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I know the term housewife is outdated so first off apologies.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?

Running the house is a job though, whether paid or not. It's the thing that usually tips me over the edge of feeling overwhelmed when I'm working f/t, doing things with the kids, and then facing a pile of washing up, bills to sort out, car needing MOT, taxiing kids around the place (this is a big job).

That's where the concept of 'wifework' comes from, the mental load of juggling all the stuff, obviously it's even more if you have children, but it's still a part-time role in its own right. People who work f/t do that job on weekends and after work (and sometimes at work if they can). Of course doing it for an hour or two in the morning and then having your weekends and evenings free as a couple would seem advantageous to some.

I personally would hate it as I like my job and get a lot of satisfaction and identity from doing it, but I'm not mystified that running a home is still an activity/job that can be tiring at times if there's two of you and the other person doesn't do any of that stuff.

@happydays00

Urgh "running the house". This is not a FT job. Yes, it fills some time but let's not forget someone still needs to "run the house" even if both people work FT.

My mum was a house wife, has never worked a day in her life. She spends her days planning holidays, walking the dog, running errands, cleaning, cooking etc. She basically does in the week what everyone else does over the weekend or on days off. The trouble with this is that she becomes overwhelmed if she has more than 2 tasks to do in one day. Horses for courses, but it's not a life I'd choose any time soon!

That is what I mean about ageing. People after a few years can no longer cope with a normal level of activity.

The other option is for people to create housework.
Cooking from scratch does not take that long. But sure you could make elaborate meals every night. Or invent constant remodelling of the house and garden. I remember older housewives going on cake decorating courses and flower arranging courses and spending lots of time making elaborate cakes and about half a day arranging flowers in the house. It is easy to fill up time if you try.

@IntermittentParps

That takes you up to 9.30am, perhaps 10am if you’ve had a lie-in. Does it, aye? Are you the lie-in police? (or, indeed, the how long housework takes police).

Anyway.
DP and I don't have kids. I love working, so suspect I would carry on even if I didn't have to.
But I have no doubt that if I had any spare time I could very happily fill it with sorting out the shit-tip falling-down house, going to galleries, walking, exercising, day trips, reading, studying...

Well, I suspect most of us could fill the time, but the question is more about why we should rely on someone else's work to fund the day trips and exercising? Hence the point that 'running the house' is a very poor excuse for any kind of significant contribution to the household -- the bit that always baffles me is when people refer to their spouses' relief that they 'manage the bill-paying'. How much time can that possibly take in the average week for things like electricity, gas, internet? Don't most people have them as direct debits?

[quote CounsellorTroi]**@KarenTheGammonRemoaner Yes Betty Friedan is American. She wrote about this in The Feminist Mystique. It is the book widely credited with launching the women's liberation movement in the 60s and 70s.

It’s The Feminine Mystique, but yes hugely important book challenging the notions that women should be fulfilled by marriage, housework and motherhood.[/quote]
Yes, you are right Feminine.
A bit depressing to see some women today's seeing this as the ultimate thing to aim for.

I think it’s a bit depressing to see some women today so totally closed to the idea that different women want different things.

My mum was a housewife. She was rubbish at it,. The house was always dirty and chaotic. Our clothes were never clean. And yet she was never ever lounging around on her arse. She loved cooking so all the bread was made from scratch, she made her own jam, pickles, cakes, pies even yoghurt, and all food was from scratch. She loved a bargain and walked miles to the market for fresh veg rather than pay a few pence more at the local greengrocer. She did try to keep the house clean but it was bit and old and tatty and it eluded her.
Didn't make me want her life at all. She certainly never spent time at exercise classes or afternoon cinema. It looked like drudgery to me.

@MeSanniesareBrannies

I think it’s a bit depressing to see some women today so totally closed to the idea that different women want different things.

I don't think anyone's unaware that different women want different things, its blatantly apparent from the views on this thread. But some of us happen to think that devoting your life to keeping house for you and your husband isn't developing women to their full potential.

I fully support (to the death etc) the right of women to become housewives if that's what they want and their finances support that. But let's not forget that for decades we were told that this was the full extent of our capabilities and steered away from other kinds of lives. Women have fought hard (and in some cases died) for the right not to have that as their preordained destiny.

Don't let's reduce this to this hoary old cliche about "choice" either. Of course there's a choice and so there should be. But not all choices are equal.

