Staying at home with kids IS a contribution and it is also WORK

[carshaker]

A lot of people don't respect a mum who's ' just at home '. Like she's not really contributing to the family.

The reality is though, that it's very much a big contribution, even if it's not financial.

If you took away the financial risk of staying home long term, what's the issue with it? Why is it considered by many ( especially women ), less than ?

If this is a woman's choice, what's the issue ?

Is there? I never do more than an hour a day during the week. I do more at weekends.

What about all the SAHM that don't cook from scratch, put their kids in nursery, have their partners actually parent/do night feeds , don't walk the dog (SMH), don't drive etc.

Are they not working then? Are some SAHM more SAHM than others?

Is the work qualifier actually determined by how important and busy you can make yourself sound?

Being a parent is my greatest achievement - I have the DT’s to prove it but it doesn’t mean I can’t also have a successful career by using high quality professional childcare. There have been no negative impacts from using full time nursery, breakfast and after school clubs or school holiday programmes. Both DT’s have 1st class degrees and are happy and healthy.

No, they don't. This is not a 'to do' item for women.

Men need to raise their standards out of the gutter.

The number of men who truly share the load 50-50 is miniscule. There is literally no one to 'choose' for many women if you're looking for a true divide of responsibilities. Many man pay lip service to this, but that's all.

And you can't necessarily predict how men will behave after having children - this is when inequality/abuse/sexist expectations ramp up.

I'm not saying all SAHMs are downtrodden. SAHMcan be great when things go well

What I'm saying is that if difficulties do arise in the relationship, a SAHM often has very little power to push back.

Of course a woman is going to be worse off financially after a break up, even if she's earning. However this can be magnified many times if she hasn't worked in years.

I have no problem with SAHM or SAHD, if you can afford to and are happy that way. Brilliant.

However, saying that “he wouldn’t be able to work hard or he’d have to pay someone else to look after the kids and keep the household” is what I have a massive problem with.

Without my husband I managed to move abroad, work full-time, save up to buy a home, take our son to and from nursery, where he did 7 hour days, I studied and planned our wedding.

I didn’t need to pay someone to “keep the household” and my home wasn’t disgusting.

(His income at the time went on paying for all the paperwork for his visa and our wedding, keeping our home in the UK and moving our stuff from the UK to our current country).

Then you say “What I mean is that if you're an actual stay at home mum, then it's usually up to you alone to do the 24 hour shift. Your husband / anyone will not help you. It's your job. When you're working, you should ideally get support from your partner or nanny etc.” and I fundamentally disagree with this stance as well.

If you are a SAHP then this is a sure fire way to burn out AND the working parent is ALSO a parent and someone who lives in the house, so they shouldn’t get away with not helping out when they are off work.

Both to be a good role model to the child, if it’s a boy to show him that men aren’t excluded from housework and childrearing and if it’s a girl to show her that she shouldn’t accept being the only one to clean and take care of the children. But also to show his (hopefully) wife that he loves her and values her. She can stay at home with sick children/wake up in the night but he can do bedtime or whatever, as it’s so important that children also bond with their father as a father and not a “friend”.

Also, you later touch on the money being half yours in case of a split, even if married you’re very unlikely to get half of his income today. As any kind of spousal maintenance is very rare today. You might get a good amount whilst the children are still children.

I think SAHP are heroes, I just personally prioritise being able to pay my way in life. If my husband lost his job tomorrow then we’d be able to survive on my income alone and vice versa.

If every family had a sahp it would hugely reduce GDP and therefore tax receipts. The country would be poorer and there would be less money for public services.

People often go on about ‘it’s awful two parents have to work these days to buy a house’ but there is actually a hell of a lot more to it than that.

Some kids are better off not being parented by their actual parent, at society level,

Off our extended family and group of friends, all working full time, there is an equal sharing of parenting and home. You can’t tell how men will behave after having children anymore any women.

Actually from what I have seen close up, it’s the men who have divorced SAHMs who have been the worse off. The SAHMs have stayed in the family home with massive contribution from the man until children are no longer in education. I have warned my sons not to marry women who don’t want to work.

