To think it's a bit sad that both people nowadays need to work to afford a household?

[Lowef]

I know this isn't a popular opinion on MN but was thinking how rubbish it is that today mostly both parents need to be working to be able to afford the basics of food, clothing, rent. mortgage etc for the family without being on the breadline.

I have really fond memories of playing with my mum in the garden planting pots, watching her cook whilst i sat on the worktop. She'd collect us from school everyday and on fridays she'd have baked some warm muffins, sweet buns which were still warm and fresh from the oven. She'd give some to my friends too. She taught me so many things like sewing, cooking, gardening (she was very green fingered), growing veg. She spent alot of time with us kids and i look back at those days really fondly.

In comparison I am nothing like this with my children - I just don't seem to have the time and energy for the things she did. I can't bake cupcakes in time for the kids school pick up as they're in the after school club. Dinner is a quick whisk up whatever I have in the freezer / fridge , I'm too frazzled and tired for spending lots of time with the kids. DH is the same.

In an an ideal world i would love to be a SAHM and have more energy and time for my family and myself too instead of just rushing through life. The years are going by so fast and most of my energy and life is taken up by work. The children are growing up so quickly.

Not sure if anyone else feels the same too or if ill get an MN roasting!

I have been thinking about this recently. On the one hand, I think it's great that women can, and do, have jobs, because back in the 60s and 70s, women 'gave up' work when they got married (I remember my aunt doing this), which meant, for women in abusive marriages, they often didn't have the choice to leave because they couldn't financially support themselves and/or their children.

However, we are slowly creeping back to that situation, because it now takes two workers to afford one household. I suppose you could argue that the benefits system is there to hold their hands, should they need to leave, but that in itself will be putting a lot of women off striking out alone. Obviously if you are lucky enough to have had a university education and have a good career then you will be fine, but for many people, in bog standard jobs - retail workers, Healthcare Assistants, admin in schools, accounts assistants, customer care operatives etc, who all earn under the average wage, it's a lot more difficult.

@HeavyHeidi

I don't think I'm that materialistic, but being poor even as a child is no fun. Sure I didn't know anything about bills or grocery shopping budget, but I knew about never getting anything new and nice as we couldn't afford it. Third-hand worn out shoes from cousins. Freezing house as we couldn't afford to heat it, where I was getting dressed under covers in the morning, as it was too cold to get out of bed. Seeing other kids getting new bikes, doing activities, going to places, travelling...yeah I was jealous. And I'm not talking about Disney only - when we were teenagers, a friend was sent to a language immersion summer camp abroad, I still remember how I wished this was me, but understood that this will never happen.

I didn't really think about it this way, as mum was just.. home, so it didn't occur to me that she would be able to do anything about finances. Her working could have made quite a difference though and it would not occur to me to be a SAHM if we were in similar situation financially.

I agree, it’s not about being materialistic and wanting Disney holidays etc but about all the other things that children miss out on when parents are on a tight budget. As an adult you can see how their wants and choices affect children that you may not have seen at the time. Thet may be happy for no extras for their children so they don’t have to work but their children may not be.

The only reason I brought up evolutionary biology is because "women have always left their babies and gone out to work" was being used as an argument against the benefits of having a SAHM.

I was simply pointing out that this wasn't the case in the most relevant time in our evolutionary history.

And yes evolution is fairly relevant to a lot of human instinct and behaviour.

@crossstitchingnana

Yes, in the last babies would have gone in the fields with mum or left with family. Not left at a nursery with low paid, often young, strangers.

I think you’re assuming a level of individualised care here that simply didn’t happen, because that idea is a comparatively new one, and partly because children above the age of six or seven would have been working themselves, not seen as a separate category requiring care.

For long periods of time, parents in the past routinely did things we would think caused horrific trauma to children, like well to do families handing over their newborns to wet nurses at a distance and only retrieving them once weaned and walking. We know a lot about this in Jane Austen’s family, as just one instance — all the Austen children were BF by their mother for a few weeks, then sent away to a wet nurse in a neighbouring village with only occasional visits by parents until they were around one, when they came back ‘home’ to comparative strangers, leaving the only family they’d known. The reason for this illustrates exactly what I mean about modern ideas about SAHMs having little or no relevance to the past — Mrs Austen had far too much work at home to look after babies who had to be carried and fed. She worked alongside her servants to run a small family farm and provision a large household at a time where growing, killing, preparing, preserving etc food with no fridges, reliable ovens, supermarkets was a huge job — she simply didn’t have time for her babies. They came back home at an age where they were less work.

