The working mums on school night out

[TimothyTaylor]

I went to our school festive drinks thing last night. A large portion of the evening was spent with a group of mums (who all work outside of the home) trying to "boost my confidence" and "help with my cv" and "help me to explore my power" (wtf). They seemed on a mission to get me back into work. I am a sahm through choice. I sometimes joke about getting a job for a break etc (just a joke) but am very happy in my role at home for now. They made me feel a bit sad and pathetic, as if I was only at home because I had no self-belief or confidence to go back to work. I said firmly but nicely on a couple of occasions that I wasn't working through choice and was happy to do that - but even that elicited "of course but in a couple of years when you're ready you must blah blah blah". Then I got the old "I admire you for sacrificing so much for your kids - being at home all day would do me in". Somehow that always feels like a jibe.

Anyway, it just left me feeling a bit irritated that there's a sense of sahms all being mad jealous of working mums and that we're only at home because we can't get a job!

Maybe they were just pissed. I know no harm was meant...

[TheNewKaren]

I don’t blame them in the slightest OP.
How dare you joke about ‘getting a job for a break’ - does it not occur to you that most of us working mums don’t have the choice to work ‘for a break’ - we work because we have to support our children.

May be next time you feel like making a ‘joke’ like this, I hope you remember how it made you feel to be patronised. This experience should encourage you to be more respectful of other mums’ choices and decisions in the future. You are very lucky to have this choice, others, including the ‘working mums’ are possibly not so lucky. I would have called you out on this sort of ‘joke’ as well.

As pp have mentioned - we do it all, raising our children and supporting them financially. Come back when you are capable of doing this too, OP.

[Zadig]

Did you read the thread at all TheNewKaren?

[cantkeepawayforever]

I would say that a surgeon whose children are suffering because their needs as human beings, to be loved and supported and given value, are not being met IS failing, however good they are at their 'out of home job'.

However, I would also say that raising the children is a family responsibility, not a single person's - and can be achieved just as well within a family of two high-flying adults as within a family with a single parent on benefits. It's an attitude of mind, not a matter of hours spent at home or money spent.

[ZigZagandDustin]

I think it's simply that people tend to speak from their own perspective. I wouldn't overthink it but equally it's not fun hanging out with people whose perspective makes you feel bad or uncomfortable.

[LipstickHandbagCoffee]

Parent Ardest job in world twee rubbish. Like a hallmark card schlocky sentimentality
Being a parent is not a job,it’s not comparable to a job. Not in the least
A job is a series of tasks,behaviours undertaken to an externally agreed standard for financial remuneration in a defined time
Parenting is driven by largely influenced by personal preferences,education, class,and upbringing and is undertaken for no financial remuneration

[Babbitywabbit]

“However, I would also say that raising the children is a family responsibility, not a single person's - and can be achieved just as well within a family of two high-flying adults as within a family with a single parent on benefits. It's an attitude of mind, not a matter of hours spent at home or money spent.”

Absolutely.

Raising children into well adjusted adults who achieve their potential is far more than the sum of a series of tasks. It’s not just about tangible things but about the values you impart.

I worked 3 days a week until my children started school. wasn’t a ‘better’ parent to my children on my days off.

[Zadig]

Lipstick - it doesn't matter whether you call parenting a job or not. Call it what you like - the point is it needs doing!

[LipstickHandbagCoffee]

attempting to digress from the ardest job in works rhetoric
Nicely attempted

[Zadig]

Before I became pregnant with DS1 (aged 30), I was working in social work (child protection) with children and families. To be honest, I felt totally burnt out when I left. After I had my own DC, I felt as if my priority had to be them and their welfare, rather than expending my energy on someone else's DC.

In my view, the early years are crucial and it was precisely because of my field of work and Child Psych MSc that I wasn't prepared to leave anything to chance. I wanted to do it myself and I was fortunate that DH was highly paid and could enable that.

If I had needed to return to work, I would have done, but I would have had to pay someone else to act in my absence for that 50 hours a week.

I would not have claimed to be "doing it all" because the nursery or childminder would have been with the DC for the majority of their waking hours.

My DH works over 60 hours per week and is often overseas. He doesn't claim to be "doing it all". That would be ridiculous.

[Zadig]

"Attempting to digress from the ardest job in works rhetoric"

What does that mean?

[Zadig]

Where have I ever claimed to have "the hardest job in the world?" What kind of nonsense is that anyway?
If you must know, my life is fairly easy and well I know it!
I have no idea what the hardest job in the world is. Coal miner? Prime Minister?

[DontMakeMeShushYou]

"I sometimes joke about getting a job for a break" is about as funny as "I'd love to be a SAHM so I can sit around all day watching TV"

It's a silly thing to say, although most of us probably do say it from time to time "as a joke". Which is fine as long as you're prepared to take the opposite viewpoint in the same spirit.

[cantkeepawayforever]

Lipstick, actually, as a teacher, my 'out of the house' job doesn't fit your definition particularly well (nor would it fit e.g. a vicar, an artist) , let alone my 'in home' work when I was a stay at home parent!

I find your statements contradictory. You state that paid for caring / early education is very different to parenting - even if that paid for caring / early education is nannying or childminding of exactly the same children as could be cared for by one or both parents? You state that someone working outside the home does exactly the same as a stay at home parent, even though the latter provides 8-10 hours of caring / early education per day that the WOHP does does not?

