to ask if anyone on here regrets going back to work after dc, and not being a sahp?

[mammyoftwo]

Context: It's a snowy day here..........beautiful stop-you-in-your-tracks-to-look-at-them snowflakes.....it's spent playing outside, coming inside for home baking, snuggling by the fire with books and an all round "good day".

(For full disclosure, I fully acknowledge we have plenty of "not good days" with two toddlers).

But anyways, it got me to thinking...............................................so often on here I read threads about "I don't want to give up my career for my children"/"Do you regret being a sahp" etc, etc etc....... you get the gist.

So today, having had a "good day", I'm going to be bold and brave enough to ask it.............................................does anyone back in paid work after children regret it?
I'd have hated to miss out on all that we did today. Things aren't easy, we've made sacrifices in spending for one parent to be "at home" but it's a choice we made as we believe it works best for our family.

I enjoyed working when I did a part-time job that fitted around my partner's working commitments. Then I decided to retrain as a teacher. Mistake! By then my kids were eight and five.... I can certainly see how my youngest child missed out while I was slumped over my computer writing assignments for my course and, later, spending 60+ hours pw lesson planning and fretting about targets. So I'd say balance is key.

@Jay i was a teacher before becoming a sahm... It's true that that probably contributed to my decision. If you're in a career that's not flexible, not very well paid and extraordinarily long hours, very stressful and getting harder every week, much harder to continue with it and feel satisfied as a parent too.

It's all very well giving up your career for magical snow days (FYI you can use annual leave for those) until your H ups and leaves, then what do you do? I remortgaged and bought him or of the house and am now supporting DD with my own salary with minimal CMS. If I'd been a SAHP or working very PT (I work sightly PT) we'd be surviving on benefits and would have had to move. Not so magical. You might think it'll never happen to you, so did I.

You might be capable of earning an above average salary, say £50k. That will never get several kids through independent school or a house in the right catchment area (not in London at least). If you have a DH who frequently makes ten times that in a single day, then what do you do? What course of action will secure your children's financial future best?

Everyone's circumstances are different. In our case, my DH and I earn about the same, think low 6 figures. Where we live (not UK) my income will absolutely fund private school/savings for future/pension and so forth.

The situation you describe is often cited by SAHMs in mumsnet. I personally couldn't do that, it would make me very uncomfortable to have such disparity in salaries. I also think there are bigger issues about a set up where women (because it is overwhelmingly women) facilitate and enhance men's careers by giving up work to take care of everything else. Id prefer to see society move towards shared parental care and shared responsibility for providing financially.

However, at the same time, it's a bit much to expect individual families to fight against inequalities in society if another arrangement suits them better. The very high earner +SAHM set up wouldn't work for my family, but it clearly does for others.

If you have a DH who frequently makes ten times that in a single day, then what do you do?

I doubt most SAHMs in the UK gave up work because their DHs are earning half a million per day and they have better things to do than to work for this measly 50 grand.

Then as usual, a few SAHMs jump on determined to take offence where none was meant, and demand external validation for their role.

I've not seen that on this thread. If you're referring to any of my posts (??) I can assure you I'm not looking for any kind of external validation, I'm not that insecure. I don't and never have relied on the external validation of others in my life choices and decisions. I've always been very independent and largely unconcerned with what other people think about my life. I also don't have strong opinions about how others live their lives as long as they are being kind and contributing to society positively (ie not committing crimes, antisocial behaviour etc).

What I objected to was the assertion that I am not setting a positive role model for my DD by not being in paid work. That I am not "contributing to society" or wasting my education by being a SAHM. It's not looking for validation to say that western society does not value the contribution of SAHPs - because western society likes to attribute monetary value to everything.

I'm not saying that one situation is intrinsically better than another. There are too many variables to each persons individual situation.

With regards to financial contribution to society, my DH is in the highest earning tax bracket. You could argue that as a couple (by me staying at home enabling him to do his job and have a family) we contribute more tax than 2 full time working low income parents who are claiming child tax credits, funded hours at nursery etc. (I certainly used to pay a tiny amount of tax on my nurses salary).

It wouldn't have occurred to me to measure people's "contributions" against each other before this thread, as I feel that as long as we are all trying to contribute positively to society in our own ways then we all benifit overall. And "paid employment" is not the only way to contribute positively.

