To ask if you think SAHMs are lazy?

[Camobag]

I know people say about it being valuable input to the children, equally valuable to working etc but I don’t think it is. And I’m a sahm.
I ask because dh is a high earner (over 100k) but I hardly have any money but I think this is fair as I am a sahp and he earns it. My friend said I work too in a different way but I think most people manage to work and raise children and keep a house.
Ideally I need to find a job now my youngest is in preschool for 15 hours but it’s proving difficult, mainly because covid is making life so hard. I’ve had my eldest dc off for two weeks already as part of a popped covid bubble. How am I ever going to go back to work?

@Mamabear12

Hmm. These types of comments annoy me. My dh has had friends ask them what I do all day with a cleaner coming twice a week and an au pair. We have 3 kids and a dog. I get so annoyed when people think I must relax all day. Sure I have it easier then some. But I’m actually very involved with my kids. Mornings start 6am with the baby. Au pair takes over baby at 7am while I quickly get ready and wake the Older kids by 7:20aM. Help them to get ready (reminding them many times to put their clothes on! Brush teeth, hair etc). Kids down for breakfast w au pair and I take over baby for a bit. Then I pass baby back to au pair and take older kids and dog for the school run. I return by 9am and feed dog. Take over baby. Play w her a bit, breastfeed her, settle her for nap. Go down and have a quick breakfast. Tidy, do some admin (buy things needed online for kids, pay bills, book appointments). Baby wakes....and lets skip to evening. After I get the baby to bed by 7pm. I have dinner. And then I’m now getting the older kids ready for bed, reading w them etc. The middle one sleeps 8:30ish. The older one 9:15/30! So it’s a long busy day. I then have about 30 mins of me time before the baby wakes for a breastfeed. Then I go to bed because I’m tired and she usually wakes again at 3am.

So please tell me, does this sound like a lazy SAHM?!

It is probably because the morning and evening stuff working parents also do. The admin stuff they also do but often late evening when kids are in bed or in snatched moments between work emails/on breaks. The bit that is different with a sahm is that they care for the children in the day when working parents are at work - but if kids are at school or there is childcare they arent doing that; or at least not much of it. I do think you can fill a day and be busy. But when you work often you do much of the same you just squash it into smaller pockets of time.

I’m a SAHM and no, I’m not lazy. However that’s not really what your post is about. I have a similar set up, in that my DH earns over £100k (as did I before I had DC). The decision not to return to the workplace was joint on the following basis:

• we both have equal access to household income
• DH’s wages fund my pension contribution every year
• DC do not go into full time childcare until they are school age but do part time nursery for socialisation. DH pays for 100% of this.

There are other financial things we agreed on but this was discussed in full before I agreed to give up my job. When youngest DC is in school I will return to employment but realistically I’ll never earn the same as I did before.

OP have you addressed the unfairness of your arrangement with your DH? Have you explained how it makes you feel? Given you are married and have DC I don’t understand why you don’t have equal access to the household income.

@Havaiana

It sounds like you're in a financially abusive marriage, OP.

Your contribution as a SAHM is immense and your husband's salary is family money, not his alone. You need access to it.

This.

Your DH sounds very mean. You should have access to money in bank, a debit cash card you can use for buying good, clothing, haircuts, days out with children, birthday gifts for your family, coffees, lunch out with friends, magazines, etc.

By caring for DC and running the home you enable him to work.

'he works' 'it's his money' sounds like he has brainwashed you. You work too in the home. It's both your money.

In your shoes I would get a job and make him pay for a cleaner and childcare. Make him do half off drop offs and collecting of DC too.

You are in a financially abusive marriage.

If you do divorced he would have to give you half of everything. Do you even know how much he has stashed away and in pensions or shares?