How is the job of caring for small children as a childminder or nanny different from the job of parenting those same small children by a SAHP? What is it that the nanny / childminder does that is wholly different from what the parent does?

[Bluntness100]

Not read the full thread, but after you said you’d want a job to get a break, I think I’d also have joined in with them. What a passive aggressive smug comment. Your life is so much harder and they only work to get a break from their kids. So you should do like they do to make your life easier.

Yup, I’d probably have stuck it to you too. Can’t blame them in the slightest. Just as I’d have expected a group of stay at homes mums to have a go if a working mum said “god it’s so hard juggling work and kids, think I’ll be a stay at home mum so I can have a break”.

I suspect you’re one of these women who makes this comment often but this time said it to the wrong people

[Zadig]

Bluntness - if you read the thread, she did not say this to the women. She says she may have possibly joked something like that to her husband in the past.
Don't we all say thinks like that from time to time - why do people take themselves so seriously?

[TimothyTaylor]

Do fuck off Bluntness I have clarified several times now that I did not make that comment to those women that night. I may have said it on occasion in the privacy of my own home! Try reading the OP updates at the very least.

[TimothyTaylor]

Just as I may joke to my husband that I'd like to get a job for a break he might joke about becoming a sahd so he could go to the park and eat cake all day. Neither of us believes this about the others role. We each respect he ofher's contribution to our family. We are comfortable to have a little joke - not passive aggressive at all - just a sense of humour.

[Babbitywabbit]

Cantkeepawayforever- I agree with you insofar as on the days I worked, someone else was doing some of the nappy changes, preparing meals, playing games, reading to my children etc.
I don’t think anyone is saying that they are splitting themselves in two and being half in the office and half at work!!

The point is that parenting is about so much more than just the quantity of hours physically being in the room with your child. If it were all about quantity, you would expect the children of two unemployed parents to have the best deal, because once the basic needs are taken care of and they have a roof over their heads and food in their bellies, they’ve got both parents able to interact with them all day. Conversely you’d expect the children of two parents with full time careers to have the worst deal, and all be dysfunctional low achievers!

Of course, in the real world it’s not like that.

[cantkeepawayforever]

Babbity, you have misunderstood my point.

The point was making is that it is NOT about hours spent with the child. iI is about the priority given to the child within the family's thinking, and within the family's life. I know familes with no working parent where the child has no priority in the parents' thoughts, and they continue exactly as they did when childless. Equally I know families with two very busy working parents who absolutely prioritise the emotional and physical needs of their children, both when buying childcare for them and when at home with their children.

As you quoted before "It's an attitude of mind, not a matter of hours spent at home or money spent."

[Zadig]

Babbitty, but there you are comparing two totally different socioeconomic groups.
I can't comment on anyone else's parenting. All I can say is, that I believe my time is more beneficial to my kids than leaving them with some 22 year-old for whom English is a second language and is more concerned with texting / meeting up with all the other similar nannies in the area and talking in their own language in Starbucks about their boyfriends or whatever. Say I'm stereotyping if you like, but when I used to take mine to playgroups I saw this every day and that is the truth. Around here, people tend to have full time nannies from East European countries or the Phillipines, rather than put them in nursery all day. I know some fantastic nannies by the way, but there are many that are just "good enough".

[cantkeepawayforever]

The argument I am making to Lipstick is that he / she does not recognise childcare exists as a task at all, separate from housekeeping, except if done by someone who is paid to do it.

That indicates to me someone who cannot possibly be prioritising the emotional and physical needs of their children, because you cannot prioritise what you do not believe exists.

[Zadig]

Lipstick seems to think that "parenting" only has value if someone is being paid to do it. Unless you are being paid, you are meaningless in his / her universe.

I would flip it around - from a baby's point of view is it preferable to (for instance) -

a) spend 50 hours a week with someone who loves you (and doesn't see you as a "task"/ means of renumeration)?

b) spend that same 50 hours in the care of someone who sees you as their job - no more?

I am not for one minute arguing that babies and children are damaged by spending time with non-parents on a regular basis. I'm responding to Lipstick's logic by applying a baby's perspective because there is clearly more to life than job specs and salaries.

[Babbitywabbit]

Zadig- you seem to be missing the point that you don’t pay other people to do parenting - as a working parent you outsource some aspects of daily care to someone else. Parenting goes far beyond that; it’s life long for a start and is about imparting values as much as changing nappies

Also, we’re all making our decisions within different contexts. Thank god I could afford quality childcare rather than relying on a worn out grandparent who’d spoil my children on sweets, or relying on a young second language speaker who’d just want to meet her friends and speak in her native tongue. If that had been the only childcare available, I’d have had to sacrifice my career, or dh his, and either one of us be home full time or take a less interesting evening / weekend ‘job’ rather than career to fit round each other. If needs must, of course that’s what we’d have done, but thankfully we were both able to stay on the career ladder in the knowledge our children’s well being wasn’t being compromised at all

[Zadig]

I definitely agree that parenting is different to childcare. Parenting is about love, instinct, imparting values, attachment, adapting, finding coping strategies, personal development, anxiety - and so much more. It's the strongest instinct on earth. "Childcare" is a defined job. This is exactly why I find Lipstick's argument that only paid childcare should be recognised as "valued" so baffling.

[LipstickHandbagCoffee]

If you must paraphrase me zadig,try get it right.as opposed to a summation that favours you