“Running a house” is such a funny expression . Unless you’re in some sort of Downton Abbey setup or maintaining an historical property, what “running” does it require?? I work F/T as does DH and along with teenage DS and DD we all muck in to keep the home ticking over. It certainly doesn’t need someone to “run” it. You could fill your day with doing housey stuff but that feels a bit more like convincing yourself that you can’t work because of the mystical house-running .
I can totally understand someone without DC choosing not to do paid work and volunteering/gymming/walking whatever but running a home is all rather antiquated.

My dad has his own business but his business is owning and leasing real estate. He has been doing this since I was 3 years old. He doesn't have a massive portfolio- 14 office units, a restaurant and a pub. He hires estate agents to replace tenants, cleaners for the communal areas and tradesmen to do any repairs.His business partner is retired and doesn't do much.

I guess I would count him as a house husband in terms of activity but not in terms of income (he earned more than my mum who was in management at a bank some years). My grandparents cared for me and my sister, so he didn't do childcare, though he did pick up/drop off when I was a teen. His days seem preoccupied with doing the accounts (he literally logs every penny he spends into excel, i know how much my glasses cost in 2000) reading the news, monitoring the property/stock markets and picking up my mum (and now my sister) from work. He is very busy. Of course it is a full time job when he has work done for one of his properties or when he acquires a new property (and is refurbishing it), but that doesn't happen very often. he last bought a new property when I was 13 years old and I am 29 this year! When people ask me what my dad does, i say property developer though he hasn't developed property in years! His main job is collecting rent from what i can see and for years he had his office at home so I can see what he does.

I gave up work pre kids because we were struggling to have them and my job involved lots of travelling, as did my husbands and I just couldn't handle the stress of such a high powered job plus potential fertility treatment. I did go on to have ivf and I was so grateful that I didn't have to build this in around work trips and I went on to have several miscarriages which would've coincided with work trips that were non negotiable so I was so pleased to be at home during that time but that said, it was very lonely. All my friends who were around were on mat leave so I'd meet up with them sometimes but it was difficult. I found the days were very long and I struggled to fill them and lacked purpose but it was also a difficult time in my life anyway so that didn't help. Now I'm a sahm and I'm always on the go and super busy but I also recognise that I have to carve out that schedule for myself otherwise I'd get lonely again. You don't realise how much you miss the office banter or quick morning chat with the coffee man at the train station. I'm thinking about going back to work now my kids are getting to pre school age but I don't think I could handle losing my freedom again so will have to find a happy medium! I love being with the kids but hate the domestic drudgery side of being at home so without the kids I imagine even now I'd be bored out of my brain! But I respect every one is different and I do hate that we have to have a job to have an identity. Everyone's life choices are their own but there's way too much judgement on either side

So if the couple owned BTL, naturally part of the running of the household would include running of the BTL properties/managing the couple's investments. So that would not make the stay at home partner any different from my dad...

We live in a capitalist society, which means that it is not necessarily work that pays, it is asset ownership that pays. Work can be traded for assets, but after you get to that point, the economic value of work is limited.

Have seen a couple of acquaintances where the non-working spouses OHs have City jobs with long hours and significant income/wealth and children didn't happen.

[quote CounsellorTroi]**@KarenTheGammonRemoaner Yes Betty Friedan is American. She wrote about this in The Feminist Mystique. It is the book widely credited with launching the women's liberation movement in the 60s and 70s.

It’s The Feminine Mystique, but yes hugely important book challenging the notions that women should be fulfilled by marriage, housework and motherhood.[/quote]
What is wrong with the notion these things should not be fulfilling? What is it that renders them unfulfilling? What's the intrinsic lack? I don't believe it is the things you mentioned there, I believe it is more due to society outside those roles.

@Zilla1

Have seen a couple of acquaintances where the non-working spouses OHs have City jobs with long hours and significant income/wealth and children didn't happen.

Sure, but why would you give up work in anticipation of children happening?

@thepeopleversuswork And who gets to decide which choices are ‘equal’? You?

Please take this in the spirit it is meant. I, and the majority of other women who are in a position to choose not to work, do not give a shiny shit whether you think we’re ‘developed to our full potential’. It’s bizarre that you believe paid labour is the sole way in which to do that (the close mindedness to which I referred earlier) and it makes me feel a bit sorry for you that your world view is so small.

Have you even thought about what you’re saying? Is working the till at Tesco ‘developing women to their full potential’? Of working in a call centre? No? So, is it only middle class professional careers that women should be aiming for to explore ‘the full extent of their capabilities’? Nothing else will do?

