To be sick of reading on MN that you are a "good role model" to your dd if you go back to work??

[ssd]

have read this over various posts on MN over the years

usually posters give various reasons to return to work, all viable and good, but then the poster throws in the "good role model" shite

why always harp back to this?

if you love your kids, teach them to respect and care for others, learn manners and discipline THEN you are a good role model

most of us eventually will return to work at some stage and if we don't we will still be good role models unless we are lying about the house taking drugs and leaving the kids to go feral, which I;m sure not too many of us do!

I know I'll get slated on here as the going back to work to be a good role model line seems to be very poplular round here and I'm not trying to wind up posters who use it, it just seems to me people work out of necessity, not to be a role model

And BTW where's all the role models for ds's??? or is just loving them enough?

Spot on, Squilly.

I disagree that 'The main barrier to women returning to work is affordable childcare.' Studies show most women don't want to work when their children are small, most want part time to fit around kids. The idea of more and more extended schools is abit creepy to many. I think the main 'barrier' is that alot of people already have one job (caring for their child) and don't really want another! Alot of people wonder why get a job to pay someone to look after their child. Doesn't make sense for many if you are willing to do it yourself.

I could return to work tomorrow...I'm on a career break for 5 years. But I wanted this time with my child because I'll never have the opportunity to do this again. And I do class it an opportunity, every bit as much as I classed training an opportunity in my blue chip company career.

It's enriched my life beyond all reason. I've felt more satisfaction, more reward and more sense of joy in life since taking this break.

And when I do go back to work, I'll take with me all the lessons I've learned and be a better worker.

Win/win if you ask me.

Yes that's a good point Jellybeans.

Maybe I am thinking too much about my own circumstances having grown increasingly restless as the years as a SAHM have gone on.

But I have many working friends who are tearing their hair trying to work out how they will cope once their child is out of private nursery and in school. What do they do with kids during the holidays? Who will pick them up from school?

There are many reasons why women choose not to return to work - or to go part time (and accept less money, reduced status and zero promotion prospects) but I think that is a majot part of it.

ONe main barrier is the assumption on this thread even that childcare is something women pay for. How bizarre. Don't your children have two parents? Why in 1983 could my children's father be interviewing nannies and dealing with them and in 2009 some women still think because they're female they find organise and pay for childcare. Taht's one thing that keeps women back, the idea childcare is something they fix and pay for. Obviously some people both earn the minimum wage or both earn £20k a year and on £40k a year childcare is expensive to fund or some men and women will never earn more than £13k a year because they have a low IQ or made bad career choices or couldn't possibly consider anything other than being an artist or whatever the reason but when children are at school most people could afford a lvie in au pair which doesn't cost much, so they can return to full tiem jobs even if the children then sleep in teh parents' room if the famly only have 2 bed rooms.

"but when children are at school most people could afford a lvie in au pair which doesn't cost much, so they can return to full tiem jobs even if the children then sleep in teh parents' room if the famly only have 2 bed rooms."

What!? and why would you want to do that?

"the assumption on this thread even that childcare is something women pay for."

Can't say that I've noticed that assumption. Childcare is something that the family pay for. And if one salary(male or female) going into the family pot is as much as or almost as much as the amount coming out in childcare then some people might not consider it worth it.

Maybe some parents prefer to collect their children from school and chat to them instead of (unter-)paying some Polish AP to do this?

Reading Squillys post (and Rivens and some others) i was thinking it cant be better role model than a happy, content mum with open mind who chooses to spend few years with her children and doesnt conform to stupid stereotypes. And who doesnt come home at 7 pm tired and stressed just to say 'good night' to the dc
What better role model than this?

I have very good childcare.

But when my DS was ill, that very good childcare collapsed and there was only me. Ill children don't get to go to school, after school clubs or child-minders and for most families, a nanny is out of the question.

And for one in four families, there is only one parent to deal with childhood illness. Theere is no-one else to pick up the slack. As I said previously, it only takes one run of bad luck to really scupper a job. Most employers are not as flexible and obliging as mine is.

Most families do have two parents so it is very very sexist to say that if the child is ill then it's the mother who collects from school. It's families which put male earning and men first which end up with these sexist set ups. If both parents work why on earth shoudl it be a mother not a father collecting the child from school?

Our household set up is far from sexist. Male earning didn't come first in our house. My desire to stay home came first.

If I'd been earning more than DH I STILL would have chosen to stay home and DH still would have supported my decision. No sexist agenda involved...just a real partnership of equals.

What fantastic role models dh & I are!

I would have thought it depended on whose job is the more flexible and which parent felt most strongly about doing the picking up.

I am very cross about the assumptions about full-time WOHMs missing milestones, not seeing their children grow up etc. (for example from the nanny who says she has influenced the children she cared for a lot).

My 2 DS (4 and 2) are totally bilingual (and their English is better than their French) and yet I work full-time as a teacher.