I’m afraid so long as there are goady fuckers like the OP starting this sort of thread, it will become a bit heated.
See my post of 14:54.
If I’d started a thread like that I’d get what I deserved

Laurie yes I agree it would be nice to see more options in society of shared parental leave, longer leave (e.g. 2 years), more flexible working options, job shares etc

Like you say, for our family set up it makes the best financial sense for us as a family for me to stay at home and facilitate my DHs career. It is a choice I wanted to take. It won't hurt my career if I don't want it to. I could self fund a return to practice, or re do the pre-qualification 2 year graduate course again if I wished and get a graduate nursing job within a few years no problem.

I need to engage my brain

See, as long as caring (be it for children or anyone else) is viewed as so mind-numbingly tedious, the patriarchy wins as caring roles are largely female-dominated. Poor woman, can't possibly engage her brain AND look after children. For what it's worth, I engage my brain a lot more since cutting back on work as I have a wider range of interests, have the opportunity to meet a wider range of people than in an office job, and I love teaching DC about the world and everything around them.

Not everyone (the majority in fact) have jobs that are incredibly stimulating either - even a lot of those I know in 'professional ' roles that one would assume 'engage the brain' more, seem to detest them and spend a massive amount of time complaining about them.

Engage your brain indeed. Plenty of ways to do that and look after children!

Personally, I didn't really get the OP or what she was asking. I didn't give up work to self-consciously be "making memories" in the snow. I suppose we do sometimes inadvertently make memories, but doesn't everyone? Anyway, I'm not a fan of the snow.

I gave up work because having 4 DC is a big deal. We're a fairly full-on family, I suppose. The kids are in high-pressure schools - it's symptomatic of where we live. DH is lovely, but he's the first to admit he's not always the easiest man to live with.

Laurie - you say you would feel "uncomfortable to have a huge disparity in salaries". But what would you do about it? It is what it is. DH has mainly made the money since we've been married. You don't always know how things will pan out.

I think it’s pretty obvious the OP is having a dig. Why is another question. I can only assume she’s feeling dissatisfaction on some level to do that.

I’d start to seriously question myself if I told you all about my working day and then asked you all if you had regrets for not doing as I do.

Quite bizarre really

Agreed, different families have different requirements and so different solutions suit different families.

When DH was made redundant, we had the choice of him continuing to work in London with all the costs and benefits that brought. Sure, he would have earnt enough for me to be a SAHM, but the sacrifice would have been the long commute - he wouldn't have seen the children during the week, and neither of us wanted that.

Instead, we chose for DH to leave the city, work closer to home and to be home by tea time so we could all eat tea together, and spend time as a family every night. The sacrifice of that was a much lower salary and so I had to work part time.

We preferred that option, it was best for us. But different options suit different families.

It's not all about the money, or buying stuff it's what lifestyle suits each of us as families and so I don't think people should judge others.

Laurie - you say you would feel "uncomfortable to have a huge disparity in salaries". But what would you do about it? It is what it is.

I could have been clearer there. In a more general sense, I'm happy that we are on an equal financial footing. It just sits better with me.

If DH were to be offered a huge raise, I'd probably get over it but only if it didn't impact our current arrangements. We both work hard and long hours, but we share responsibility for the DC care.

However if DH was offered say 3 times his salary and a corresponding condition would be me giving up my job because our shared arrangements would break down, I wouldn't agree to that. It's not how our family works.

So sahms who think that caring for their children full time is a worthwhile thing to do are after validation but working mothers who want everyone to agree that you need to work to have a sense of self and use your brain aren’t looking for validation?
Do whatever works for you but don’t criticise the choices of others. I don’t think that all working mums go to work because they can’t cope but some on here have said that themselves.

“The values in our family are that in the main you are cared for by your parents”. Wanting that is not a “value” it’s a belief - that it’s best for your DC - and a choice. There are other options too.

In practice someone SAH almost always means mothers. Men get to be parents AND work FT, building up career, pension (which secures their personal long term finances but often not their wives) and “employability”. Few feel guilty about it. mothers who WOH are sometimes - as on this thread - labelled materialistic, thinking childcarers looking after our DC are beneath us, or are “abdicating responsibility”. Or that our choice - where it is a choice - will somehow mean a worse childhood or outcomes for our DC.

