to ask how most of our mothers coped?

[ItalianScallion]

I was born in the 70's. My mother was a SAHM and there were three of us kids. My father worked night shifts.

The youngest of us was born when I was four and the oldest was 7. My mother got us up, took us to school, took us to after school activities and sports whilst maintaining a ridiculously clean home, and doing all the laundry etc with no help or family support.

My DH has a similar upbringing except his mother and father were living abroad and travelled to several different countries to live because of the nature of FIL's work. My MIL worked nights and so they would literally hand over the kids to each other as one came home and the other went to work.

I feel that we were all raised pretty decently and I have a huge amount of respect for my parents and PIL.

Which brings me to my AIBU to think that we are getting softer? My mother and MIL shake their heads in disbelief when they hear of mothers who SAHM, have a nanny/au pair and a weekly cleaner and still talk about how they're not coping.

Don't get me wrong, parenting is a hard job but it seems that popular parenting ideas and methods are allowing us to make rods for our own backs.

Please understand I'm not referring to women with PND or any MH issues. This is MN so I know I'll be flamed by people with their anecdotes of difficult babies and their specific struggles, and I agree that there will always be exceptions to the rule. Still, I can't help but feel that we don't 'just get on with it' the way our mothers did.

38cody my memory of the power cuts is of DH going to a local beach to collect coal that had been washed-up on the beach from the local pit! We had an open fire with a back-boiler. 😨
I am always astonished by all these stay-at-home-mums of the seventies. I didn't know any in my circle of friends at the time. I did come across a few later on, but as a feminist I regarded their lives with horror.

I think that some things were similar for the whole population e.g. there were less cars so children did tend to play outside without much supervision or walk to school from a young age which made life a lot easier for parents vs today. There were also few maternity/parental rights or childcare so women were less likely to work when they had per school age children. Other things were much more variable.

Work was harder in the home but other things were easier. You couldn't get into debt because no one would lend you money unless it was guaranteed. Only one person's salary was taken into consideration for a mortgage so property was cheaper. When you eventually got a mortgage and moved into your home you were considered really lucky if you had a bed and a table and chairs. Some people used fruit boxes to sit on. Patience and slow building up was the way so many people managed. Expectations were less so therefore things were more relaxed. Money was tight. We had to learn to live on relatively little as so many people do today. Children were given more freedom. We used the parks, swimming pools, museums which were free and then there were the brownies and girl guides etc. There wasn't the money for the sort of outings that so many children enjoy today. I didn't drive at that time so walked everywhere. We sang a lot as the music was the sort that boys whistled to and everyone knew the words. Singing is a great mood lifter! It's all about expectations. My friend's were all in the same boat. That helped.

We bought 2 houses in the 70s and both salaries were taken into consideration. The way my building society did it was 3 x salary for main earner plus 1 x salary for partner or 2.5 x combined salaries. We couldn't have bought our first house on just my husband's salary.

SAH that's the point isn't it?! It's hardly difficult to look after 3 kids, keep the house clean and cook if you don't have to go out to work every day is it? I do all that (admittedly with one child) at the same time as running 2 businesses. I work 8+ hours day. The house is clean and tidy and we eat most of our means based on the veggie box, cooked from scratch. I have very little time for anyone who stays home and can't manage to do normal household tasks. It seems pathetic.

granny, we bought in 1983 and it was the same 2.5x joint salary - we both worked full time even when we had a tiny baby and we bought before we had the baby (just months before). There was a property crash int he 1970s. It was a pretty awful time. My mother's diary mentions doubling of prices (there was 60% inflation generally over 3 years in the 1970s).

I think most of us just get better over time with managing a house. I remember my husband having to explain basic things (as he owned a small house in the NEW which he sold to follow my career) like how to work the cooker and hang washing. I was 22. Now I've been doing that stuff for over 30 years and the youngest children are about to leave school it's dead easy and of course I've no screaming baby nor a toddler kicking my ankles every few minutes or trying to take a lump out of the baby's arm.

