes to zeezeek

TRust fund, au pairs, travel widely... puke.

My DM stayed at home for part of our childhood. I don't judge her and I certainly know she kept active, but I also know that if my dad dies first, her pension won't be enough to live on.

I am now restarting my career having stayed at home as a carer for much of dd's life. I don't feel degraded- but I know I can't reach the kind of salary level that my colleagues are on either.

God what nasty judgemental comments in this thread.

FWIW many of you will know NOTHING about why your friend/acquaintance might be a SAHM. There are many reasons...family care needs being just one of them.

I have had three years out as my son is autistic and needed me. Now he is settled in a special school and I could go back to work but I haven't as my Dad is in the early stages of dementia and my Mum is struggling. Close friends know this but "acquaintances" don't....who knows some of you judgy knickers might know me and be judging. Hope you feel proud of that!

I absolutely applaud your ability to fit 20 hours activity into the 16 hours or so waking hours in a 24 hour day and still achieve a good quality of life and some chance to relax for yourself.You are an example to us all

Why assume I sleep for 8 hours a day? Why the sarcasm? Does it not occur to you that the reality of some people's lives is very, very hard? That some of us have no choice but to get on with it?

I think that some women extrapolate rather and apply their own circumstances to others.
My DC always had a parent at the schoolgate/assembly etc
We went to the park,helped with homework,cooked nice meals and the kept the house clean etc
We both worked and shared the responsibility. No childcare
Lots of parents we know did without one having to give up their career.
Some jobs are more flexible than others .

This thread has gone from bad to worse. I must stop reading it!!

Now that I am working in the city full time, I am less "busy." And I get paid. I now employ other people to: clean my house, deliver my groceries, run my kids around after school. I still have to find time to make "executive" decisions for the household though. But actually, I've traded a lot of donkey work for something better paid, and more respected by sons posters on this thread.

It's a fact that my children spend less time in my company and I like to think that time spent with me was to their benefit.

If I earned less, I think it would have been pretty pointless to pay someone else to be with my children, if there was some monetary net benefit that I would spending on them.

Of course, I grew up a catholic. This is a traditionally Protestant country.

I should add that the above came with long hours and some unsocial hours.
We just got on with it.
No idea why life shouldn't come with some challenges -sometimes you have to make do and get on with it.

Working makes me a more interesting person to my children and a better role model than my mother was to me but your mom was a worse role model because she was unhappy. If she'd been happy and you were miserable and skint after paying more than your salary in child care would you still be the better role model?

Does it not occur to you that the reality of some people's lives is very, very hard? That some of us have no choice but to get on with it? works both ways. One answer isn't easier or harder, everyone's situation is different so we could all just judge less

Personally being a SAHM would not be my own.choice. I would hate to be financially dependent on someone else. I cannot understand why a grown women, who has invested time and effort in her career would want to give that all up. I know plenty of women who were sahm for a long time and now their kids are older are either bored being it home or are finding it difficult to get back into the work place with nil or v little recent work experience. I am.judged (harshly sometimes) for being a wm and I think though no one would say it to your face op people will judge you for being a sahm and not having any income of your own. Whether you give a fig about them doing so is up to you.

I don't understand this 'making memories' shit

People who "make memories" also tend to be the ones who "feel blessed" a lot on FB