"a full time mum"

[DuelingFanjo]

said whatsername on Relocationthingy.

Surely you're still a full time mum if you work. You're stull a mum anyway. no?

i like cafe lady

chulita what do you talk about if not work? Well your children of course, endlessly, boringly and repetitively....the reason why I make sure I have lots of contact with childless friends so I can hear about their work. Beats conversation about jacinthas progress with baby led weaning anyday...

So I am reather stuck
I am not a housewife as my cleaners do that. Not so much a sahm as children are all at school. Ditto full time mum....

I am going to call myself "on of the Idle Rich".
It has the double virtue of being accurate and potentially offending absoloutely everyone rather than just potentially the few who are very keen to be offended by some ofthe other terms.

ah. That would be one

perhaps I should go and study English

I dont really see what is wrong with being called a full time mum, if that is what it is you do - whenever i hear that term i think, a sahm, i dont get my knickers in the twist because when i go back to work i will become only a part time mum - my DP is a full time dad because he works for his DD

Full time mum accurately describes what I do full time, so YABU to object to this term being used to describe someone who is at home full time with their children.

If people ask me what I do, I tell them I'm at home full time with the children because I don't like the way that the term 'Stay At Home Mum' suggests that we're staying at home rather than doing something that's considered more exciting or useful.
I feel fortunate to be in the position of being able to be at home full time with my DCs so I'm not going to use a term, like SAHM, which suggests that it's a role that is somehow seen as taking the less favourable option. Full time mum is a far better description of my role but because working mums don't like the term full time mums because they think it somehow undermines their role as a mother if they go out to work, we have been labelled with Stay At Home Mum which goes better with the term 'Working Out of the Home Mum'.
In RL none of my working friends with children describe themselves as a 'working outside of the Home Mum', they say they're working mums or they go out to work and those of us who are at home with the children don't call ourselves Stay at home Mums, we're at home with the children, or full time mums.
I don't care what mums who go out to work are referred to as - working mums, WOHMs, mums who work, who cares - so why do you care about what those of us who are at home are called? Full time mum is a pretty good description IMO, it in no way questions your own motherhood.

I personally see it as just a phrase but then I'm a SAHM and don't offence to these kind of comments. I'm lucky to not have to work (for now!) but at some point will be joining the workforce again.

when it comes to forms, I tend to put 'housewife' because it covers most stuff. I wouldn't put 'homemaker' because it's a bit of a nauseating term IMO.

My dad has recently retired whilst my mum is still working - he describes himself as a Facilities Manager. I have started using the term too but I have been known to have claimed I took early retirement.

I really dread it when people ask what I do (I am a full time mum, but I think it's got more to do with my own perceived loss of 'status' having gone from having the whole big career, being independent, earning my own (v. decent) salary etc. to doing 'nothing'!! I actually work harder at home than I ever did in paid employment, and it's emotionally and physically more tiring but I still don't know what to say when people ask what I do... I know it's ridiculous, but there you have it! I think other people (esp working mums) will see me as being a bit inferior and not as amazingly able to do it all as they are, I think. Am clearly neurotic. Oh well maybe I will just use pagwatch's' suggestion!

yumimummi - but why do you see it as a loss of status? How can you think that looking after your children full time is a lesser role? It's just as important as going out to earn a wage in the workforce.
There is a problem from some people with mothers who are at home full time being seen as inferior to those who work, but if you feel inferior then you are as mistaken as anyone who thinks giving up work to be at home with your children is a somehow less worthy option.
The important thing is to be happy with what you do - neither side should judge the other because there are merits to both sides of the coin and everyone is different.
Although of course this debate wouldn't keep returning to MN if we all thought that way

I think the term gets up people's noses because there are connotations attached to it.Full time being more important/commited than part time etc.

I find it all rather baffling. I work, but I don't have any childcare, so when I'm not parenting who is? Are my children parentless during those hours?

Also I had a year of not working and found that I most definitely was not 'parenting' all day. When they went off to school I was either meeting friends or doing chores around the house, or writing.
I would have been lying if I said I'd been looking after my children all day.

Well, YABU for getting your knickers in a twist about something Kirsty Whats-her-face said!

I hate the term 'SAHM', I've only ever heard it used on here and on Oprah. And would never use it in RL. yuk!

I can't think what I call myself, (although 'women of independent means' sounds good!] it's been so long since anyone asked.

