Looking after your own children IS work

[Bumpitybumper]

Oxford Dictionary definition of "work":
activity involving mental or physical effort done in order to achieve a purpose or result

AIBU to suggest that the people that suggest that looking after one's own children isn't work are wrong and in some cases are actively trying to devalue and undermine the people (usually women) that do the majority of childcare?

Would be really interested to understand how anyone can read this definition and argue that looking after children isn't work.

Ummm no... You are "working" to your own rules, your own changing whims, taking avenues often to make life easier, and wanting praise throughout (therein lies the problem). It's not comparable when you're looking after little people who can't reprimand you!

@BullshitVivienne hit the nail on the head.
It’s called parenting. It can be hard work, yes. But in a totally different sense to ‘paid work’.

@ZeroFuchsGiven
Being a parent is a lifestyle choice, it is not work
Conveniently a lot of men choose to opt out of the "non work" associated with parenting. I guess the mothers should be happy that they have the pleasure of doing everything for their children... After all it definitely absolutely isn't work.

@DruryLanePenance
Ummm no... You are "working" to your own rules, your own changing whims, taking avenues often to make life easier, and wanting praise throughout (therein lies the problem). It's not comparable when you're looking after little people who can't reprimand you!
Which differs from being self employed and running your own business because...

I’ve just done my yoga for the day. According to that definition, it was work too 🙄

It's hard work. It's just not legal employment. It's beyond hard work in some cases. I'm currently not employed, a single parents of two DC. One in Nursery for 15 hours a week. Both have medical issues. Both behavioural issues. Get no help or support from anyone - unless you count the pittance that is UC, and the hounding I get each week to "GET A JOB". Boys dad left for a fresh start, but it's all great because hey, he's employed and earning well and that's much harder and more important right? He'll probably go on to get more women pregnant and leave them too, because it's what he's like. It's all had me suicidal numerous times. I've been ill lately (chest infection and had dental surgery that felt like my skull was being drilled into and cracking and then sinus problems and a mouth full of blood and gagging for days) it's wiped me out. Dentist was like "Make sure you have at least 3 days off work to recover" ha! yeah right. I get no "time off" so have had to deal with everything as usual. I've cried twice at the school gates. I start my access course in September to Mental Health nursing. I still have to clean the house, do all the washing, make all the meals, sort the bills, parent in the mornings/evenings/weekends/holidays and sort out all appointments. There's no holidays or time off or things to look forward to. Although I honestly can't wait for the bit in between where I'm not doing housework and parenting.

Because being self employed relies on you putting in the hours to get paid to pay the bills etc

When I was at home if I felt like having a day of doing the absolute minimum just watching tv and snuggling up on the sofa it didn’t impact my life in any other way

My husband works full time. I stay at home with our toddler, and I am also pregnant.
I am more knackered at the end of every day than when I had a full time paid job.
Also, I wouldn't t feel good if I thought I was sitting doing nothing all day while he worked. It is bloody hard. Incredibly rewarding, and a great privilege, but hard.
Whenever he has had our son for a day, he is exhausted by the end of it. He has the utmost respect for the work I do to ensure our child has the best possible start in life.

mmm, I think it is just parenting really. I was a SAHM till DS2 was 3, DH went out to work. I didn't ever consider it work, I obv did laundry, cleaning etc, played with the kids and took them out, I cooked also.

I started working 4 days a week once DS2 went to pre school. I worked plus did laundry, cleaning, played with the kids and cooked, just not between 9 and 330.

I just wouldn't consider it work but it doesn't make it meaningless, I loved doing it but definitely found it harder going to work and then fitting all those things it too. It is exhausting whereas being a SAHM, whilst exhausting in a different way, was fun as we'd meet up with friends etc also.

Bumpitybumper The difference for me between self-employment and parenting is with the former you presumably are working to clients, you’re accountable to whoever is paying you. While saying you have less flexibility because you have to plan your life around naps and the school run isn’t really the same as organising your time to run a consultancy or plumbing business.

Being a parent is a lifestyle choice, it is not work
Conveniently a lot of men choose to opt out of the "non work" associated with parenting. I guess the mothers should be happy that they have the pleasure of doing everything for their children... After all it definitely absolutely isn't work.

I don't understand this.

Does no one actually interrogate their partners/get to know them/see them in action before deciding to have babies with them?

It's work but it's not a job.

Liverbird77 I assume you haven’t worked while being a parent

Obviously most women tire more easily when they are pregnant

But working full time without children is different life to working full/part time and being a parent it’s not comparable

@EnthusiasmIsDisturbed
*Because being self employed relies on you putting in the hours to get paid to pay the bills etc

When I was at home if I felt like having a day of doing the absolute minimum just watching tv and snuggling up on the sofa it didn’t impact my life in any other way*
Lots of self employed people earn enough that they can pick and choose the days they work. They can take days off and it doesn't have a massive detriment to their business or earnings. I'm not saying all self employed people are like this but there are several I know that have this ability.

