How do families have SAHMs?

[LikeDaisies]

Financially - I cannot comprehend how it’s possible!

Husband is a teacher. Earns around £44,000. That isn’t enough to cover our bills if I were to leave my job and stay at home with our baby.

Mortgage is £900. Other bills come to around £700 - not considering food, leisure, etc.

Not that I’d want to leave my job, but I’d love to be able to drop down to 3 days a week. But financially it just isn’t possible. We wouldn’t be able to afford our mortgage and bills.

So it leaves me wondering how I see so many families who are able to manage having a SAHM.

Please can anyone who is in this situation explain how it is possible/how you make it work?

If I’d worked overnight I would need to go to sleep all day so then who would watch the baby - my husband wouldn’t be able to work that day. I would also be too worried to work from home with a baby in the house incase they needed my attention, I’d need the other adult there too. Working 4 days is obviously a help. I’d just be way too stressed and need sleep!

Ireland has diverged from the UK quite significantly since 2008 on a number of metrics that affect income and outgoings. It is significant potentially for how many families can afford to have a parent at home.

Our total income is about £24,000. I’m a SAHM. Mortgage is £500, small mid terrace house. I’m planning to work when youngest is around 3-4 years old. We only have one car, we don’t drink alcohol, mostly vegetarian. We still have trips out to zoos/soft play, occasional takeaway, budget UK holidays. Very happy kids, at that age they don’t need tons of money. I imagine when they’re teenagers it will be more expensive but we should be on two incomes by then so I think it will work out.

Remember that my husband worked 4 days. Guess when I did most of my overnights……..

I am a SAHM but only for 2 years for a career break. I previously worked FT & PT. PT nearly harder because no childcare just working around them.

Luckily, DH works in tech. 6 figure plus bonus etc we have some investment in the form of shares also

Kids do loads of clubs, one child in particular is in too much stuff. 9 different classes. We are comfortable but not wealthy at all. If times changed clubs & holidays would be first to go. 44k doesnt seem alot in today's world but it is so dependent on outgoings and also where you live, cost of living can vary hugely.

I'm glad it worked out for you but I'm not sure it's great for kids to have a parent out at work every day/night, and night shift work is really detrimental to the health. My DH still struggles to sleep after night work in his 20s and 30s and so do some of my doctor friends

So you worked overnights and then he was always off the next day and no meetings? And then you worked maybe sometimes in the day and he worked at night? When did you get to spend anytime all together?

There are lots of parents working nights. DD was never not with a parent……… please explain how that is any different to her being with a SAHM with a father that works long hours/away.

We had a couple of evenings a week and at least 1 full day at weekends, often more. DH is in tech and could work around my schedule. Life is very different when you have 24 hours in the day to use and aren’t fixed in your views about when different things should happen.

I’m not fixed in my views and I also don’t have a 7-7 sleep for my kids etc but I can’t just work at night and neither can my husband. Our industries don’t work like that. Plus I would be the worst at concentrating at night !

In our case we were able to because we had a lot more income, plus no mortgage.

I do my best work after 8pm. :-)

I'm afraid all the schools I've worked in have had extremely fixed views about what times lessons should happen 😂.

I'm not sure DH's university students would be desperately pleased to rock up for a 9am lecture and be told to return at noon either (all his and my students would probably be thrilled if nothing happened till noon, tbh, but that is a different discussion).

Neither DH or I work in roles who’ve require activity st set times.

well aware of school hours etc. what’s your point?

my point, in case it wasn’t clear, is that not all members of a family have to work and sleep at the same time.

I didn't think my point was that obscure but it was that very few families can live successfully like that, so it's not likely to be a driver of something widespread enough for the OP to be puzzled by it.

Why do so many women on here state that they had to give up work because “my salary wouldn’t cover childcare costs”. Don’t most parents split the cost? I’ve heard this from friends as well who’ve said once they paid nursery fees they were left with virtually nothing so they had to stay at home with DC.

Genuinely baffled particularly as so many men earn significantly more than their wives.

What they mean is that nursery fees would wipe out their salary and then some, so it would be a net loss to the household if they went back to work, which many can't afford.

High earning husbands, as they always have. 🤷‍♀️

those people saying that they made it work by being frugal and not having any luxuries…was that not utterly miserable though?

Whereas it’s just a loss to them alone to be knocked down the career ladder/taking a pension hit. That doesn’t matter though. Long term pain for short term gain. Especially if the relationship breaks down.

It depends on the cost of your mortgage / rent plus bills per month really. And this largely depends on where in the UK (or the world) you live.

Our household income is over £100k per year. However with the size / cost of our mortgage and our outgoings, I would not be able to be a SAHM. I may be able to reduce my hours but that would be it. Frankly, I don’t think I’d want to be a SAHM anyway, I think I’d go mad.

But you can't just not pay for the mortgage, or feed your children fir a couple of years.

One partner earns more than £50k?

I know what you're getting at, but many families don't have a choice. Childcare costs are often more than one persons' wage and when you have a mortgage to pay, the person that brings in the most money is the one whose job needs to be prioritised.

Like a PP said, you can't just refuse to pay your mortgage, or your council tax, or feed your kids just so you can stay on the career ladder.

Indeed. but why aren’t men making such sacrifices?