Many careers - a PP mentions science, other fields include finance, media and creative industries - are stacked against mothers/parents who wish to work PT or even “just” FT without overtime/ extensive travel.

I don’t think MN is anti SAHMs but posters highlight the significant personal financial risks of being a SAHM, especially if you’re unmarried.

DH and I earn the “average*” salaries quoted above (around £100K between us; yes, of course we couldn’t put 4 kids through private school on it, but it gives us a very good lifestyle). I wouldn’t give up my career in return for him having a massive salary increase. Likewise he wouldn’t want to work crazy hours and never see the DC in order to enable me to stay at home. Both having a good balance is more important to us than one huge salary. However, that’s just our opinion and I can perfectly well understand that others see things differently and want different things in life.

*Note I am fully aware that we earn far above average household incomes. I was responding to the poster above whose DH earned £500K per day (presumably a typo!!!!)

I absolutely agree that it is mainly mothers and I think there should be more sahd’s too. But aside from the ‘tradition’ of the mother staying at home the pay discrepancy would have to be sorted for that to happen. Most families with one sahp choose the parent who earns less which is more often than not the mother. If women were paid the same I’m sure more men would stay home.

Who had said you need to work to have a sense of validation?
I get validation from all sorts of things, both inside and outside work

I was responding to people saying sahms on here need external validation that they made a good choice. I think the working mothers on here who are putting forward arguments as to why they made the right choice are also looking for validation. Else why would they be posting about it on a public forum?

@Asbofrigginlootly why would you suddenly both become low earners if you started working? Surely he’d earn similar and you’d earn whatever your capabilities allow you to? Let’s not pretend your husband would quit Bank of America and start working on the Asda checkout

We're a fairly full-on family, I suppose. The kids are in high-pressure schools - it's symptomatic of where we live. DH is lovely, but he's the first to admit he's not always the easiest man to live with

1ndig0 I was really surprised when you posted this. This has just made me feel that you’re in the position so many of my friends are. Stuck with a rich arsehole. Bizarrely more tolerable to everyone than poor arseholes.

Of course I agree that caring for children is worthwhile, but I have seen countless times on MN, SAHMs claiming that they are under appreciated by society as a whole for the work they do. If that’s not seeking external validation, I don’t know what is. That’s not to say that all SAHMs say this, but it is certainly a common complaint.

I think the working mothers are posting in reaction to the fucking awful OP actually porkflute.

I don’t think most of the posters on this thread are seeking validation on their choices. Merely responding to the question posed by the OP. We could just say no regrets and not elaborate but that would be a boring thread

In real life, I don't think it ever crosses anyone's mind to seek "validation" for their life-choices, does it? It never occurred to me that being a SAHM was unusual in any shape or form, or that anyone would even take a view on that. What's unusual about being with your children?

This kind of discussion only takes place on MN. In real life, nobody has ever asked me if I work or not, except for the purposes of the odd form.

Sprinkles - I didn't mean to imply my DH is an arsehole at all. Just that it's not always realistic to think you can both work in a job with defined hours and all play happy families, even if you wanted to. I don't know many families like that. Maybe a few, but they have full-time staff and that's not a life I would feel comfortable with. I know a lot of women who are SAHMs and they are not stupid. Many of us are ex-lawyers or corporate types. It's not a decision you take lightly, it just makes sense in specific circumstances.

sparkles I just typed out a long reply to answer your question but decided I couldn't actually answer it properly without revealing lots of personal details about our family circumstances, health/mental health, finaces etc. Which I'm not comfortable with sharing online tbh.

I don't quite understand your question also because I never said that if I don't stay at home we would both be low income workers...?? I was just saying that in terms of the tax contributions (which another posters raised as another reason why SAHMs don't "contribute") as a unit we probably contribute more tax than 2 low income working parents taken as a unit.

Like I said, I'm not going into details but trust me when I say that mentally, physically, and practically speaking, my DH could not do his current job (or equivalent earning potential) and have children (which is something he's always wanted as have I) without my support at home.