It contravenes all modern ideas about primary carers and bonding.

"well to do families handing over their newborns to wet nurses at a distance and only retrieving them once weaned and walking"

And this is being used by you as an argument that there is no benefit to having a SAHM? "Modern ideas about parenting and bonding" are based on scientific research into bonding, why these instincts exist and why they are beneficial. You're dismissing this and holding up quite a cruel and cold period in our history where children suffered as if that's more relevant than what we understand about our biology and psychology now.

Well if we are now talking about evolutionary biology, in Stone age, 1 man would pass their DNA to 17 women. I'm doing it all wrong..

Actually social monogamy between our ancestors evolved fairly late in our history - advantageous for the survival of children for a number of reasons...

I was simply pointing out that this wasn't the case in the most relevant time in our evolutionary history.

first, I don't see many people here talking about leaving babies, this is an UK based forum so most women benefit from maternity leave. OP is talking about baking and gardening, so she was probably also not a baby.
So as we are talking about older children, which is the "most relevant time" where women stayed home and dedicated their lives to raising their children, so the children could benefit from full attention of one of their parents? Paleolithic age? Middle ages? Industrial revolution?

I'm really glad I was born in an age where I can have financial independence and be equal to the man I live with in terms of finances and caring for the household. I would have hated for that to have been forcibly taken away from me. We could get by pretty well on one salary, and would happily do so if, say, one of us was I'll, or needed a break. I was out of work once for 6m and it was pretty would destroying which the kids were at school. I much prefer to have a life outside the household as it is beneficial for my mental health when the kids etc get too much. I am also pleased that I'm showing my children, especially the boys, a role model where their mother is truly on an equal footing to their father. Equally he has always done half of the childcare which I think is a really important role model for them too.

@chocolatesweets

A stay at home mum does not just benefit her own family. Misconception. So if I stay at home , help my own family , my son for example becomes a doctor - does he only serve me because I stayed at home with him or does he serve society? Exactly.

I don't understand the point here? So no children who grew up to be doctors went to childcare?

Freddyfuzzbear so you are arguing simultaneously that being a SAHM is what evolution and nature intended and how it's been thoughout the history, but we should also disregard the past, as we know better nowadays?

I'm very glad that I have equal opportunity to work and bring in money and generally be an independent woman outside of my DP.

My step grandma is entirely reliant on my step dad now her husband has died, and she doesn't know how to drive, do basic household bills etc and generally have any confidence to be independent. I find it really shocking. She always berates me and my my mum for working and says we should just let the man work! Worked out great for her...

I do find it sad that some areas of the UK are entirely unaffordable on one wage, but part of it is also expectations, lifestyle etc.

Me and DP live in a poor area up North, yet have a high household income and wouldn't feel comfortable living down South despite being able to afford it on paper. We like our lifestyle up here, and has given us a much smaller mortgage bill every month which helps alleviate any worry about an unexpected illness or job loss etc.

I was a sahm when mine were small, you simply cut your cloth according to your needs. Children need not be expensive, mine wore hand me downs, I bought toys from car boot sales, we had an old car.
I had time to do so much with my children, issue is they don't seem to remember it!
On the downside my career suffered and my pension will be reduced. Really I should have gone part time and had the best of both worlds.

For every thread like this, you can find 10 others on MN where the woman is asking for or advice because she feels dependent on her partner, because she cannot her fulfill her financials needs fully, because she cannot leave and have the same quality of life as she isn’t the main earner.
Yes it’s a choice, many things in life are. But saying it’s a choice doesn’t make the consequences less severe. Women put themselves at risk when they give up their financial independence, i.e a full time job or a career. OP has some 50s ideals about how great it was that women could stay at home. It it was so great, why did women fight so hard to acquire rights in the workplace. You call it what you like, it’s bad for women to not be financially independent and have their own earning power.

