To be shocked at how many of my (public) school friends are now SAHM

[TrophyCat]

Went to a baby shower last week. The mum to be is an old school friend and there were 8 others from our school there.

We all went to a well known public school, we all have degrees (3 from the bunch went to Oxbridge), and yet 5 of us are stay at home mums, 2 of the women that work don't have dc. So only 1 woman with DC has continued to work.

Most of us had careers before dc, but quit work after marriage and having children.

Interestingly, although a couple of us send our DC to private school absolutely no one has any plans to send their DC away to board ever.

It can vary by industry and that is why we shouldn’t judge.

My last full time job (before I changed career) I found out it had taken a colleague years to negotiate leaving at 4 on a Friday to see her kids. This was from a manager who was a (childless) woman.

I do wonder how many women would be SAHM if they had a choice. I think the number would be very high. Unfortunately threads about it are just foaming with jealousy and resentment. It's impossible to have a sensible conversation about it on MN.

I would. I work from home so do all the childcare for my children anyway, but I would love to not wor at all and just focus on my children.

When I worked in the City, there were such double standards. A male colleague would often work from home because his wife wasn’t around or was ill (nothing serious) so he had to be with his young dcs and nobody batted an eyelid. I once requested in an email that I needed to work from home due to a similar reason and my manager rushed over and said ‘dont say that! Say you have to stay in for the plumber or something.’
I felt I could never take time off in an emergency if it was to do with the dcs so I’d just lie. Dh had no problem.

Our goal would be for both me and DH to do PT

This is our goal too, I want DH to have a good work life balance as well. He already works from home about once a week & has flexibility so does some pick ups/drops off. However I'd like to get to a place where maybe we both worked 4 days a week rather than him being full time.

Your (well known public) school friends can afford to be at home if they want to be. Not at all surprising. What a navel-gazing thread.

Good god. Not this again! Almost as predictable as a Boris bashing thread! 🤦🏻‍♀️

*Highly educated career focused young women end up in jobs typically with long hours, mixing with men who work full on careers with long hours (and good money).

They find it hard to be a parent and keep up the high paced job.
Their husbands also work long hours and typically it falls on the woman to hold the family together.
**

All of the above!!*

I'm in a stressful profession. I've worked part time since kids which has totally screwed my career progression but I don't want a nanny raising my kids and my dh has had to get on with his career

I'm going to try and pick it back up now ds is older but I'm years behind my male peers who were junior to me before .. what can you do!

I do wonder how many women would be SAHM if they had a choice. I think the number would be very high. Unfortunately threads about it are just foaming with jealousy and resentment. It's impossible to have a sensible conversation about it on MN.

I suspect that what you mean by "sensible conversation" is everyone agreeing with you that being a SAHM is amazing.

I genuinely have no interest at all in being a SAHM and my DH doesn't fancy being a SAHD either.

The vast majority of women I know would opt for part time if it came with no career penalty. I work in a sector like that and most women with kids are part time and a substantial minority of men are too

I do wonder how many women would be SAHM if they had a choice. I think the number would be very high

I think if you offered women good (pre kids level) jobs, flexible hours, attuned to school time, you’d get more takers. Work is so much more than money. The system needs changing. Everyone should work, but less, including men.

I think if you offered women good (pre kids level) jobs, flexible hours, attuned to school time, you’d get more takers. Work is so much more than money. The system needs changing. Everyone should work, but less, including men.

I agree with you on the flexible work opportunities (provided they are targeted at everyone and not just women/mothers).

Don't agree that "everyone should work" though. If people choose and want to SAH and can afford to do so then good for them.

I agree with you on the flexible work opportunities (provided they are targeted at everyone and not just women/mothers)

Yes, this is probably what will help women the most, for it to be recognised, and actually workable in practice, for men to take equal responsibility for home and childcare responsibilities and for employers to recognise this and allow it to happen. Plus stopping the ridiculous presenteeism/long hours/always on culture that is prevalent in some industries.

Because then we won't be in the situation where it is not possible to continue in a professional job on a part time basis and one parent, usually the mother has to give up work/take a step back and then can't get back into the workplace at the same level, while the father has no flexibility because he earns all the money and he's expected to do long hours all the time.

Also more flexibility, eg one parent starts early and does pick up, and the other does drop off and stays late. Because for a lot of jobs, it doesn't really matter if someone is in the office from 7-4 or 10-7.

