AIBU to think staying at home with children is undervalued?

[Amby99]

I’m not ignorant of the fact that staying at home isn’t financially possible or desirable for everyone, and I don’t think children who go to nursery are disadvantaged whatsoever . There are brilliant nurseries, brilliant working mums, and plenty of happy, healthy children being raised that way (and fulfilled and happy mothers)
However, I do wonder whether society (or the government) has become so focused on measuring “productivity” through paid employment that we’ve started to undervalue the work involved in raising a child.
Badenoch saying that the government doesn’t want to “punish working parents” in relation to childcare costs … it made me wonder why being a SAHM is so rarely viewed as valuable or productive in its own right.
Preparing my baby’s first solids, BF him, reading, playing, taking him outside, talking to him, letting him explore and generally being available. It feels like important work, yet because it isn’t paid it often seems invisible.
There are of course many advantages to nursery, and that work can be important for a mother’s identity, finances, career and mental health.
But why does the conversation seem to focus so heavily on encouraging parents back into paid employment, while choosing to provide that childcare yourself is rarely encouraged or valued in the same way? I’m not talking about mothers that sit at home all day feeding their child McDonald’s and claiming every benefit under the sun. I get why they may be encouraged back into the workforce and their children would be better off at nursery. BUT I’m sick of having to feel guilty of my choice to stay home. Every parent I know who was a parent in the 90’s stayed at home and it wasn’t so frowned upon.

I just think it should be seen as a worthwhile and valuable choice rather than something that needs to be justified because you’re “not working”.

So you don't think children who have suffered trauma might need a parent at home! Children who have suffered or witnessed abuse or watched a parent die? What about children with severe SEN? Do you think they might need a parent at home? What about families who've had a bad experience with childcare and now the child is too scared to go elsewhere? Should the child just stay home alone? What about children with severe school avoidance? Where do they go if there's no parent at home! You can't say children don't need a parent at home because there are some who absolutely do. Not every child needs a parent at home it's true but what about those who do?

YABU
Thete is value in it , but only to the individual family. It doesn’t provide anything to anyone other than the individuals involved that can’t be achieved through taking a year of maternity leave. Therefore there is nothing there of value to society, and no reason for something that is pure luxury to be viewed as valuable to society.

I was lucky enough to work so little when my dc were small that I was pretty much a SAHM so I’m not coming from a place of envy. Do it and enjoy it, but don’t kid yourself that you are fulfilling a role that has any impact for anyone except yourself and your own family, especially after the first year or two when children can be cared for perfectly well by others.

Why do you want approval from others outside the family who has agreed to it?

I agree

Not all stay at home parents are barefoot earth mothers.

Some of them perch their filthy dc in front of an iPad and leave them to rot their brains.

See? We can all spin a line when we want to.
My dc excelled at school, and university, and I was / a full time working mum. Am I perfect? Of course not

I was going to say this. Covid for me was a time I felt I had a positive impact on their education and we spent so much time together doing crafts, talking etc (still worked part time). But yet so many children who were pre-school age or under came out of Covid without necessary skills.

I think being a SAHM, with your child not going to any setting before school, is a hard path to take if done properly. I was very anti-nursery but can now see the positive impact it had and if my children had been solely with me they wouldn’t have been as independent as they were because I did (without meaning to) do too much for them.

My children were born in the 80’s and I was what is now known as a stay at home mum (I hate that term)
We made sacrifices in order to be able to do that and didn’t receive benefits other than child benefit
I think it would probably be much harder now to afford to live on one salary (costs of rents etc are crazy now)
I look back on that time with great fondness

I also “stayed home” when my children had access at the age of about three and a half (two and a half hours each morning to start with) to free good quality nursery provision which was valued as providing opportunities for the children rather than being “childcare” - in my experience there is a huge difference

I think it's massively undervalued. When my children were young, being in childcare five days a week with two working parents was the norm, and that's what most of their peers grew up with. Instead, because I had a 'job' and not a 'career', I stayed at home full-time until my youngest started school and then only worked part-time - with them going to a kindergarten two to three days a week from age 3 to 5 (school starting where I am), which I volunteered at, for socialisation.

They were well ahead of their peers when it came to oral language skills, expressing and managing their emotions, being confident in themselves, personal care, reading, writing, and fine motor skills when they started school, and I do think that's because in their formative years, my focus was 100% learning through play, reading to them etc - and because I wasn't tired or stressed from work and had plenty of time to do housework, I could give them my all.

I do notice now that they're in their teens that they have much closer relationships with both me and their father than their peers do, and they have said that, looking at their peers and hearing their complaints, they actually really value and appreciate that I stayed at home, and made them my full focus.