It’s not just men at fault it’s society, ‘gender’ stereotypes at work yet again. As many women hold misogynistic views as men. Women making themselves into victims who can’t change anything just perpetuates the problem.

DH does his 50%, maybe it’s coincidence that I have one of this miniscule number or maybe it’s because I don’t agree with gender stereotypes. Hmmm.

Yes but women and society need to allow men to be SAHD more.Women automatically think they are best at caring buy sometimes they are not

@CrispieCake

I agree, but I'm not so sure that the "average" man would achieve what he does at work without female facilitation. Many mediocre men are facilitated not just at home but at work by women. There is a body of research into office gender dynamics showing this.

Indeed. Which is one of the reasons it’s still an uphill struggle for women in the workplace. Work is still set up for men, not women, which is why we have had this stupid backlash against working from home. It’s men who are used to being “facilitated” by their wives grumbling about any attempt to make work more friendly for working mothers and it honestly makes me really angry. It’s still a massive handicap not to be able to stay late to go to the pub or play golf with clients all weekend.

You expect men to cling onto their advantages. But I don’t expect other women to back up this narrative.

If SAHMs genuinely wanted to support working mums they should understand that it’s not a fair fight and would stop parroting this crap about “I’m supporting his career”. If he was really that smart he would be able to manage his career without a “facilitator”.

Most of the posts on this thread are concerned with what's best for the mother or father.

How about what's best for the children?

And the answer to that is... no one size fits all. Different kids, different needs.

But would like to see some child-first responses, even so. It's all me-my-mine from the adults.

Still having a career at 50 now the kids don't need me so much, and they will be leaving home soon has been an absolute lifesaver for me mentally. I'm seeing so many friends marriages go south at this stage, including friends that are SAHM mums and I know if anything happened between my partner and me I have my independence financially bit I am also as a person who is not just "mum". I love my kids and it has been hard juggling but I hope I have been a role model (especially to my daughter) to show them I can be successful professionally and also be a wonderful mum. The slog juggling everything is definitely paying off as the kids leave home and I still have so much to look forward too. I was very envious of SAHMs when the kids were younger, but wouldn't change it for the world now.

Very few women would want their DH to be SAHD though. Men are meant to be ambitious and career driven.

Mesher orders are becoming increasingly rare.

You only get a massive contribution if he earns a massive wage. Spousal maintenance is also increasingly rare. So it’s only CMS.

And if you have a mesher order you are expected to pay the mortgage, upkeep all the bills and still have to hand over a big chunk of equity when it’s sold.

Women who get the family home outright, are only the ones in marriages with lots of assets. And in a lot of cases would have given up access to other assets.

Plus if you don’t have your income, the period between separation and divorce can be very financially challenging if he decides to live out and only pay CMS and even CMS isn’t always a given or easily got.

My own experience as a child informed the decisions I made about work/SAHM. So definitely a child focused decision.

Thanks @LookingForEnergy for your reply - that's a good angle. I'm interested to hear what decision you made based on your own childhood experience?

On here, sure, it’s very middle class here.

That doesn’t mean there aren’t plenty of people in that position.

You can be a sahm and have pensions, lots of women do.

I chose to be a SAHM for my children's early life and then only worked part-time thereafter.

@RoseUnder

How about what's best for the children? And the answer to that is... no one size fits all. Different kids, different needs.

Disagree completely. What's unequivocally best for small children is to have a loving caregiver at home with them as much as possible. Putting small babies and toddlers into full time childcare is certainly NOT the best outcome for them, no matter how much people dress it up. That's all about the parents putting themselves and work over the children. Children don't give a shit what you do for a job or how high up in the company you are. But they do care if you don't show up for them.

Same.

My mum was a SAHM. She was and great mum, it I remember from a really early age the sense she was isolated and just didn’t have much to do. I always knew I would work. I have never told her this of course because I know she made the choice thinking it was best for me. I have always been terrified being a SAHM because I grew up with one. She was well educated in a great job when she had me and I just think such a waste.

It's definitely a valid choice and all choices should be respected. It's not work though.

To be fair, there are many situations where both members of a couple must work part-time, or where households are single parented and there is no real choice.