@Mamabear12

Hmm. These types of comments annoy me. My dh has had friends ask them what I do all day with a cleaner coming twice a week and an au pair. We have 3 kids and a dog. I get so annoyed when people think I must relax all day. Sure I have it easier then some. But I’m actually very involved with my kids. Mornings start 6am with the baby. Au pair takes over baby at 7am while I quickly get ready and wake the Older kids by 7:20aM. Help them to get ready (reminding them many times to put their clothes on! Brush teeth, hair etc). Kids down for breakfast w au pair and I take over baby for a bit. Then I pass baby back to au pair and take older kids and dog for the school run. I return by 9am and feed dog. Take over baby. Play w her a bit, breastfeed her, settle her for nap. Go down and have a quick breakfast. Tidy, do some admin (buy things needed online for kids, pay bills, book appointments). Baby wakes....and lets skip to evening. After I get the baby to bed by 7pm. I have dinner. And then I’m now getting the older kids ready for bed, reading w them etc. The middle one sleeps 8:30ish. The older one 9:15/30! So it’s a long busy day. I then have about 30 mins of me time before the baby wakes for a breastfeed. Then I go to bed because I’m tired and she usually wakes again at 3am.

So please tell me, does this sound like a lazy SAHM?!

Honestly? Yes. Cleaner and au pair and no job. If you are still rushed off your feet and only have 30minutes to yourself in the evening, you need to organise your life better.

It is very unfair of your DH.
DP doesn't earn anything like a 100k but shares every cent.

You'd be far better off without him.

The way your husband withholds money from you and the children is absolutely shocking. He sounds vile. You shouldn’t put up with this as it sets a bad example to your children. And Nope, SAHM’s are not lazy!

@JoJoSM2

Kind of depends. I’m a SAHM with childcare, cleaner, gardener etc. so a lot of my time is filled with leisure-type activities. I wouldn’t say I’m lazy but can’t see the point of working so do things that are more enjoyable.

SAHMs who actually look after children all day on top of doing housework etc are very hand-working IMO.

Surely you are not a SAHM if you don't even look after kids? So not relevant to the op really.

@ImSleepingBeauty

I’m a SAHM and no, I’m not lazy. However that’s not really what your post is about. I have a similar set up, in that my DH earns over £100k (as did I before I had DC). The decision not to return to the workplace was joint on the following basis:

• we both have equal access to household income
• DH’s wages fund my pension contribution every year
• DC do not go into full time childcare until they are school age but do part time nursery for socialisation. DH pays for 100% of this.

There are other financial things we agreed on but this was discussed in full before I agreed to give up my job. When youngest DC is in school I will return to employment but realistically I’ll never earn the same as I did before.

OP have you addressed the unfairness of your arrangement with your DH? Have you explained how it makes you feel? Given you are married and have DC I don’t understand why you don’t have equal access to the household income.

If I might say so, this is a really sensible way to approach it. My husband and I have discussed him becoming a sahp at some point. These threads make me so sad. I would never want someone I love to feel this way.

Put it this way - if you left and claimed even the woeful amount of Cm the govt seems you entitled to you'd get around £1100 a month from him

And a lot of that pension pot and the house or part of. It’d finally get a bit fairer.

@Camobag

I know if I found a job he’d take back that £600 - I have worked since having the children but only part time and my take home was only about £900, which by the time I’d paid for before and after school for three days a week meant I was only slightly better off than I was when I wasn’t working.

If you seperated you would probably get more on child maintenance, as well as a break on contact days, you'll be able to claim benefits until you're back on your feet job wise and be open to find someone who treats you properly.

You definitely need a job if that's all your husband earns.

Tbh I thought this - sounds unemployed. Unless of course keeping the home for some of the time in which case part time sahp. But that's pretty much everyone

Oh OP I really feel sad for you. You have such low self esteem.
My DH is also a really high earner, and I am on a stipend (studying).. paying out way more in childcare than I bring in - but I’m investing in my future and don’t think being a SAHM is for me. We discuss big financial purchases together and treat money as shared family money. I do think that’s how it should be once you have kids.
V practically, you are doing all the housework, all the childcare, those are easily jobs that together cost people £20-30k a year. If you divorced him, you would receive child support, or he would have to pay for 50% childcare and you would have half the week to work. How is your current situation fair at all?

