To think SAHM with young DC deserve more respect

[CheekyFawn]

I work full time but currently on maternity leave looking after my 5 months old baby and a toddler DS who is 3 yo.
I just don't know where my time goes. Between breastfeeding baby, getting DS ready for preschool and tidying up the house, cooking meals etc, it just feels like there is no time at all even to have 5 mins of coffee break. I feel it was much better when I was at work couple of months ago when DS was in nursery that I used to get at least a lunch break for an hour or 30 mins at least or time between meetings to have a coffee and look at my phone in peace. I imagine this is I think how a day looks for SAHM with young DC and it's bloody hard. Many people just assume they are not doing much but I think they deserve more respect.

My chief feeling about SAHMs is that they are doing their future selves a huge disservice. Unless you have a great pension paid for by your OH you're jeopardising your financial wellbeing, and even then you're vulnerable if you don't have any earning power. It's not about respect.

By 'people' I mean nursery staff (especially when child needs immediate pick up as they get unwell suddenly, and you have to commute back to nursery so can't be there within 10mins), employers who resent you for being unpredictable, needing to suddenly take leave or drop everything, colleagues without children or colleagues who took a few years out to raise theirs. Especially when you use parental leave or take mat leave! It was as if I couldn't please anyone in those days!

Now i'm a SAHM and not trying to balance motherhood with advancing my career, I nolonger rush everywhere either.

Agree sort of. I think there's a huge lack of respect for working mothers within workplaces both public and private sectors. And lots of resentment too, as if managers and colleagues expect you to switch off the parent responsibilities at work, or neatly arrange for anything child-related to happen on your days off!

I agree. In theory if you are married and your husband is reasonably solvent and decent it should work, but its a big gamble.

Fundamentally you are handing over control of your family's financial wellbeing to a person who you may or may not be able to trust. You are choosing to live a very financially vulnerable lifestyle.

Again, if people want to live like that and are confident it will work out for them its a free country, let them crack on. And clearly it works for many. But its far from clear that this makes any real difference to the children in the long-run: there's no significant long-term evidence that children of SAHMs do better than children of mothers who work.

Why should society "value" women who choose to make themselves more vulnerable for marginal upside more than women who choose to spread the risk and take a bit of ownership of their financial futures?

It's a bit like demanding special "respect" because you have chosen a career as a professional tightrope walker or a calligrapher. Fine, enjoy it and if its your passion don't let anyone talk you out of it. But don't expect to occupy some hallowed role in society as a result. It's your choice.

@Thepeopleversuswork - As I understand it, you are a single mum with one DC? That is a certain type of challenge for sure. But you must surely see that life is a LOT simpler with just the one child, working or not. All you have to think about is you and her/him. Minimal scheduling / school issues / homework / friendship dramas / food shopping / general mess / everything. It's the two of you, day to day. It's obviously totally different with several kids. Even with two adults involved. We are not in la la land and not everyone works 9-5 locally, or flexibly. The household dynamics completely change. The DC might be in different schools. All with totally different issues at any given time and you have to divide yourself into 2/3/4 whatever. Life is much more complex for so many reasons. You can't compare daily life with one child to daily life with 3. Families may need to prioritise differently.

Nobody needs medals for anything, you are right. But every family is obviously different, so arguing that you worked and your DC was fine is irrelevant to someone with 3 or 4 kids - all at different ages and stages. Put it this way, I never met a SAHM who just had the one child!

People are not SAHP for nothing. They do it because it makes sense at given stages in their family life. Not every family can afford a SAHP. But that doesn't mean it's not hugely beneficial for those who can afford it. Each to their own.

Everything is relative. Every family is different. This is why these threads, comparing apples with pears essentially, are pointless.

Not thinking of/calling it “mothers’ work” would help. It’s “parents’ work”. If mothers are becoming SAHM by default (I don’t earn as much as him/my wages would all go on childcare/I don’t care as much about my work anyway) and are effectively child carers and housekeepers then nothing will ever change because they are literally perpetuating the situation. Equality if responsibility from the start tips the tables. Push back against the sexist conditioning.

Disclaimer this is just my experience and how I felt during this time with a young child. So I know SAHM
are not all like this, but a lot are.

