So I’m a housewife/SAHM and I do love it. I was brought up by a family who worked and frowned on people who receive benefits. I was expected to go to uni and get a good degree despite a lot of discouragement and no support from parents. I left home very young, 18, and worked as a low paid hairdresser apprentice but got pregnant during my training. My son has severe autism and I never returned to work or training to look after him and unexpectedly fell pregnant with his younger brother. I am a SAHP to them and I’m very happy doing this but feel a real deep seated sense of shame when I call myself a SAHM or housewife, and it’s always inevitably followed by “when are you going to return to work?” Or “wouldn’t you like to start earning money again”. I am autistic as well (much higher functioning than my son) and not a lot of people know, just a few close friends and the truth is just looking after the kids and running the house is fulfilling for me but people don’t seem to believe this. I’ve even been called a benefits mum, I only get disability benefit for my son and CA but I don’t get any kind of benefit for myself other than that and my husband works hard and we are comfortable with what we have. Does anyone have similar feelings?