LostArt - at Oprah!
You're right though - who uses the term SAHM in RL? It's a ridiculous acronym made up to stop people getting their knickers in a twist about something they have no reason to get their knickers in a twist about!

display I shouldn't have admitted to Oprah thing,should I! [shame]

'of the idle rich' teehee

now there's something to aspire to...

"full time mum" is what I do. (in answer to the question "What do you do?" OR better yet " What do you do all day!"
It has nothing to do with parents who work not being parents all the time. Who invented that idea?
I will not say "I'm a parent" in reply to such a question because my husband is a parent but he runs a business all day. My grandmother is a parent but she is retired and watches soaps all day. I will say I'm a full-time mum because of all that it implies; it describes what occupies my hours. Give me a better phrase to describe what I do all day (running after a toddler, cleaning up messes, answering the question "why", breastfeeding etc) and I may use it.

I don't take offence to the term 'full time mum', but when I took a career break to look after my young children I would never have referred to myself as one. I didn't use SAHM or housewife or any of those labels either.

I just said 'I am taking a career break to look after my young children'. It wasn't that hard.

I sometimes say full time mum, stay home mum or even housewife. Most people know what they mean. When I worked f/t after DD1 none of these phrases offended me so not sure why some people don't like them, they are just phrases to explain about not being in paid work due to caring.

I do find 'full time mum' irritating.

It may be because the only person who has ever used it to me in real life was a colleague who has fairly fixed views that young children should be looked after at home by their mothers. He used it to describe his wife, whose youngest child is probably 8 or so, (and at school from 8-5). The implication was therefore that I was not a 'full time mum' because I work part time and therefore was not doing the best thing for my children!

displayuntilbestbefore - Oh, I do see bringing up my children as the most important priority and also a complete privilege! Part of me sees it as a loss of status because I was used to 'impressing' people with how well I was doing at work and so on. I think that I have a subconscious doubt that people will be a bit disappointed if I say I am a full time mum / sahm or and think people may assume that I've never achieved anything else or won't be capable of discussing anything but children!! Clearly that is my problem, not anyone elses and I'm sure it's not true, but I struggle to say it just the same and always feel the need to say but I do XYZ or 'I used to work in..' which is silly as there should be no need to justify it! (I am better at not saying this now, but its taken a while - if someone is going to write you off at that point they are probably not worth talking to!)

There are lots of mums I know who have continued with their career or even changed career to a more family friendly one, and I haven't! I have done other things (got a masters etc.) but I think I have a nagging feeling that I am not doing 'enough'. Whether that is true or not is obviously completely subjective and if I feel I want to do something else as well as looking after the children no one is stopping me! Maybe it is because I thought I would probably work when I had kids and now I'm not I don't know how to define myself. Perhaps I am a bit jealous of those mums who work? Still at the minute it doesn't work for our family!

I don't think I'm alone in having doubts. The reason I stopped working is because personally I wanted to bring up my kids myself and my job involved quite long hours and was quite inflexible / demanding & I wouldn't have really seen DS during the week had I gone back to work and lacking family to help would have to have had a FT nanny or nursery / childminder combo. I think what it is about for me is figuring out what I want to do in future, whether that be work / charity work / retraining or something else!

Clearly - being a sahm doesn't involve 'full time parenting' as here I am on NM while DS at school and DD at nursery.

My DS birth certificate says 'full time mother' on, that's the term they used when I said I was a SAHM so some officials do use it.

It's one of those unanswerable questions. I don't even know what to call myself. I'm not keen on being called "house wife" (can't remember that wedding) or unemployed, but won't lose sleep or get offended over it.

Coffee-maker/drinker-extraordinaire is probably most correct, but I'd quite like to join pagwatch's "Idle Rich" club. Hmm, wonder if it would help if I nag dh into getting a better paying job!

yummi
I think you're right in that you certainly aren't alone in feeling how you do and certainly the decision to be at home with your children, if it is a choice you have, is not one that everyone would choose. I wouldn't have been able to continue in my previous job once I had had children due to the long work hours and the amount of travelling involved so I know what you mean about going from that to a totally different role.

I think the grass often seems greener - lots of mums at home envy their working friends who get to have "time out" from the hand on parenting and who have something different to do during some or each of the days, other mums who work wish they could be at home more and then there are working parents who are quite happy doing that and would hate to be at home and mums like me who love being at home and would hate to have to go to work while the DCs are small.
It's about finding the balance that works best for you and your family.
I find a daily balance that includes DS3, the housework and hopping onto MN to post here and there works nicely