I ran a business and was a single Mother with no Father involvement and went back to work after six weeks and yes I used a nursery plus paid the mortgage and kept the house clean. I found stay at home Mum’s giving it what a hard job it is and rubbing it in that “children shouldn’t be at nursery that young” when I was doing it all with no emotional or physical support just indulgent on their behalf. Also all the “I can’t go for a shower or pee”. Yes you can you might have to leave them crying a little bit but what do you think happens at nursery they’re not 121?

I found the “I’m wonderful I look after my kids and go to Mother and toddler groups and my child is so clever and amazing ” and the inference being yours won’t be because he’s at nursery and you’re a single parent. I found it hurtful and a dig at me trying my best to do it all. Needless to say these people don’t have a more intelligent or academic children now and are rather sheepish about their children accomplishments. I’m not sure staying at home looking down on a parent’s working and doing the rest was worth being so smug about (and they are!).

Raising children is hard it’s no competition and staying at home does not deserve an award particularly when you’re looking down on people who’ve had to get back to work to provide. I get it, you’re in a bubble and you think your child is Einstein but staying at home IS much easier than working full time and doing all the chores and life admin. They sleep, they play, there is plenty opportunity for a cup of tea and to get stuff done. We experience that on weekends and annual leave.

The thing is during maternity you just have to keep the child alive and well. As they get older you have to ensure positive values, good attainment and their general happiness. I suspect many SAHM are just unhappy themselves so they want others to reassure them they are doing the right thing.

Not fathers though, right? Wonder why that would be.

If we were (the majority) of men we'd be patting each other on the back !

I think it depends on age of the child(ren): being with a toddler and newborn, or two toddlers, all day is much harder than being in lots of white collar jobs 5 days a week. Also children at home and not in childcare create even more chores.

I respect parents for doing a great job raising their children especially mothers who usually have the greater share of care. Whether they were at home or working… and I’m not a parent. However you if depend on a DH while being a SAHM he should be the one who appreciates it the most and shows that to you.

@spaceisfree ** - As I understand it, you are a single mum with one DC? That is a certain type of challenge for sure. But you must surely see that life is a LOT simpler with just the one child, working or not. All you have to think about is you and her/him. Minimal scheduling / school issues / homework / friendship dramas / food shopping / general mess / everything. It's the two of you, day to day. It's obviously totally different with several kids. Even with two adults involved. We are not in la la land and not everyone works 9-5 locally, or flexibly. The household dynamics completely change. The DC might be in different schools. All with totally different issues at any given time and you have to divide yourself into 2/3/4 whatever. Life is much more complex for so many reasons. You can't compare daily life with one child to daily life with 3. Families may need to prioritise differently.

Correct, I'm a single mum with one DC (now a teenager). Of course every family is different, everyone has different dynamics and challenges. My life is easier in some respects: I've only got one DC and I have a fairly well-paid job so I can pay for childcare. But it's harder in others: I've never had any childcare or babysitting which isn't paid for, so having any kind of social life or work networking has been a total nightmare for me and I've faced a lot of judgement at work and my working life is exhausting. It's swings and roundabouts.

I'm not arguing that what I do is more heroic than what anyone else does or that SAHMs don't have a difficult life or hard choices to make. I'm very aware that many women can't work and they have my sympathy.

I just don't buy into the rhetoric that remaining at home with your kids (for any reason) is a particular kind of "heroism" which requires some special societal validation. It's something people do, sometimes by choice, sometimes not. It's not intrinsically more or less valuable than anyone else's life. And while I absolutely respect SAHMS, I don't see why I should respect them more than any other type of mother.

There is also a lack of respect for childless/childfree working women. Lack of respect for women all round really.

@CheekyFawn

people on here say get back to work not because they disrespect SAHMs but because men can be bastards and leave you at any time and then financially you can be fucked. It’s basically telling women to protect themselves and not rely on a man. Good advice.

Everyone deserves respect. Not sure why a SAHP deserves it any more or less.

Parents who work outside the home are still parents you know op. I’m not sure who you think does all those things you describe for the 16 hours a day when they’re not at work.

I think this OP initially used the word 'respect' and this particular word is like a red rag to a bull on MN. But I think, what she really means, is that she doesn't want to feel 'put down.'

It's like if you said single mums should be respected. You would hardly be asking to be held high on a pedestal of great virtue and motherhood. You are asking not to be disrespected - that's all. That is the crucial difference. And it would be a reasonable request because SOME people do judge single mums, let's face it. Just as SOME people (mainly on these threads, but presumably they must also walk among us in real life) do judge stay-home mums. Mostly it's insecurity, lack of understanding and projection in either case.