Not where I lived. London and Scotland. Had milk delivered. By the 70s would be very hard to find a butcher etc van doing rounds. A lot of women were not at home so not worth while for these businesses. The SAHMs were very rare in my world, most had to work to raise the 10% required for property deposit and wages were very low. Women were paid a lot less than males no matter what job then absolutely no parity. Some of the postings have mentioned technology, acknowledging that is wonderful in some instances, however in the standard household there is an inordinate amount of time spent (wasted) on its use. Just look at how many walk using a mobile phone. Everything seems so important nowadays that it can't wait a minute or is it as I said in my original posting there is so much emphasis on "me time" being so important.

Roomster those aren't things that are the similar for the whole population at all, they are general trends... My parents actually had 3 cars between the two of them in the late 70s, and my mother worked full time and outsourced childcare and housework, and in their wisdom my parents decided the local, walkable, school wasn't good enough (thus alienating us from the local kids who all went there) and sent us to schools half an hour's drive away...

Ironically I suspect my own kids born in the 00s are having more of a "typical 1970s" upbringing in terms of playing out and walking to school and me having done my own childcare until the youngest was 4, then doing part time for a couple of years, and neither parent choosing a career which by its nature takes precedence over the children, than my siblings and I had in the 70s.

But thats what I do
But I also work 27 hours a week.
Whats so amazing?

I think this depends very much who you are. If you are a middle class mum with all children NT and you are heterosexual and white, it is probably slightly harder now. And note, some jobs people talk about as being ordinary, were then middle class jobs.

If you are poorer, have children with SEN, are black, lesbian or gay, have mental health problems, have an abusive Husband, then it was harder then.

Peoples normal working week was 45 hours a week, and most working class people worked on Saturday morning. Wages were low and women were very low paid. And sexual harassment and racism at work was seen as banter.

Roomster those aren't things that are the similar for the whole population at all, they are general trends...

Whether or not your mother drove is irrelevant to the fact that there were fewer cars on the road and it was therefore safer for children to play outside/walk to school. Yes, there were plenty of cleaners (I didn't mention them) but very little in the way of childcare for pre school age children in the 1970s.

Also remember more women looked after elderly relatives. It was rarer for people to go into residential care.

My mum and dad only had me and both worked FT. They shared housework and mostly got all the cleaning and shopping done on a Saturday morning. Relatives helped out after school and in school holidays. My mum thought I was mad having as many as two children! Our set up is actually pretty similar though.

I am in my mid 50s. I know women who have been in mental hospitals for PND or having a baby outside of marriage. I also know miscarriage was not talked about. Women were simply expected to forget about it, and were not even told the sex of the baby.

These kind of threads actually annoy me. You might have it harder than your mum because she could stay at home, while you have to work because of house prices. But meanwhile lots of women had their kids forcibly adopted, PND dismissed or ignored, racism and physical attacks ignored, lesbian mothers routinely had their kids taken away from them, homeless mothers had their kids taken into care, and birth injuries were often not treated. Women who were beaten and raped by Husbands often had nowhere physically to leave him to. Housing Departments saw you as making yourself intentionally homeless, and would not help you. Lots of families saw it as "you made your bed, now lie in it". SEN children were often in institutions, or seen as naughty or thick. Those women who are the most disadvantaged, used to have it a lot harder. Those women who had a better time of it, have it a bit harder.

My mum worked full-time and raised me on her own till I was 6.

When my brother was born 10 years later, she also worked full-time with an hour commute and did a PhD in 3 years - only in evenings and weekends! While being a great mum to us.

I think that's amazing, so I have to admit, I don't have a lot of sympathy for SAHMs you mention who have domestic help yet claim they are "so busy" and "exhausted". A lady at work says one of her friends was complaining about a busy day because she had 2 gym classes and a hair appointment....

SAH that's the point isn't it?! It's hardly difficult to look after 3 kids, keep the house clean and cook if you don't have to go out to work every day is it? I do all that (admittedly with one child) at the same time as running 2 businesses. I work 8+ hours day. The house is clean and tidy and we eat most of our means based on the veggie box, cooked from scratch. I have very little time for anyone who stays home and can't manage to do normal household tasks. It seems pathetic.