Women fought and died so other women would have the ability to make the choices we have now. Not so that all women could be shamed into ceaseless labour in pursuit of what you consider their full potential.

I suspect if you have always done this you wouldn’t be bored as your life will have evolved around that “free” time and jobs around the home.

For those of us that have always worked we cannot imagine filling all those days so suspect we would be bored.

When I went to 3 days from 5 After 35 years full time, I imagined days of me time, joining a gym or swimming and lunching but the reality is, those days filled within a blink of the eye with domestic chores and doing things for other people.

I am pretty sure if I was without paid employment for five days I would be one of those people who wondered how they had time to work.

@InisnaBro Probably because the 16 hour days, working till midnight and huge amounts of stress that comes with a lot of City jobs isn’t really conducive to TTC. Particularly if you’re in your 30’s/early 40’s (the age of the women I know who have done this).

Well, I suspect most of us could fill the time, but the question is more about why we should rely on someone else's work to fund the day trips and exercising?
I suppose it depends if you think that a relationship with one person working in a formally paid job and the other at home looking after other stuff is a one-way deal or not.

You could argue that the person in the paid job equally 'relies on' the other partner for a decently comfortable house, food, house/life admin, laundry, holiday-sorting, social plans etc etc. One can pay people to provide all of these things as services; and yet if it's a spouse/partner providing them, it's so often thought of as 'just stuff you do' (or wifework).
the bit that always baffles me is when people refer to their spouses' relief that they 'manage the bill-paying'.
I think people generally list that as part of a long list of things they do. And if their spouse is relieved that they manage it, that suggests that the spouse would, if their partner didn't do it, struggle, or pay someone to do it.
Actually paying a few bills isn't a lot on its own, sure, but there are always things like Ts and Cs changing, wanting to look for cheaper deals etc. Again, on it's own it's not like running the UN or something, but it all contributes to a burden of responsibility/mental load/wifework.

What is wrong with the notion these things should not be fulfilling? What is it that renders them unfulfilling? What's the intrinsic lack? I don't believe it is the things you mentioned there, I believe it is more due to society outside those roles.

Friedan’s idea was that women should not be expected to be totally fulfilled by these roles to the exclusion of anything else. That it was not somehow “unfeminine” to want to do something else. The antithesis of “a woman’s place is in the home”.

This is a really interesting discussion, I work full time, in a very interesting and fulfilling (though challenging) sector and I have dc and a dh. I have also spent several years as a SAHM when dc were little (and in early primary school so I had lots of days on my own in house etc)

I think we really allow paid work to define us far too much. I love my job and I feel lucky to work where i do but it is not the be all and end all of me.

@Sunnysideup999 your post sort of encapsulates the gist of a lot of the argument for me - why would be only achievements I might look back on be related only to my paid work?

Why do I need work to 'give me a dimension'?

I think about this a lot and I would have a really happy and fulfilled life without paid work (assuming I had means to actually live and not have the threat of homelessness) and it wouldn't be all housework or shopping - are they the only things permitted if you're not in work?

I am endlessly interested in the world and read a huge amount. I would love the time to read to my hearts content and follow paths of interest.

I would study subjects because I was interested in them

I would spend far more time outdoors enjoying the beauty of the countryside

I would travel as much as I possibly afford

I would spend more time preparing good food and eat far better than I do now

I would re-organise my house so it suited my interests / needs better

I would have an even more lovely garden as I would have the time to work in it

I can guarantee I would rarely, if ever, be bored. I am really looking forward to retirement!

I am very senior in my role (CEO) but it baffled me in the years I took out how it really challenged some people and I have to say it was mainly female former colleagues. They didn't quite know how to introduce me without the 'this is UniBallEye, she's the XXX at YY company'

My grandmother was overtly proud of the fact that she'd 'never had to work,' and she saw it in those terms too 'having to work'

I adored going to stay with them for weekends / holidays. It was a blissful house to me. She was a wonderful baker and cook and made delicious meals every day. Her days had a rhythm to them - up early to have breakfast with my grandad before he want off to work, clean up the kitchen and sweep the floors. Always dressed properly etc. Out to the shops for the days supplies by 10am - a walk up the town to the individual shops, the butcher, the greengrocer, the bakery, the fishmonger etc. Home by 11am. Radio on in the background and she would make dinner, always always a two course meal. My grandad got home 1.10pm on the dot each day and she would have the food timed to perfection with zero stress or frazzle. Dessert ready to go on the side - usually things like stewed fruit & homemade custard or rice pudding with homemade jam.

