To think this is a case of sour grapes?

[Diaria]

Woman believes that childless women pick up the slack for working Mums….

Reading this, she sounds bitter, sour and traumatised by her prior fertility battle and failed relationship.

She worked in retail; it is of course mental and draining around Christmas time.

Essentially, the argument is that childless women are forgotten and mothers get all these perks along the way like total exhaustion but I digress…

She even goes so far as to complain about mothers having a paid maternity leave (often a pittance) and complains about her having to save £500 a month and not being given a free holiday…… maternity isn’t hopping around Thailand and most mothers couldn’t afford to save £500 a month!!

Anyway, I have no patience for this… but discuss.

I quit because I can't bear picking up the slack for working mums

https://mol.im/a/12860533

If course yanbu but it seems at present to even mention you have dc you are cruel, entitled, boring,selfish, self important etc etc....
Even on here lots of batching directed at colleagues who have dc, underground attempt to drive out of workforce? (Off to get my tinfoil!)

What she’s describing is the pitfalls of retail work. Retail and hospitality are notoriously rubbish to work in at Christmas, seems unfair to apportion that to colleagues with kids. I worked in retail whilst at uni, I experienced the manic Christmas rush and lack of downtime and that was working in a uni city with a staff full of students without any mums. It’s just how it is. She needs a career change not a swipe at mums.

And the maternity pay dig…that just makes her sound ignorant and a bit unintelligent.

Maybe it is a case of the grass is always greener?

I find myself hugely envious of women in her position.

• relative freedom to do what you want whenever you want
• time and energy to build career
• no loss of pension
• days off are actual days off
• spending time with adults that you actually want to
• hobbies
• enormous amount of disposable income

Very often it is women who end up being the main care giver for a child and children are important for the future of society… so should they not be cared for and nurtured by their parents because a 50yo wants to scoff chocs on the sofa for hours on end or whatever else she thinks mothers do that we don’t actually do. 🤷‍♀️

YABU to read the Daily Mail and to expect it to be anything but sensation seeking misogynist propaganda ; sure she has a point but frankly it’s a real non story, let’s start pitting women against women shall we?

@Fleetheart true… but I don’t think I’ve ever seen an article so venomous. Horrid to think that is how what mothers do is perceived by some.

I'm a mother who has worked both retail and hospitality. Until 18 months ago I missed out on a lot of my kids stuff due to these jobs.
These jobs are soul destroying during any holidays
But, we have bills to pay like anyone else

No. It isn't sour grapes.
There is plenty to read about how childless /childfree women are treated at work to a point if any other group was, there would be a tribunal and pay out. And eventually there will be. So far cases in US were dismissed, but that's a case of many now successful claims.

It usually hits around important days, especially Christmas. Unless you have children your life outside work simply isn't as important so why should you get time off.
And god forbid she is single. You know. The absolute nonconforming "freak"...

WhileI agree that she is partially describing retail/hospitality work which is pita, the picking up slack while not having any concessions does absolutely happen everywhere and it adds to already stressful jobs.

well my point is that the Daily Mail edits people’s stories an makes them more venomous. It also dresses people up in unlikely outfits and females ALWAYS wear high heels

It’s pretty unhinged to say that she needs to save £500 a month because she doesn’t get perks like maternity leave, as if this is a great opportunity for mothers to make a bit of cash. Mothers get maternity leave in place of the regular income she would get, and it’s usually quite a lot less!

The point about caring time for her father is also irrelevant as mothers have parents to care for too - this is not a differences between mothers and the child free.

I agree, it’s pretty empty. But then, as PP have pointed out, it’s a DM article.

OP, you seem to be taking it a bit too personally.

I wish you hadn't posted this. It'll just be an excuse for people to come and bash mothers and spread the misogynistic myth that non-mothers are the ones oppressed and discriminated against in the work place and in society. No wonder the Daily Mail are encouraging this rhetoric, they are about as misogynistic as you get. It's almost a form of gaslighting.

I never felt aggrieved at working mums before having a child (I had mine quite late so plenty of years prioritising other peoples kids). I mean yeah they have childcare responsibilities and I didn’t. I didn’t always like it but it didn’t take much imagination to understand their position. The kids have to go somewhere you can’t just lock them in the house and wish for the best.

But I also had nieces and nephews and I knew what a nightmare it was to find childcare sometimes, especially holidays.

Retail is hard though, I did it as a student and was bloody knackered around that time of the year.

I just read it as an advert for her upcoming website. She's jacked her job in so needs to make money somehow.
And it's as told to Samantha Brick!

My dd has a toddler and I don't envy her one bit, it's relentless for parents these days.

Retail and hospitality are notoriously rubbish to work in at Christmas, seems unfair to apportion that to colleagues with kids.

i completely agree with @shakespeareontheroad that the writer works in a sector which doesn't treat its staff well. It is typical Daily Mail to try and create barriers and drag everyone down instead of asking what could be done to make things better for everyone.

As someone childless (not by choice), I can see some of her points.

I had to cover (I.e. do two people's work) for three successive six-month busy periods for the same woman off on maternity leave. That's time I'll never get back.

