Intensive mothers

[Xenia]

It seems pretty clear children benefit a lot if their mother has a good career and here is another piece of evidence of the damage housewives do to children:-

"Stay at home mothers are more likely to be unhappy than those who go out to work, according to new research.
Women who believe in "intensive parenting" are at risk of a range of mental illnesses including depression.

They think women are better parents than men, that mothering should be child centred and that children should be considered sacred and fulfilling.

This may put them in danger of suffering the 'parenthood paradox' where their ideology increases feelings of stress and guilt.

Psychologist Kathryn Rizzo, whose findings are published online in Springer's Journal of Child and Family Studies, said: "If intensive mothering is related to so many negative mental health outcomes, why do women do it?

"They may think that it makes them better mothers, so they are willing to sacrifice their own mental health to enhance their children's cognitive, social and emotional outcomes."
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She said parenting is a big task and requires a variety of skills and expertise. Many women rate the challenge as one of the most fulfilling experiences in life.

But some previous research has suggested it may be detrimental to mental health, with women reporting taking care of their children as more stressful than being at work.

So her team at the University of Mary Washington, Virginia, looked at whether intensive parenting in particular was linked to increased levels of stress, depression and lower life satisfaction among 181 mothers of children under five.

Using an online questionnaire, they found out to what extent the participants endorsed intensive parenting beliefs by measuring their responses to a series of statements.

These included "mothers are the most necessary and capable parent", "parents' happiness is derived primarily from their children" and "parents should always provide their children with stimulating activities that aid in their development".

Others were "parenting is more difficult than working" and "a parent should always sacrifice their needs for the needs of the child".

Overall, the women were satisfied with their lives but had moderate levels of stress and depression.

Almost one in four had symptoms of depression and these negative mental health outcomes were accounted for by their endorsement of intensive parenting attitudes.

When the level of family support was taken into account, those mothers who believed women are the essential parent were less satisfied with their lives. Those who believed that parenting is challenging were more stressed and depressed.

The researchers said overall, the women were satisfied with their lives but had moderate levels of stress and depression.

They added: "In reality, intensive parenting may have the opposite effect on children from what parents intend."

Earlier this year a study of more than 60,000 US mothers found 41 percent of those not in work experienced worry compared to 34 per cent of those employed.

And 28 per cent suffered depression, eleven per cent more than the others. Psychlogists fear the phenomenon is linked with feelings of isolation and a lack of fulfillment. "

www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/9381449/Stay-at-home-mothers-more-unhappy-than-those-who-work.html

I want my DCs to end up with a career that they find interesting - I will support them in what they want to do rather than try and shoehorn them into my ambitions (it never works anyway, I have seen many midlife changes where people throw it all up and do what they wanted to do in the first place.)
Maybe they are artistic and want to be a potter, go off and be a shepherd in the wilds of Scotland, want to be a nurse, a costume designer, dressmaker, librarian etc etc etc. I certainly don't want to have paid school fees and say - 'this was my investment and I expect a return'!
There are some jobs that I would hate - life wouldn't be worth living- and Xenia's top jobs come under this heading. I am glad that there are people who find them interesting and exciting - but we don't all.
It isn't a question of thinking we are worth less- just that given a list of what we want from life , money is way down and , in my case, power and islands are off the bottom of the scale.

Well, in my country we're already responsible for our own healthcare and education (college anyway), so no matter there. :o

I personally genuinely find fulfillment in caring. I feel like I make a difference and it comes naturally to me. And I have to explain it over and over again, because I'm well read or something. My friend's DH (who is an RN) told me "oh you're much too intelligent to be a CNA" What does that say about the standard of care, if you think it's only for people who can't do anything else?!

For me it is a genuine calling. I used to work part time as an aide for a girl with AS. I changed her diapers until she was almost 9, sat through tantrums that lasted hours and hours, taught her how to speak to others by role playing over and over and over again for years, and basically took her from someone who screamed when she had to sit still in a circle for five minutes to someone who can more or less hold her own with her peers. It was my job and I loved it and I was damn good at it.

For this I was paid the queenly sum of about 4500 pounds a year. But I wouldn't have traded it for a board room job or any other kind of office work, honestly.

I would find that job fulfilling too, CheerfulYank. If I had to work in the medical profession I would want to be a nurse, doing the caring and not as the surgeon poking around in the insides, seeing the thyroid and not the person.

Cy, but do you think that's because you are a women or cheerfulyank?

Math, I agree with almost everything you say, except that I don't believe that all men oppress all women. I doubt Xenia is being exploited by her gardener.

Under all modes of production over space and time what is clear is that, some men oppress all people, these men oppress all women, they have power over their women. All women are exploited by their men. Some women profit from the exploitation of other women, lower in social/economic class. To set up the pay differential argument as being one brought about through biology and not the means of production and not rooted firmly in historical materialism means that we set women and men up for a situation of ongoing struggle, we may as well flee to Xenia's island and set up a lesbian enclave!

Yes word, what is happening with the state and the fact that the top ten economies now are not nation states but corporations, very worrying for women. It is women and children who are most vulnerable as the world becomes a far more selfish place.

She is a human being- we are all different. I know men who are nurses and very good at it - men who are reception teachers. I don't know why we have to get so hung up on the sex of the person. The problem with many top jobs are that you really do work long hours and many women don't want it.
I think that people get to the end of their lives with a few regrets but not many think ' I should have spent longer in the office'!

Why the assumption that the gardener is male?

