A 23 year old wants to be a stay at home wife?

[Ludlow2]

Friend's son had a girlfriend and both are 23.
She was keen to marry. Friend's son not so and his parents agreed.
Told him sort your career out,save up, find somewhere you will live. He agreed.
They split.
Both his parents work. My friend, his mother has always worked full-time and has a side business too. She is a great role model an although she is the breadwinner the father also works considerably hard.
Their children have and will benefit from this. They have also instilled good work ethic in their children too.
The friend's son and his ex girlfriend remained friends. She is keen to be with again and said she is happy.to wait and will continue with her studies maybe get a masters etc. She has then said that after marriage she does not want to work.

She thinks work is a want and not a need?

Obviously son Friend's son has run for the hills.
He did tell her it is impossible to survive on one income bla bla. But she just responded with we can move to a cheaper area and I'm not materlistic?

Im.just surprised at this attitude.

The girl's father left the family (Mother and siblings) whilst they were young.
Mother found another partner who comes and goes. Maybe it this why she is craving to be looked after by a man.
However, it sounds all so sad.

@SouthLondonMum22 come back and let us know how you get on after baby no 2 or 3 when they’re all at school will you? It’s harder than you think.

Because she wanted the boyfriend to fund it and he wasn't prepared to do so.

If this was in reverse he would be called a cockledger.

You only have a choice if you can find someone to fund it.

it is impossible to survive on one income

This isn't true.

And it's not 'sad' that someone wants a different life to you.

You'll get lots of extremely defensive posts, OP, but you're raising a really important point and you have the right to do that.

Women... ALL women should be absolutely 100% certain that they have the wherewithall to sustain their lives under their own steam. If that means becoming a footballer's wife, stashing the cash and leaving when they have enough financial clout than so be it.

Many women want to have a career whether they have children or not and I think it's so, so important for women to safeguard themselves by making themselves financially independent. It's not the 50s-70s anymore where mortgages were lower and only the man needed to work, they're now unreachable for many couples.

In any event, handing over your whole financial wellbeing to a man is ludicrous unless you have a watertight contract in place. How many women post on MN about being left high and dry, ripped off and unable to get back to where they were pre-family? Other peoples' dire situations don't seem though to warn other women who think that it won't ever happen to them...

Who says I'll be having 2 or 3 children?

Of course it's hard, I never said it would be easy but I will never give up my career or having my own money, never.

Depends on income and housing costs.
With rising COL it is getting more difficult.

But regardelss of this if noone want to fund you staying at home it then you need to get off your backside and work.

Good for you.

@MrsBennetsPoorNerves

Not wishing bad luck on anyone.

But to say working with children is all fabulous, when you only have one child, and that child is an infant…

It’s not at all reflective of reality.

When they are a baby you can plonk them into a high chair, a cot, a playpen. They sleep 12-16 hours a day. There are no academic tasks. They have no freewill to create chaos. Their friends aren’t traipsing through the house. They don’t have 20 birthday parties to go to, nor multiple hobbies and extracurricular activities. They eat bugger all and their clothes are tiny. They cost comparatively less except for childcare - but that is alright as they are out of your hair 5 days per week between the hours of 7.30am - 6pm so you can go off and be a fabulous working women.

Out of my friendship group/school Mums only 2 remain working full time, one is retraining to work part time the other is an academic and stuck with it. These are doctors, dentists, teachers, ophthalmologists, solicitors, accountants etc.

All started out with this idealistic view we could do it all and be there for our children, but financially and in terms of quality of life, have all done a back step.

My partners ex was like this. It was a miserable sounding existence, no money to do anything with the children etc. She’s set about recreating the same set up with her new partner.

I would love to be wealthy enough to not work and still lead a good, fulfilling life. However I’d rather have my fingernails peeled off than give up work and just be able exist. So work it is!

100%

Safe guarding themselves is important.

Both sexes need to protect themselves.if the situation was reverse and the man wanted to be a sahh many would be saying to kick him out, cocklodger.

Double standards.
If someone agrees to fund your sahw/h good for you.