I'm also ALWAYS the one asked to cover for people during the festive periods because my family time is deemed less important than those with kids. I may not have kids, but I have family who only really get together during the holiday. You're not seen as a teem player and actually receive an incredible amount of vitriol if you stand your ground. And there will always be someone with kids...

On the mat leave, I understand and agree with it, but it doesn't alter the fact that most employers expect other staff to pick up the slack rather than bringing in a temp. That's not the mother's fault but it still makes the lives of the others much more demanding.

On the holiday issue, the other side of the coin: Working on christmas day, the entitlement of others | Mumsnet

I'm not saying I agree with her, but to dismiss some of her points as unreasonable just because she is, isn't necessarily right either.

It’s all so boring.

Media makes money out of woman bashing women. And woman bashes women to make money. Not surprised to see ‘as told by Samantha brick’ at the bottom.

she is annoyed mum work par time which makes them less loyal. That they take time off when their kids are sick, that her company wouldn’t class her father as a dependent because he didn’t live with her (no employer I have had has said elderly parents had to live with us it was about wether the depended on us in some capacity)

Mums phone in sick when she is on the beach. Mums phone in sick when she is on her days off…..but no one else ever does. She doesn’t have young people off with hangovers (I mean sickness big) people who just can’t be arsed going in that day, people who decide they aren’t going back and don’t work notice and so on.

She worked with no fathers? Or she found that fathers did take time off for the kids……which is women often have to.

I can’t work out her job role in her successful 30 year I assume as she say management it’s store management. As she is opening and closing. So the Christmas rota was either her decision or company policy meant she had to work these shifts.

She hasn’t left a successful career because of working mums. She has left because she think she can turn her Facebook group into a business. This is a promotion piece.

I think women not having kids isn’t a big deal. I hate to see women told they should have kids or their lives will be less if they don’t have them. But I am pretty bored of the narrative from women who don’t have kids) that women who do have kids are somehow less or somehow taking from them.

I have worked plenty of jobs where people who don’t have kids have phone in sick, don’t turn up, turn up stinking of booze, can’t be arsed when they get there causing more problems, people not coming in because of elderly parents and so on. It’s just life.

She wanted out of retail and is now spinning a story to promote her business. Embarrassing she can’t do it with using the dm bash other women.

Possibly, sleep deprived and tired due to DC. I found it difficult to imagine how someone with so much freedom could be so aggrieved and lacking in comprehension about what is actually required being a mother.

For instance; at Xmas it is not just about spending time with the child, it is expected of you to be there awake, bright and interacting after ensuring Santa got through the night ok and making the dinner and and and… Mums don’t have the luxury of falling asleep on the sofa on Xmas day!!

And where are the childless men with their vitriol? Or the dads (many of whom keep going so Mum gets to be with kids), where are their complaints?

Are we honestly expected to believe that in the workplace childless women are specifically targeted? Or is it the case, in this instance, that someone is so envious they imagine a rose tinted existence and lots of good experiences they’re missing out on.

It’s more to do with the job than colleagues with kids.

But that’s down to her employers. it has nothing to do with the women. She therefore left because her employer was a poor employer. Not because of working mums.

In my years of working I have picked up the slack for loads of different people, people who are sick, people who are hung over, people who can’t be arsed, people getting divorced and needing time off, people who are bereaved, people struggling with their mental health. Some have kids and some don’t.

If I don’t like how an employee covers long absences, I leave. Never occurred to me to blame the ones taking the absence.

As others have said, it's a DM article. It's designed to get people going. Don't rise to it.

Also, you in turn seem strangely resentful of women without children? It's not compulsory to have them. They don't have perks that you were denied against your will: you made different choices.

That’s a ridiculous article, designed to enrage.

I’m childfree by choice and a primary teacher.

I work hard and focus on my job in term time without having to worry about child care, or anything that goes along with it. I also get really long holidays and loads of time to do whatever I like, with whoever I like.

I don’t begrudge anyone having maternity leave/pay/whatever else is given to people with children.

TBH I don't think this is a woman v woman issue necessarily. I think the problem stems from businesses not ensuring adequate support to staff.
The personal matters of mothers shouldn't be shifted from one staff member to another, that's poor management.

Women have hard enough lives that we should be more appreciative of each individual and their struggle without having to pit against one another...which seems constant.

This kind of thinking is so small minded because we all need the next generation to fund our pensions and provide our care in old age.

So someone has to have kids. Look at the situation in Asian countries like South Korea where they have to incentivise women to reproduce due to concerns about a population decline that will cause a major crisis in future years.

I'm struggling to understand her comment about there isn't any equivalent to paid maternity leave for childless women like her.

I know it's early in the morning but still ...

What can that mean?

This is exactly it.

The women in the article was management.

As an aside I assume she was store management. I would have thought regardless of who has kids and not she would have had to work Boxing Day anyway. Lots of store managers do. I suspect even if her staff were all people without kids, she would have had to be there. Nature of the job.

But that wouldn’t promote her business idea, I guess.