To ask if you are a 'housewife' with no children?

[crochetmonkey74]

I know the term housewife is outdated so first off apologies.
I've always wondered about this , I had a great aunt and uncle who never had children but she never worked. I've always been interested in how this would be (been a bit of a fantasy of mine)
Do any of you have this life ? What is it like?

I did it for around 2 years for multiple reasons I won't bore you with. I basically just pottered around at home, watched Netflix, met up with friends around their work and regularly went to visit family members so I wasn't ever just sitting on the sofa.

The house was always clean but it never took that long anyway and I could put more effort In to cooking but that was about it, no improving communities or volunteering like PP. Just good ol mooching about. I did get bored after a while and I'm starting to get the same now my DC are out of the baby stage.

She creates TONS to do

Maybe it's tons of stuff she likes doing

[quote AllThePogs]@ChickenStripper no she did not used to be like that. Why poor friend?
She has slowed down to a glacial pace of life.[/quote]
Poor friend because here you are talking about her driving you bananas when she was helping you and yet you say it is a part of her ageing ie something that happens to us all in varying degrees.

@crochetmonkey74 “cue - someone coming on to forensically examine the semantics of my first post and how I brought it on by vocab choice”

😂😂😂

[quote TatianaBis]@amusedbush why don’t you have a cleaner? 2 incomes no kids - must be possible.[/quote]
A very fair question! I'm a full-time PhD student on the lowest stipend and DH is a postie, so not a huge amount of spare income. I have told DH that I would like a cleaner when I've graduated and found a job but at this point, I'd have to clean up before I let them in my house

I actually don't know a single person in real life who has a cleaner, it's not common around here - or at least not in my social circles. I would love someone to help with the grubby jobs even once a week so I could just try to keep the place clear of surface junk.

@AllThePogs You’re being very repetitive. Not working wouldn’t be for you. We get it. However, it’s a choice that people who are not you get to make for themselves. And that’s fine.

I'd love to do this but I'm single so for me it's working until state pension age or I die, whichever comes first!

[quote AllThePogs]@amprev I have been talking about friends and acquaintances who have retired early. People can obviously do what they want. When I was younger I would have posted on this thread saying I would love to leave work and bumble about at home. But the reality I have seen is it ages people.
I don't want to become old before my time. The early retired people who don't do this are those studying, volunteering, or taking on another challenge. So it is not about paid work. But it is about doing something challenging that keeps your brain taxed.[/quote]
I think this hits the nail on the head. It's not about having paid work - though there is of course the issue that others have raised about being financially dependent on a man and therefore potentially screwed if the relationship falls apart - but about doing something that challenges you and is meaningful to you. I think doing very little can breed listlessness and brain fog and the less you do the smaller your world can become etc

But I think it's perfectly possible not to be employed or raising children and still be ticking the 'brain taxed' box, and conversely to be in paid employment and still have very little in your life and become 'old before your time'

[quote ChickenStripper]@CounsellorTroi I am agreeing with you. I didn't want people to think that everyone on a State Pension will be able to do so and a work pension is essential. How does a woman get that if she stays at home?[/quote]
I haven’t said that women should stay home even if they aren’t in a situation to do so. Only that there’s nothing wrong with doing so if they are in a position to do so.

I'd hate to depend on anyone financially like that

I think it really depends on your personality and how each individual gains satisfaction from life.

My partner is a work-a-holic. He takes satisfaction from being high up in his company, bringing home a big wage packet and being respected and all of that crap.

I am not motivated by the same things at all. I find work generally unsatisfying. Although my current role is in an interesting field and I get to meet lots of interesting people - I could imagine being much more content pottering about at home.

To me, being a "housewife" would give me the opportunity to pursue things that give me satisfaction - art, socialising, gardening, cooking, exercise, reading, studying (even, dare I say, cleaning! :D).

Providing the working partner is happy with the decision, and the non-working partner has some financial independence / security then I don't see the problem. However, the non-working partner should be willing to re-enter the job market if their working partner changes their mind - there shouldn't be any pressure on the working partner to continue if they don't want to.

@MrsPelligrinoPetrichor

I always wonder on threads like this how people will cope when they retire.

I think the difference with retirement is that by the time people get to retirement age, they've worked for decades, and had to put off doing all the fun stuff they'd like to do. So they've saved up loads of activities. I like to do jigsaws, and when I retire that's one of the things I'll do. But I wouldn't have wanted to do jigsaws every day since leaving school!

My parents were married 18/19 years before I came along and my mother never worked, neither did her sisters or brothers' wives once they married. It seems very strange by today's standards. Their worlds were very small.