I know a man with a job like CheerfulYank's - he came to it later in life but is really good at it.

Where do you want your DC to end up

Word I know where I want my DC to end up but I don't give a fig where I end up. We could afford private ed for one child, and that is what we did, until DS2 arrived without invite and spoilt the party! After that it became clear home ed for a few years would give both the academic edge over their peers,so that is what we did, I doubt regret having less time for my work.

I doubt I'll regret (too early)

I think the issue is so much more nuanced and complex than most of you realise. It's clearly not that every SAHM should go back to work and aim for the boardroom. Even if we had 50:50 in all boardrooms across the country that wouldn't be most women. With the split we have (which is more like 70:30 or even 80:20) most men are not 'in the boardroom'). Most men don't have 'high flying careers'. It's reasonably possible that should there be the redistribution that would assure parity at these levels it could be done entirely by promoting women in the next few tiers down, without dipping into the pool of SAHMs at all. Of course some SAHMs have 'given up in disgust' on their careers and might have stayed in had things been different. But in this day in age most women who SAH are doing so because they want to and the won't change (because despite exotics laughable self assurance - which far outstrips Xenia's - most people, of either gender, can't be dentists or doctors. Because they lack the skill set and qualifications. Although I do enjoy reading the long list of jobs exotic 'doesn't want').

It's really not about getting more women into the workplace at this point. It's about challenging the popular narrative of why some women don't work, so as to stop men using it as an excuse for holding back other women.

YoYo because I'm me. :) I'm CheerfulYank and it's my inborn personality. Which is my point. I left that job at the end of the school year (May). Right now I'm at home and I absolutely love it. Not because I'm a woman, but again, because I'm me.

I know a man who stays at home while his wife works in an office type job (she runs a radio station.) He is also a born potter-around-the-house type, like me.

Here's the thing; lots of jobs are very interesting and pay very well.

So what on earth is wrong with suggesting that more women aim for those?

Women are far more vulnerable than men as the economy moves to a more polarised version of itself. So why shouldn't more women aim to place themselvs in a more secure position?

It seems a no brainer to me.

But then I've been poor. And I wouldn't recommend it.

There's nothing wrong with suggesting it at all.

But I feel that there is something deeply wrong with suggesting time after time that parents who choose to stay home with their children are no better than prostitutes or cock lodgers who damage said children in their "laziness".

The problem is that as long as women are putting their careers second they are making themselves vulnerable, they are making themselves reliant on male earnings and they are enforcing inequality - the position that women earn virtually nothing and serve and men earn and keep families. There are far too many families where that is still so.

So how do housewives given the damage they do by staying home, ensure they right that damage? They should treat it like carbon footprint. They have chosen a path which damages women and their daughters for theirown indulgence. SO in return they should put in say 15 hours a week writing to people in Saudi lobbying for women's rights or go into schools exhorting women to do medicine not beauty therapy. They should make up for their perverse and damaging decision to stay home.

So ask yourselves - what have I done this week to ensure women progress?

ROFL at "perverse and damaging decision."

Oh Xenia. Honey, honey, honey. :o

This thread has gone off the wall. I don't think I've ever seen Xenia actually being abusive to other women before. Superior, patronising and dogmatic yes, but not accusing them of being perverse and damaging because they're making different life choices to us.

In answer to your question, Xenia. I haven't been abusive to other women this week. I feel that I have done my bit to progress the cause of promoting women's self-esteem.

No it really isn't funny, but it's 4 a.m. here and I feel a bit loopy.

She writes in hyperbole but her fundamental point is sound. The problem is that some women not only put their head in the sand but also purposely spout wrongheaded justifications for why they make the choices they do (instead of the available perfectly reasonable no-brainer acceptable reasons they have made their choices). Being a SAHM is fine. Telling people it's necessary because otherwise the kids will be damaged is in fact incredibly damaging to society in general and our daughters in particular. As the Radio 4 piece yesterday demonstrates.

Unfortunately, while I would instinctively laugh at Xenia's position that women who SAHM are not bright the evidence from those who continue to spout damaging rhetoric indicates that she is right. For those people anyway. Which is sad. And damaging to the sensible honest SAHMs (who make up the majority of the posters in this thread).

wtaf????

wordfactory,post 07.45am
Maybe I am mis interepting what you said ,or misreading,but why,if you are a SAHM,does that mean your children are less lik ly to end up rich.Not meaning that rich is the best place to be.Are you saying it is because of the supposed advantage of private schooling.
I know plenty of people,whose children have been nowhere near private schools, have got degrees and more,and have gone on to great careers.

oh,men and women,both.

Umm, most people on the thread haven't said anything about their own work status Metabolis3.

I do agree with you that making generalisations about consequences of perceived life choices isn't very bright, though, whoever is making the generalisations.

amillion I really don't know if the DC of SAHMs will be more or less likely to be rich.

But what I do know is that the DC of rich parents will be far more likely to be rich than the DC of poor parents. All the research backs this up. Advantage follows advantage.

Of course there will be some people who buck this trend. Me for one!!!

But this should not distract from the sad truth. Social mobility is at a very low ebb and not look set to improve. In fact I would hazard a guess that in the next ten years it will dive to a shocking level as the middle classes effectively disappear. We cannot look to the past and how some of us became upwardly mobile and extrapolate to the future. Too much has changed. The DC of today and tomorrow face much greater hurdles to jump.

Cna money remove the hurdles? Not all. But they can buy you a damn fine pair of running spikes.