Part time work is trickier in some ways - it would take such a big culture change in some industries for there to be no penalty, I can’t see it happening.

For me the public sector is so much better for part time working. There's a lot more scope for it & it doesn't seem to slow down progression like it does in the private sector.

True part time - as in unavailable for a number of days is harder if your client wants top service or can choose from many global service providers. Someone is usually willing to provide it if the price is high enough. Although being available doesn’t mean you have to be present at work (and yes delegation etc)

Having said that I much preferred to leave work and not do any until the next morning rather than pick it up again in the evening at home

I have an Oxbridge degree and am currently a SAHM. There was simply no other choice for me. My work hours did not allow for even seeing a child (I worked from 7-9 pretty much every day) and a reduction of hours was discouraged. Then my son did not take to childcare and I decided to be home for a few years before returning to work. A lot of women around me had to face the fact that childcare costs and work restrictions meant they were better off financially staying home - or simply could not make the hours work.

What I don't understand is what's wrong with being a SAHM? Isn't feminism about the right to choose? Chances are they're better off to start with if their parents sent them to major public schools so maybe they don't need the money, and certainly if their fellas earn more, why not. I couldn't afford to quit my job but I am self-employed so I'm a lucky to be flexible, and managed a patchwork of childcare that meant I could look after my (only one) dd as much as possible. What I find irritating is bloody 'daddy day care'. My other half earns less than me yet got an almost literal round of applause every time he shared the childcare. FFS.

Why are you surprised 😮 I
Educated people know the benefits of raising their own children.
I have 2 degrees ,I am also a SAHM ...

What is SAHM? Something Mum? This Mum's and Gran's Net habit of reducing things to capital letters is very annoying. Do what journalists do- write what you mean in full the first time its mentioned, then resort to abbreviation.

Why is it shocking? People from privileged backgrounds aremore likely to have privileged (rich) husbands and thus will be more able to give up work. Makes sense. Everyone I know who went back to work quickly after having kids did so because they couldn't afford not to.

True part time - as in unavailable for a number of days is harder if your client wants top service or can choose from many global service providers.

We are a market leader in what we do, have customers all over the world and many of the people in customer facing jobs are PT. Clients know we work on multiple projects and so we just say 'I'm not available then but I am available Wed at 4 pm'. We never mention parental responsibilities and over a certain grade people tend to work 4 rather than 3 days and not being available for a day is easier to cover. It's more about the company culture being accepting of PT work than client expectations. We have a skills shortage, it's very hard for us to recruit people with the experience and skill set to cope with the client facing jobs and so it makes sense to nurture and retain the talent we have by supporting flexible working.

I've worked for the same company for many years and when I started it wasn't like this, an old colleague of mine was the first woman to return to work after having a child in the 80s, her boss didn't know what to do with her. When I started working for the company 15 years later it was normal for women to return to work PT after having DC but there was a clear penalty with working PT, women just didn't get promoted. That slowly started to change in some departments and now has spread across the company as the dinosaurs have all retired.

Same here, I went to a well known boarding school. All my friends went to university with the intention of becoming doctors, engineers, scientists, not one in my group amounted to anything. Even the brightest one has only managed a very part time bank teaching job.
I often wonder what happened to all that girlish enthusiam and drive.
Very disapointing really.

Most people work because they have to. Let's face it being a working mother is hard.

Count that’s good we didn’t get that at our global company, but had the opposite to a skills shortage. People would say if they don’t like it we have CVs lining up out the door which was true.

Some did four days a week but it was very hard and they either had to work five over four, check in on day off. But the projects were too time based for a client to wait a day.

It wasn’t unusual across the industry. Women left in droves after dc.

All we can do is make decisions throughout our life that are right for ourselves and our families.
To assume all women want to be SAHM’s is ridiculous as is assuming all SAHM’s miss having a career.
Each to their own!
I know I am judged for my public school, degree level high earner ‘ness who’s DC’s are at boarding school but I can honestly say as a family unit we are happy and healthy and all have had input into decisions along the way.
I could have become a SAHM because that’s what most of my friends did, and I certainly felt the pressure and disapproval from some, but it just didn’t feel right for me.
We must never feel we make these decisions because it’s what’s expected, the norm, what everyone else does.
It’s ok to be ourselves