I absolutely agree...

what exactly was there to "cope" with being ASAHM, kids at school, I had 4 kids, could never afford to stay at home, I worked nights, so was there to put them to bed, when they got up,never missed a sports day, school function, was there if they were ill. Also had a quarter acre garden, chicken, 2 dogs, 2 cats, and no car. Definitely engaged with my children when they were there because I wasnt constantly on a mobile phone!

It's absolutely bollox to say someone who works and outsources childcare is doing "exactly the same plus a full time job" as someone at home with 3 preschool children. It's trotted out on MN all the time, but it simply isn't possible unless you've cloned yourself and are physically doing childcare whilst your clone is out at work.

Why the one upmanship "I do all that plus work" is not true. You cannot be doing childcare for small children and a paid job at the same time unless the childcare is your paid job.

Why are people so afraid of admitting they do something else, no better, no worse, no harder, no easier (in general, specific cases may vary). Why the bitter point scoring by trotting out a weirdly over used bit of trite nonsense which is logistically impossible.

If your talking about sahms of older children then maybe - but most sahms have small children at home and work part time once all children are at school.

It's absolutely bollox to say someone who works and outsources childcare is doing "exactly the same plus a full time job" as someone at home with 3 preschool children. It's trotted out on MN all the time, but it simply isn't possible unless you've cloned yourself and are physically doing childcare whilst your clone is out at work

I must admit this confuses me too. You're not doing 'the same' as a SAHM because youre not looking after children all day, you're at work. It's different. No better, no worse, just different.

'SAH that's the point isn't it?! It's hardly difficult to look after 3 kids, keep the house clean and cook if you don't have to go out to work every day is it? I do all that (admittedly with one child) at the same time as running 2 businesses. I work 8+ hours day. The house is clean and tidy and we eat most of our means based on the veggie box, cooked from scratch. I have very little time for anyone who stays home and can't manage to do normal household tasks. It seems pathetic.'

You only have one child!!! Do you have any concept of just how different that is to having 3? I have 2. 3 would probably break me. I consider the days I go to work as 'days off'. That said mine are pre-school. Once they are at school it is different.

'I have very little time' for parents of one child who don't get the realities of having more

My mum worked full-time and raised me on her own till I was 6.

Where were you when she was working if she raised you totally on her own?

Where were you when she was working if she raised you totally on her own?

I meant she was a single mum until I was 6.

Hear hear. "I have very little time for" anyone who judges someone else for what they can and can't achieve without knowing ALL the facts. You don't know someone's medical or personal circumstances.

For example I struggle to achieve much with my 4 and 2 yr old in tow, others would be writing PhDs whilst creating playdoh models and cooking dinner with their third hand. But my dc1 has sn and dc2 is of the "very lively" variety whilst their DC may be compliant jigsaw loving types. Mine don't sleep, maybe theirs do. Etc.

Plus, some people simply have more energy or organisational skill than others. Just as some have more intelligence or beauty - these abilities are something we are born with (at least partly). You don't judge people for being less clever or less pretty so why judge someone who is less energetic or organised?

I do find this thread kind of depressing. What is this "just getting on with it" that we nowadays don't do? I get on with it - I go to work, come home, do laundry, play with the kids. I haven't sacked off the job of parenthood and gone on a jolly round the world. So in what sense are we all supposedly slacking? Is it by aspiring to a life beyond the home? By expecting to share the parenting equally with men? It all seems a bit "you women have stepped outside of your box. You should be satisfied with your role in life and "just get on with it"."

My Mum had three children. She was the one to do the washing, cooking, cleaning, bringing us to after school activities and taking care of the household because my father was a lazy gobshite.
She was also a lawyer, full-time working and earned more than my father.
They came close to a divorce few times, he then improved slightly just to slide back into his old lazy ways.
How she did it, I don't know. She was a great Mum and is a great Grandma, even though she is still working because she likes it. And a great example for me that you can juggle a family and a career and not feel guilty about it because your children not only respect you as their Mum but also because you are a qualified and very smart and successful professional.