Haven't read all the posts but there'll be loads of sahp bashing im sure "I could never let my brain go to mush....assuming all sahp are uneducated, unambitious losers etc. Both me and my dh have been sahp with our dcs , I have a degree and a masters as does he . We lived abroad when our first was born and I was wking ft and we jugglesd childcare ourselves, I have worked in several creches pre uni /pre kids and absolutely hated them especially for small babies(that's just my opinion).
At the moment he has the permanent, well-paid job and I work freelance.
It's not as simple as ppl make out that everyone can find childcare (just go back to work is always stated on mn for parents trying to get back into working life like it's so simple) actually we find it's more difficult now our dcs are in school/preschool , all finished at different times, massive shortage of childminders here, we have absolutely no family support even in emergencies, it's 15 euros an hour for all of my 3 dcs to be minded after school and actually there is no option to add on hours for my preschooler. That's our experience but our area has severe childcare shortages and the majority of parents here have family help.
We have had to work together to come to the best conclusion for our family so it means I'm very flexible but earn less but we have set up a small business together too and my dh works ft. I do love picking my dcs up from school and I really , really appreciate the years that we got when they were small, it was a time we will never get back and despite being very tired we loved it. But I also agree it is important for women to protect themselves so of course it's good to have their own income and also would highly advice as a freelancer to set up your own account and pay into your own pension.
And its great that women and men can keep their careers and be parents, more power to them. But I absolutely hate the implication that sahp are mindless idiots with no ambition who are sooooo screwed later on in life. Actutallu the drive to be with our kids when small motivated us to set up other things, work harder around the hours. Hopefully there'll be more flexibility for parents in the future, I think though if you gavd no family support at all, multiple dcs and live in a country like Ireland where there is very, very long holidays and very short schooll days in comparison to other European counties something has to give or in our case one of us has to be flexible.

I am old enough to remember when the wife’s earnings were not taken into consideration when applying for a mortgage as it was expected that when children came along she would not be working. As house prices increased I remember discussions with friends about the impossibility of affording them so they couldn’t go up any more. So then mortgage companies changed the rules and took the wife’s earnings into consideration. Result, prices continued to rise at a greater rate.

But it's not like that for everyone. You can choose to live in a cheaper house/area, drive less expensive cars, spend less on holidays/entertaining etc, or like many these days you can have all the latest gadgets/cars/holidays, to live in a house that you really can't afford, and therefore might 'need' two salaries to pay for it. We all have choices.

I had time to do so much with my children, issue is they don't seem to remember it!

Reading this thread I'm trying to remember my time at home and I can't. My mum was a SAHP and I don't remember it at all. I know she baked, because I can bake - I don't remember learning though, I've just always been able to do it.

@ginghamstarfish

But it's not like that for everyone. You can choose to live in a cheaper house/area, drive less expensive cars, spend less on holidays/entertaining etc, or like many these days you can have all the latest gadgets/cars/holidays, to live in a house that you really can't afford, and therefore might 'need' two salaries to pay for it. We all have choices.

There's plenty of people though who live in small houses, in less desirable areas, have old and cheap cars and never going on holiday and still need two parents to work because wages are low and cost of living is high.

I was pregnant and had my ex-DH come home and tell me he had quit his job on a whim. Thank God I had my own job. I was NEVER going to be a SAHM after that!

That's because a stay at home parent is generally not contributing to society. It's only of value to their own family. Nothing wrong with being a stay at home parent, but it's of no value to society in general

Except that they could be raising the doctor fire fighter police officer etc. etc. who might save your life one day 🙄

@Germolenequeen

That's because a stay at home parent is generally not contributing to society. It's only of value to their own family. Nothing wrong with being a stay at home parent, but it's of no value to society in general

Except that they could be raising the doctor fire fighter police officer etc. etc. who might save your life one day 🙄

But so can working parents.

Right. And children of parents who worked all become criminals, drug addicts and layabouts do they?

@chocolatesweets

A stay at home mum does not just benefit her own family. Misconception. So if I stay at home , help my own family , my son for example becomes a doctor - does he only serve me because I stayed at home with him or does he serve society? Exactly.

You do realise that children who have parents that work are also supported and can become doctors too.......

@Whatatodooo1 you have a degree and masters, haven't read all the posts, but are 'sure there'll be loads of SAHP bashing?'
That's not even the point of this thread. So much for your education
Also this thread is about being able to afford SAHP in the UK. So if you lived abroad this is of zero relevance to you

I'm using my education in my job now, I have a job. Its in the area of education and I work from home , its freelance. I had to have a degree and post-grad to work in the area I work in.