I think that governments who complain about women not having enough children, or those who complain about children not being ready when they start school, really need to understand that raising children is a job in itself, and value it through financial remuneration for active parenting, instead of expecting all parents to feel pressured to juggle work and parenting.

This is such utter bullocks.

I think another factor as far as the government are concerned (as well as getting more tax out of everyone, of course) is the prevalence of divorce and multiple families now. Men going off and having family no 2 (or 3), means less contribution towards family no 1 and more government help required. If everyone has some level of financial independence, that's less for the government to top up.

Given it's my actual experience, I'm not sure how it's bollocks... Others might have different experiences, but that's mine.

And I do believe more people might be keen to have (more) children if they didn't have to juggle two full time jobs to do so (both parenting, and work) in order to avoid being financially penalised.

Agree.

Children are people with their own personalities and aptitudes. Nursery prepares them very well for school - in fact, many teachers that I know, say you can tell the ones that didn't go to nursery.

No you made that up unless you are referring to “peers” as 2 or 3 anecdotal friends.
It’s such bullshit when typically SAHMs come and claim how they have such closer relationships with their children and they are so much more developed yada yada

My personal view is that the focus should be on funding more affordable and better quality childcare. It’s good for women to work. It’s good for the economy and it makes good role models especially for our daughters.

It’s grand until your OH shags someone else and you’re left up shit creek without a damn paddle.

I did it. I enjoyed it. But it wasn’t a good long term decision for me.

So who are these men having these extra families with? Women who have a choice

Absolute rubbish. Why should governments pay for people to stay at home and look after their kids? Can you not see what that will lead to?

As I said before, there is no measurable or observed difference on a population level in the life outcomes, behaviour or attainment of children who have SAHM mothers vs working mothers vs mothers who work part time. If SAHM were mass producing Nobel prize-winning scientists and captains of industry vs the crack-addicted-destined-for prison children working mothers were all producing then you may have a point but as they’re not, why should being a SAHM be “valued” by society? The value is to her immediate family, not the society at large.

A child benefits from having a loving, attentive, competent mother who gives her child guidance and structure and a good home life, regardless if she works or not.

I think SAHP is undervalued.
I think it becomes problematic when all dc's are in school yet the SAHParenting continues.
Dare I say, it could be seen as being work shy or lazy.

I was fortunate enough to be a sahm and loved my time with the dc. Both went to nursery part time but the youngest absolutely hated it. We persevered for a while but being at home meant I could pull her out completely, which was the right thing for her at the time.
I would have quite merrily never have gone back to work but I have an expensive hobby (horse) that I refuse for my dh to pay for. That said, I gave up a career for the dc but now have a job I love, it all worked out for us.

No, there's a huge issue with literacy and numeracy attainment in my country, as well as a lack of social development, which typically comes from a lack of parenting - whether the parents are working or not, to be fair.

But yes, anecdotally I have noticed a huge benefit from staying at home and having more time and energy to invest into my children, and so have my kids. Interesting that you assume it has to be a mother staying at home, and not a father.

In my kids’ school at least, the huge behaviour problems aren’t coming from the kids with two working parents.

One issue is that people who take a long chunk of time out of the workplace can struggle to return to it.

Barriers can include:

• loss of skills through lack of use
• not keeping pace with with tech/industry change
• loss on confidence
• unwillingness to accept returning at a lower pay/seniority level than you left

While i think a lot of people value mums (or dads) being at home with children under 3-5, it really does become unproductive people sitting not working when children are in school.

I've always thought returning but dropping to 3 or 4 days or 5 shorter days is a good compromise where possible.

I dont love young babies being put in nurseries, i think childminders are much more suitable for under 2s.

It is undervalued when the mother or father does it as unpaid labour because it doesn’t generate any tax revenues.

It is valuable if a paid employee of a small business do childcare because that puts tax revenues into the Treasury.

They dont need to go from 9 months tho. My DC both went to preschool but only for 18m or from age 3. By that age they valued their peers etc & got a lot from it. The value is far less proven for kids under 2.

Governments already pay for people 'to have children' in many countries, with family tax credits etc - I'm not sure what horror that's led to.

But as it is, many people are not having children, or having fewer children, because it's too much of a financial burden, because they don't have the time or energy, etc between working and looking after their existing child - and so if governments want people to have more children, perhaps it might help if they valued the job of parenting more.

They don't have to, of course, but I think it could be beneficial.

What’s so aspirational about your job?

I don’t count preparing and feeding my DC, taking them out to activities, interacting with them or playing with them as work.