As a pp said, if you are at home with your cildren when they are young, don't expect them to thank you for it or even remember it.

Great if you love doing it, but don't be a martyr about doing it (or pretend you are "doing it for them".)

(although admittedly for once on this thread tthere is not much martyrdom in evidence.)

I agree Haven'tslept. I am a WOHM,and my children don't miss out. If there were really a huge difference in outcomes between children whose mothers work and children whose mother's don't, then there might be something to debate, but actually there is barely any difference. Statistically I believe children of working mothers are more likely to achieve better at school and earn more themselves in later life, but I wouldn't put too much emphasis on stats - and besides, I don't think it's a huge difference.

Certainly my kids are happy, healthy and well adjusted with both parents working full time, and there doesn't seem to be any major differences between them and other children we know whose parents work part time or stay home. The only difference I can see is that we tend to have more money because we both earn well, and we both have interesting and enjoyable careers - so it makes our lives pleasanter even if it doesn't make much difference to how our kids turn out!

As Haventslept says, if you want to stay home,fine, do it, but be honest about the fact that you want to stay home, because it isn't necessarily 'better' (whatever that means!) for the kids.

Agree completely Violethill, it's often more about the women wanting to stay off than anything else.

I see no massive difference in the emotional and physical well-being of children from familes where the mum has SAH rather than worked.

What is really odd about this argument is that at some point most of us will have experince of being in both camps.

I was a SAHM for 5 years, I have now simply swopped roles with dp . So although I AM A wohm i would never want to belittle anyone who is a home. I would be criticising what I chose to do for half a decade and what dp does now. Although because she is at school he can work school hours from home.

I work long hours during term time, it was probably me who quoted the 70 hours but I dont do that to buy stuff for dd, I get paid the same whether I work 40 hours or 70. Although admittedly working those long hours probably means I will get promomted giving dd and I more security.

I work the hours I do because

1. I love my job
2. My job matters
3. If I work long hours during term time I can enjoy the holidays
4. Dp is at home to do what I cant
5. I want financial independence and security for dd and myself, having relied on a man once and ended up on the streets I would be daft to do it again. I am lucky that dp understands that and is willing to be in many ways financially dependent on me.

I do think that my dd benefitted from me being at home, but I think we are an exceptional case as she had such a difficult start to her life. I think she also benefits from having dp at home she certainly seems happier than when she was being ferried about from her grandmas to breakfast club, to school, to after school club, to my classroom to home and then a quick tea and bed.

But a big part of that is that dp and I are happier and she has a mich nicer lifestyle here, but my wage his paying for that lifestyle.

Its a very untypical woman who doesn't organise the childcare. Statistics across time inform us that kids are just at more risk when being looked after by men, especially men who don't choose to do it.

Yes twinset I don't recall any animosity in RL between SAHM and WOHM - maybe because if you know someone in RL you know the whole picture and can see why people make the choices they do.

I miss my financial independence, I miss thinking that if I get promoted/ better job we will then be able to afford to do x,y,z.

But DP and I chose to raise a family and felt strongly that one of us should be at home while the children are little. It's as simple as that.

It works for us as a family in the same way that both parents working pt or ft works for them.

Have never felt so judged in my life as I have on mumsnet but it does make you think...

It may be sexist Xenia, but for many families it's reality.

And as I said before and you are steadfastly refusing to acknowledge, for 1 in 4 families in this country, there is only 1 parent to collect from school/ lok after a sick child.

Personally, I just go to work so I can finish a cup of tea in peace

• so HEAR you yadayada. work is so chilled out and relaxing. thank god for work.

I'm a full time working single parent so I know all about those 1 in 4.

It's the reality women organise child caer because they are stupid enough to let me lumber them with it and not assertive enough to organise things better. They are the architect of their own misfortune in that regard. More fool them but their daugthers' positions will only improve when they do ensure men as much as women arrange child care particularly where as in most marriages both people work and in many marriages both work full time. The day you assume women only arrange child care and you don't expect the husband to be out there trawling for child minders or calling round for emergency child care cover because the chidl is off sick from school is the day you've lost the fight for proper fairness and equality.

And on the whole children of working parents benefit most so women sho stay home because they think it is best are just conning themselves.

I certanily agree with this too:
"As a pp said, if you are at home with your cildren when they are young, don't expect them to thank you for it or even remember it.

Great if you love doing it, but don't be a martyr about doing it (or pretend you are "doing it for them".)"

absolutely pmsl at the suggestion to have child sleep in parents' bedroom to be able to fit in an aupair...

I would hate hate hate to have an aupair, I like to have our house to ourselves

yes but if you want to better yourself and the lives of your children by going back to full time work and you have school age children that is one way it is possbile to do it. I've never had a live in au pair or a live in anything but it is an option for some people who want a full time job and need after school care for 3 or 4 children.