I was a SAHM for many years.i enjoyed being at home .however most defo hard work.2 DC various ages, mum needed help,and a very lively dalmatian to boot! I think that it is a choice though. I also have had people ask what I do all day ,I must get so bored, mum no! Women always seem to be judged by society some how whatever they do

Sorry that post above was to @Thepeopleversuswork

Well this didn't go the way you wanted it to did it @CheekyFawn

But she seems to feel disrespected when people say that SAHM is not a particularly hard job (it might be occasionally relentless, but if you find it hard "to find a way to pee without the kids" you might need better organization and also, a better sense of how hard many jobs actually are). She seems to feel disrespected when people say that many SAHMs work less than other people, or at least work on things that have virtually no value to anyone else (compared to parents who also work). She seems to feel someone else should pay for her to sit in her own house making more snacks for her own kids because she is a Mother.

Many here are saying motherhood is not that hard compared to motherhood plus work; that it's okay to contribute less to society if you so wish but then don't pretend that's not what it is; and no they don't want to pay for you to be at home necessarily.

That's not putting her down. She wants to have her cake (not do the outside work) and eat it *too (getting the respect as if she were doing equally as much for society).

I think posts like these are made through the lens of someone that assumes that all people have well paid careers with a great pension that will be hugely detrimented by spending some time as a SAHP. This just isn't the case for loads of people. The reality is that spending a few years being a SAHP won't be doing a lot of people a huge disservice as it won't fundamentally change their financial prospects in the longer term.

I think there is a belief on MN that being a working parent somehow automatically insulates you from risks that SAHPs are always more exposed to. This just isn't the case. The most common risk cited is divorce or a relationship breakdown. I have known quite a few friends go though this and to be honest it is a really mixed pictures. Some SAHPs have struggled but quite a few are living quite lovely lives with half the settlement and have had the time and money to retrain. Obviously there were a lot of assets to go round in these cases but it could be argued that they now are living a higher standard of life than they would have enjoyed relying solely on their own earning capacity. Other SAHPs have gone back to the kind of work they were doing before being a SAHP (teacher, cleaner, carer) and don't seem massively detrimented by the career break. Some have been unable to go back to what they have done before but to be honest quite a few of them hated their careers and that's why they were keen to be SAHPs.

Of the working parents I have known that have gone through a divorce, quite a few have had to change their jobs and careers as they have been unable to maintain their working patterns and commitments as a single parent. A friend needed to commit to frequent overseas trips which exDH refused to facilitate childcare wise. Quite a few found that they needed to change careers to earn more money. Obviously lots of managed to maintain their careers as well but it is by no means guaranteed that this will be the case.

TLDR; all the research shows that the gender pay gap and the vast differences in lifetime wealth accrual between men and women is due to childbearing and related gaps in employment. Childfree women accrue wealth on a par with men who have children.

I was at home with 3 DS under 5 at one point! Hardest work I ever did - both physically and mentally. On my feet all day - caring, playing or doing chores. Mentally - coping with lack of sleep, stress, anxiety and worry about being a first time parent, needing the patience of a saint, especially with the SEN one!

When I went back to the office, my 20-something male colleagues thought the multi-tasking, patience, resilience, negotiation skills etc that I had learned were worthless because I hadn't been in an office...yes, not for 7 years, but I learnt all the new office skills I needed in the first day. Wasn't more difficult than years of dealing with multiple children.

Hopefully they'll find out for themselves.... 😀

Because everyone that works is forwarding and contributing to society? If you believe that then you are incredibly naive.

Many jobs and organisations actively harm society. They exist to make money. Think of betting shops, vape shops, fast fashion manufacturers etc. Think of marketing companies who aim to part people with their cash even those who clearly can't really afford what they're flogging. Think of fast food restaurants and junk food manufacturers making our population sicker and less able to work. Think of factories and farms polluting our environment.

Very few professions and industries are completely 'good' for society. Many arguably do more harm than good. Lots of corporations pay minimal tax in the UK so you can't even make that argument.

Being at home with my baby was a piece of piss compared to my job. But some people’s jobs are easy and their children are hard. I can understand that different people’s lives are different and show everyone respect accordingly.