However, highly unlikely a young 20
something could do that with
Rising housing costs and COL etc.

Exactly.

Depends on what that life is, and the level of naivety of the person concerned.
There is a vanishingly small chance this woman is going to find a man who will agree to this who is also the sort of man with whom she will have a healthy relationship. We're not talking about a woman giving up work in an established relationship remember, but one setting out her stall from the outset. What sort of man, if any, do you imagine will be the takers of an 'offer' like this from the average 23 year old woman?
It will be sad if she wastes the years when she could be building a life in chasing a unicorn.

@Robinni

she might only want the one child

@GabriellaMontez

well sure you can survive on one income

but who wants to just survive?!

a life without any kind of treats for yourself is shit

My child will be 18 in a few weeks, so I know all about parties, homework, extracurricular activities etc. Been there, done that. It has been perfectly possible to maintain my career while facilitating all of that and building a fabulous relationship with my dd.

Would it have been harder with multiple children? Yes, probably. Do I know lots of women who are happily maintaining fulfilling careers with more than one child? Yes, absolutely. Your friendship group is just that... you probably gravitate towards people with a similar mindset to your own. I'm the same, hence I know plenty of women who have managed to balance family life and career very successfully.

The key, in my view, is having a partner who genuinely believes in equality. I can quite see how it might seem impossible to juggle everything if you're stuck with a man who will not share the load fairly. My advice to my dd will be to choose her life partner wisely!!!

I have two children and still manage to split the load equally with my DH - do I get to have an opinion?

I know a fair few women who work 4 days a week and lots who work full time with multiple children. It's not impossible at all.

I think you’re being rather judgemental, OP.
It’s not sad that somebody wants something different to what you think they should want.
Live and let live eh?

@MissTrip82 I was actually basing it on my mother and her circle of 20 or so friends who went out to work in professional roles and out earned their partners. By contrast their mothers were all housewives who did a “little job” here and there at most.

You can see here that while women did work, particularly since the 40s, the clout and increase in pay comparable to men didn’t kick in until the 80s.

https://www.futureofworkhub.info/comment/2021/7/6/women-in-work-a-brief-history-of-women-in-the-workplace?format=amp

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/women-and-credit-in-the-80s-women-gained-career-options-and-financial-clout-2020-08-04

I remember it because of how excited they were to move to bigger houses, get better cars, and I was dragged around a lot of boutiques and expensive hairdressers as they spent their cash.

GabriellaMontez, perhaps but, if that one income isn't yours then you have no real right to say how it will be spent. If the one income is spent on things that you wouldn't have/want and you have no 'say' in that, what then?

Wanting a different life is fine. Completely abdicating your own financial wellbeing to a man (or anybody actually), is just stupid.

But it's not just something different....it's pure laziness and entitlement. She wants a certain lifestyle but wants someone else to fund it.

I say this as a sahm of teenagers by the way.

All of this, 100%. Thank you, @TedMullins, I was starting to feel like a time traveller.

I think I asked @Ludlow2 if she's working now?
Does she have a job or a career plan of any sort?

Because she can yearn all she wants to not work, but the reality is unless she marries someone older/richer she's not going to have a choice.

I brought up my DDs to appreciate they need to support themselves. They bought their own places in their late 20s so when they met their partners they already had property , a mortgage and good careers.

The expectation was set early on that you don't rely on a man to support you.

@Robinni it would appear you’re rather defensive about your non-working status and as such, are writing long and condescending posts to women who’ve chosen to continue working while having children.

If that makes you happy, fine, but plenty of us do manage to do it ‘all’ and are happy in our choices, even though they’re different to yours.

It’s possible to do both, it doesn’t - as you seem to believe - mean a marriage will wind up in divorce. That you believe that is a rather damning indictment as to the attitude of your own husband.

And again, this young woman doesn’t want to be a SAHM, she wants to be a SAHW.

I do wish people would stop to process that, and maybe then we can sift through the defensive SAHM me-railing.

100%

But why does it matter? As long as both are on board what's wrong with that? Let's not act like the man would get nothing out of it...