Do you love him? It sounds like you are in difficult position. Be smart here. Speak with the lawyer and ask what evidence you need to collect. Quietly collect the evidence and divorce him. He doesn't treat you well and it will not change until you divorce him or separate.

Plus child benefit to pay towards your pension.

I can’t really believe what I am reading. I am very much in the camp of earning for yourself and splitting things (however DP and I earn a very similar wage so we split the bills and keep what we have left over in our own bank accounts) and as a full time worker with two kids I am never really sure what SAHP do all day as I have to do all of these things too and work but I don’t think of them as lazy - I find it FAR harder looking after kids and go to work for a rest, and I don’t have an easy job.

However it seems that a decision has been made for you not to work and you have no means of being able to at the moment so it seems very unfair that you are so limited, especially when there is no mortgage and he clearly has a LOT of disposable income.

You really need to have this out with him. I am never one to say LTB but in this case you really would be better off!

Wait, when he works he has you to provide free childcare but if you work have to pay? This is really bad OP.

If he’s earning £100,000 he must be taking home £5,000 a month and you have £200 for your own personal spending money for you and the children. That’s outrageous.

You should tell him he will be paying a lot more out if you leave him.

This is crazy OP. Your thread title isn't actually relevant. Can I take a guess and ask whether your DH has hinted that SAHMs are lazy? Tbh I would move this thread to relationships as you are not happy with the set up in your relationship and your independence and that is the real issue I think.

For context, as soon as we started trying for a baby we set up a joint account. We agreed both salaries would be paid into it. Then we totted stuff up and thought about individual discretionary spending and gave ourselves the same amount. For anything. Clothes, books, haircuts, ipads, whatever. EVERYTHING ELSE (clothes for son, day-trips, eating out for all of us, food, bills, rent) goes on the joint account. Including a private pension for me because I am a freelancer with an irregular income and no single employer. It's a joint investment. Because we're married.

When I was on maternity leave, I put baby groups and half of all the eating in cafes with baby - because I wasn't staying put in a tiny flat all day - on the joint account too.

It's taken a while for it all to even out and I am still the worst at talking about money but what you're talking about is NOT FAIR. Please don't let your husband take your self-esteem. The world is quite literally structured in favour of people who don't have to give up time to grow and raise a very small child (mostly women, right?!)

You sound sad and down about this. Please move this thread to relationships and benefit from some very real support from women who have been there.

I am never really sure what SAHP do all day as I have to do all of these things too and work

Well it depends, as the majority seem to go back to work once their youngest starts school, I would at a guess say that during the day they look after their children?

Financial abuse. You’re facilitating him earning £££ yet you don’t get a share. If he can’t understand this I would 100% divorce him. You’d probably get more from him through child support.

Im a SAHM and I'm not in the slightest bit lazy. I don't sit down (unless driving obvioulsy and eating my lunch) until the children are in bed. Im always on the go. Doing something for the home, doing errands or volunteering.

Some people in general are lazy. Whether or not you are a SAHM or not doesn't automatically change who you are. If you were lazy before, you'll be lazy whatever role you have in life.

If you are desparate to earn your own money, which I completely understand, have you tried online work. Audiotyping, proofreading or the like spring to mind.
Just a though!

That's awful of him, would he be willing to stay at home and look after the kids while you went to work then? It most definitely should be family money, especially when he earns that much! My husband earns 30k, I became a sahp after our second son was born and he puts money in my account and I have his bank card to pay for more expensive stuff. You're meant to be a partnership

Honestly I think you need to talk to someone. Have a look on the women's aid website. Your situation isn't right, in my opinion. You aren't being treated well, it sounds financially abusive to me too.

If you're married, you are protected in the case of divorce. I would look into this option if I were in your shoes.