@MeSanniesareBrannies

I think it’s interesting how many women on this thread seem to require labour of some kind to justify their existence. Like, if they are not engaged in some manner of slog, they are failing somehow.

That's the case for humans in general. Heck, it's the case for all living beings. We've evolved to do things. Having no purpose in life is a recipe for depression, if nothing else.

I don't think this is an issue for women only- we've all heard of 'cocklodgers', have we not?

@NETSRIK

If it works for people and they're happy, anyone who says they must be bored can only be jealous. Why should it matter to anyone else whether children are involved or not or how they fill their days? If people don't have to work and choose not to work and are happy then good luck to them.

People who are resigned to an entire lifetime of wage servitude often need to maintain that those not doing so are miserable otherwise they would have to consider that they are wasting their lives.

My mum has always been a housewife and we left home 30 years ago. My dad retired in his 40s but they are kind of involved in a consultancy/advisory/financial capacity in my siblings' businesses. So they do their exercise, their housework, go out, go travelling, gardening, cooking, hobbies etc.. they also have a cleaner and a gardener that come every few weeks.

I personally would rather work than do housework because it is so boring, but if everyone is happy and they can afford it, then great. When I retire I will volunteer- as it is, 20% of my work is pro bono so I would probably do more. I'm hoping to also live near at least some of my kids and help with any grandchildren.

.

@JosephineDeBeauharnais

I know several women in this situation. They are childless by choice, married to high earning men and wouldn’t dream of doing any sort of work. They don’t volunteer, do charity work, fundraising, nothing. They also have cleaners and gardeners. What they do is shop, coffee, lunch, plan holidays, walk the dog. They’ve always got a home improvement project on the go, or are moving house. They seem to fill their time very nicely and have lovely, enviable lives.

I think most people would consider this an empty life, rather than enviable.

I am late 50s and considering retirement in the new few years . Even with no gardener or cleaner (apart from DH!) I would still want something more in my life. I mean, yes I love holidays, going for lunch and walking my dog but I would still be looking for a little more stimulation and the feeling of being useful.

I know a few people who do this, all of whom are very wealthy. The wife stays busy with running multiple homes, charity projects, bit of light studying (eg short courses in art history), runs a very full social calendar, fitness and beauty, in one case very active in the local synagogue etc. It works for them.

I think not working to spend all day scrubbing the floor would be a very different prospect. Modern technology means keeping house isn’t a full time job any more. You’d need a lot of hobbies.

@ThirdElephant ‘Doing things’ and ‘having a purpose’ are not synonymous with ‘slog’.

I'm a SAHM although to school age children. I enjoy a relaxed pace of life. I always have done. Working and taking care of all the day to day needs of family life made me quite miserable, I hate rushing and I hate feeling I'm not doing something well.

Some people don't, PIL have both been retired since early fifties and are always 100 miles an hour. Getting up at the crack of dawn, popping here there and everywhere, taking on responsibilities then moaning they're too busy. They need to be needed and get frustrated by me because I rarely ask for their help.

I wonder if those who don’t work have a feeling of self worth/identity?

I feel my job is what gives me purpose and my own identity away from just being a mum.

I lost my job a few years ago and I hated not working - don’t get me wrong if I won the lottery I’d go PT in a heartbeat but it’s not working that’s difficult it’s the cooking, cleaning etc that also needs to be done on top.

id love to be a house wife and no way would i get bored

Unless you're lucky enough to have a job you're passionate about, the idea that work is a source of fulfilment or the purpose in life is very toxic. Most people work to earn the money they need to do the things they enjoy outside work. Work to live, not live to work and all that.

I'm child-free, and if I didn't have to work I'd never be bored or directionless. I wouldn't spend my time doing any more housework than I currently do, either (a slatternly bare minimum). I'd read more books, see friends more, exercise more, I'd get back into organising activist campaigns rather than just showing up randomly when I'm free. I'd be a more interesting person who contributed more to the world than I was when I was pushing paper around in an office job.

That said I've made a conscious effort to get a career in a field I'm passionate about, and even if I didn't have this job it'd be something I invested a lot of time in.

And ultimately the thing I couldn't hack isn't the "life of leisure", which is idyllic and certainly not something to look down on, but doing it on my partner's dime. That would feel a bit like taking the piss out of him while also putting myself in a precarious position.

As for people I've known who have done or are doing this - they range from people who make the most of it in terms of changing the world and living their best, most fulfilling lives - those women I respect a lot. And then there are the ones who have all the time in the world and yet still don't know enough to hold an interesting conversation or talk about anything except their outfits and their housekeepers. Mind-numbing company and not people I choose to have in my life.

@KarenTheGammonRemoaner Yes. Not to any specific one of your comments, just to all of them. Yes!