Grandad went back to work and she cleaned the kitchen and the afternoon stretched out. I remember these afternoons of my childhood as lazy, warm, filled with sunlight beaming in the windows and we might do stuff like go for a long cycle all along the old canal banks way out in the country - sometimes bringing a small picnic.

Or she would go up to their bedroom and work for a few hours on her sewing machine, she was a competent dressmaker and made summer dresses for herself and me sometimes. I would curl up for hours, undisturbed, reading and reading and reading

Or we would bake something for the tea - brown bread / scones / apple tarts / fairy buns / tea brack / sponge cake. These were my favourite days.

Or she might visit a friend or relative, sometimes going to the local hospital to make a visit. I remember that long walk there and back

When my grandad got home we would have tea and whatever we'd baked. Then we might all go for a walk, or he would work for a few hours in his beautiful garden, or we might go to the church for prayers

The tv was only put on late in the evening for the news and perhaps 1 programme.

The days were busy and happy and not at all like my own home life which was always quite stressful. I don't think my grandmother would consider that her like was unfulfilled or without dimension or lacking in achievements..

It's not the life I live now, but I have really fond memories and in many ways when I think of 'home' its their house I think of and not my own actual childhood house

I am almost in this position as I only work a handful of hours per week. My DH earns a huge salary and loves what he does - wouldn’t dream of giving it up in any circumstance.
No children. I am autistic, like PP and cannot cope in the workplace. I have worked full time in the past, then regular part time and it absolutely wrecks my mental health. My DH was very worried for me at the time and I have always struggled to hold down a proper job.
DH just wants me to be happy and well, which I am now. He also enjoys having me at home. It means he doesn’t worry about the housework, and I always have a healthy, home cooked meal ready for when he comes home from work. Both of us are so much happier now and our relationship has improved tremendously. When I was earning, I was earning less than 10% of what he earns and it was money we did not need and made zero difference to our quality of life. We already have more money than we could spend so makes no sense to destroy my health for a little more.
I have no problem filling my day. As PP mentioned, my disability means I take longer to do things/ switch between tasks. I also volunteer, care for our pets, exercise, and am currently studying which takes up a lot of time. I fill any remaining time with hobbies etc.

@KarenTheGammonRemoaner

What is wrong with the notion these things should not be fulfilling? What is it that renders them unfulfilling? What's the intrinsic lack?

It's not that these things are unfulfilling per se. Clearly they are fulfilling to some degree or women wouldn't seek them out. It's the idea that they are the sole fulfilment that a woman should aspire to and to structure her life around, that's problematic.

And its problematic for several reasons but chiefly:

a) because marriage, housework and motherhood are all essentially about supporting other people. These are good and worthy things to do but if a woman devotes her entire life to supporting others, she very often finds there is no room for her in it.
b) because marriage, housework and motherhood as a full time job necessitate giving up your own financial autonomy and essentially handing it over to your male provider, which is extremely risky.
c) because the idea that marriage, housework and motherhood is all that women are suited to is often used to close women out of other endeavours (such as work/government/lots of other productive enterprises). If the idea becomes prevalent that there is no greater fulfilment for a woman than motherhood and marriage its not a great leap to suggesting that that is all she is suited to. Which was the narrative which has dominated our society for a large chunk of human history.

Some people want….

…..others to pay for them to be able to do that.

I mean, I’d want a whole load of those things too, but doing that whilst my husband goes out and knocks his pan in at work to pay for it would be unthinkable. What happens in a “partnership” if both people want all those things? I guarantee there would be resentment in a set up where someone is working 60 hours a week to pay for their partner to potter in the garden in daylight.

Don't let's reduce this to this hoary old cliche about "choice" either. Of course there's a choice and so there should be. But not all choices are equal

This. I'm in favour of choice if a woman prefers not to work for a wage or have her own business. The problem starts when the question gets asked whether she's financially independent or not. If she is financially independent, more power to her. There is plenty of interesting unpaid volunteer work if she wants to do more than be a housewife.

Unfortunately, most of the time being a housewife is the opposite of being financially independent which puts the woman at home in a difficult position if there is a divorce or the partner dies young.

I did this for a short time whilst having fertility treatment after a previous pregnancy loss.
I know someone slightly older than me who would be classed as a housewife but actually looks after multiple elderly relatives.