I have never had a day watching TV and snuggling since I was beyond the baby stage with my first. My kids climb the walls if they aren't taken out places and besides I see it as an important aspect of looking after they physical and emotional well-being. There are school runs to do, chores to be completed irrespective of if I want an easy day.

In many ways I have less ability to have downtime from my role and take it easy than some of my self employed friends. I know my experience isn't universal and some SAHPs have a different experience but that is my point. Generalising doesn't work and is particularly damaging when it's done in an attempt to other people and what they do.

Conveniently a lot of men choose to opt out of the "non work" associated with parenting. I guess the mothers should be happy that they have the pleasure of doing everything for their children...

what does this have to do with anything? The dynamic of a relationship are completely irrelevant with your OP.

On another note, I have seen "mother groups" refusing to include fathers, and proudly so.
I have seen mothers sniggering about useless men, or weak men..
Let's not pretend women are the constant victims here shall we. Some mums are great, some dads are just are great.

Of course it’s work. It’s labour that needs to be performed. Whether you enjoy it, find it easy, wish you could do it rather than your job or whatever, it’s still necessary for someone to feed, wash, watch small children. If you are at work doing another job, someone else has to do that during that time so the labour still needs to be performed.

As it happens, I love my paid job - it’s no bother, I enjoy the chat with colleagues, the cups of tea, alongside my actual duties and I choose to do it and pay a nanny to do the work of childcare for my small children several days a week. Loving it, choosing it, being a working parent or not, it’s all labour.

We do all women a massive disservice by ignoring the huge amounts of unpaid or low paid work that go into raising children and running homes so that other paid work can be done. Lots of women end up working outside the home and doing unpaid labour within it at a hugely unfair level because we don’t value it and stay at home parents and carers are underpaid and undervalued by society. It’s not a working mums vs stay at home mums argument. It should be about all people - but especially women - wanting traditionally female forms of labour valued.

@Lily193

I'm my own boss and work part time at home whenever I choose, so it's not restrictive at all. Not everyone has en employer or a rigid working life.

You are not remotely the same then, as a full time worker, working for someone else, in an actual WORKPLACE (that I was actually on about) !

Working part-time - from HOME - for yourself is NOT the same as working FULL TIME for an employer.

Totally ludicrous that you would even compare the two.

Lots of self employed people earn enough that they can pick and choose the days they work.

yes, it's that easy.

And lots of SAHM have a lot of help from family. What's your point?

by ignoring the huge amounts of unpaid or low paid work that go into raising children and running homes so that other paid work can be done.

Now I have a problem with that.
Working parents still raise their kids, and our homes run just as well (kind of) as the homes of a stay at home person.

No one is devaluing the role of a SAHM, only people with a massive chip on their own shoulder. But pretending that working parents don't have the same responsibilities and role is just ridiculous. You don't stop being a parent when your kids are at school, do you? I don't stop being a parent when I am at work.

DruryLanePenance

What nonsense. I work freelance and you could easily say exactly the same about that.

If I don’t want to take in a project I don’t have to.

If I don’t want to work with a particular client I don’t have to.

If I want to drop everything and work (or not work) from a beach in Thailand for a week I can.

I have a whole lot more freedom and autonomy than a full time parent. Just because it doesn’t involve the restrictions associated with some employed roles, doesn’t mean it’s not work (and in this case professional, full time, paid work no less...)

If you have all school aged children then you have 6 hours a day to do all the household chores whereas if you are working whilst the DCs are at school then you still have to do all those things but in less time. I rarely sit down before 10pm during the week.

Being at home with toddlers/babies all day is hard but still more of a lifestyle choice than work. I personally loved it but had to go back to work for financial reasons.

@JustInCaseCakeHappens
It's relevant because lots of posters have implied that it's just parenting and therefore can't be seen as work. My point is that plenty of parents actually choose not to "parent" and opt out of all the activities associated with raising and looking after children. Essentially burdening the other parent with all the responsibilities and duties. Yet for as long as people insist there is no work associated with looking after children then how can the parent left doing it all complain?

I don't find looking after my own children to be an "effort".

In any case you make the definition of effort very broad, going roller skating is "work". As is doing the times crossword.

To me "work" is doing something I would not choose to do without financial remuneration. I will happily look after my own children for no financial remuneration.

No one is ignoring or devaluing unpaid mother work. We just don't really care because we're doing our own unpaid mother work or similar.

My point is that plenty of parents actually choose not to "parent" and opt out of all the activities associated with raising and looking after children. Essentially burdening the other parent with all the responsibilities and duties. Yet for as long as people insist there is no work associated with looking after children then how can the parent left doing it all complain?

I can't tell if you're being deliberately obtuse.

We all agree that raising children is work, it's just not paid work. It would of course grate to have a partner who does not do his fair share. How does this have anything to do with your status, or perceived lack of status?