Article about Stay-at-home-mums in the Sunday Times today - what did you think?

[emkaren]

Hi! I'm new-ish to Mumsnet, have only posted twice before, but today I read this article in the Sunday Times which really made me angry, and I was wondering if anyone else had seen it and what you thought. Basically the author went on in a VERY unkind way about stay-at-home mothers and how they might enjoy their existence now while their children are young, but will regret it later. Which is a fair point and something I do worry about sometimes, but what I didn't like was that she made it sound as if all SAHM's had husbands who are loaded, so that they drive around in their 4X4's, see their personal trainer every day and pop out to lunch all the time, not really bothering with the children at all, only 'using their fertility as an excuse' (this line actually ended the article). I mean, where does she live - what planet is she on? I am a SAHM and several of my friends are as well, but we are by no means rich and the reason we're at home is that at the moment we very much enjoy being with the children, more than being at work anyway, and we can just about afford to live on one income, so we're lucky that way - but this might change tomorrow or next year and then my decision might change - I don't know. But why write such a hostile article about SAHM's? Am I the exception, and most SAHM's are just using their children as an excuse to be a bit of a parasite? Find that hard to imagine!
Anyway, what did you think?
Oh, here's the link by the way, only I can't do it properly yet, sorry!
www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2092-841478,00.html

"Who wouldn?t love to be able to have a lie-in after a succession of broken nights with a teething baby or an anxious toddler?"

Eh? and how exactly does a SAHM do that? Does the baby get its own breakfast?

Do you think she has to justify to herself her decision to work, instead of to spend time with her children? And she works off her guilt by making people who decided to have different priorities out to be parasites?

Not that I think the decision to work when you have children is wrong, I think it is something that depends very much upon personality and circumstance. Children can gain a lot from having ambitious and well paid parents and outside childcare, but also they can gain a lot from having a mother or father who is constantly there for them and able to devote hours to being with them. What matters most is the happiness of the family unit - if the individuals in the family are happy then that works - if they are not then it doesn't.

And also - what world does she live in???? Not the one i come from!

This is so ridiculous, it's almost laughable! Does the author of this piece have children? has she any idea how much work goes into looking after them, a lie in indeed! exactly Jimjams, how exactly do us SAHM get one!? I would love for her to tell us that, i can't remember the last time i had a lie in!!
Working full time is hard especially when you have children, but being a SAHM is hardly a life of luxury!! Shopping, keeping fit! What do you do with the children you are staying home to look after while you are off enjoying these luxuries!!
I can't abide women who work getting on their high horses and looking down on SAHM,I was under the impression that the point of women having equality was to enable us to make our own choices, be that working or staying at home.
I would love for the author of this piece to give up work if only for a week to look after small children, then come back and tell us how much of an easy life it is!

It's a stuoid article :
" I see yummy mummies who were once intelligent, independent individuals becoming narcissistic and frivolous." - PLEEEAAAAASE - that's the sort she knows.... I know loads who are not like that!

And the : "here are stay-at-home mums who work. They treat motherhood as a job and I have nothing but admiration for them. They?re the ones who get their children reading early, keep fit by doing the housework and are always willing to help out."
Personnally I don't think reading early is good..... so IMO her judgement of what is a good SAHM stincks.....

Bitter grapes/envious that's how I read it !

Oakmaiden, I thought the same thing. It was a real only in London piece as far as I could see (not that I mean all SAHMs in London are like that, but it's a type you just wouldn't even recognise outside London). Jimjams, I was also struck dumb by that one! Perhaps all her SAHM friends have nannys, too???

My paid maternity leave is coming to an end and I should definately be returning to work due to financial reasons but I can't bring myself to leave my dd. I didn't realise I would feel this strongly and did intend to return. Also I am not in a very highly paid job and would have very little left after child care costs. Not sure what to do for the best. I do feel I should go back and dh hasn't said as much but I am sure he would like me to as we are really not in a position for me to be a SAHM. I just can't imagine leaving dd all day with someone else.

I just read that article; that whole thing about "what do you do when you're kids are teenagers" - well thats when you move on and do something new! And since you're all ready set up to live on just the dh's income you have the chance to be really useful; most communities are crying out for people with time. Looking around my friends with teenagers - one works as a learning assistant to kids with special needs (loves the work and the low pay doesn't matter), one has just become a youth worker, one is training as a counsellor, one volunteers with Home Start, one is the person who is always there when you need help... I think being a SAHM with teenagers will be a great time. (not to mention that teenagers do actually need their mums a lot, too!).

Sounds unbelievable. I couldn't hack it at home and had to go back to work. I have so much respect for SAHMs, cos I know I could never cope with that much work and so little thanks. What are they like?

just a tad bitchy i thought .Sounds like the author is a bit jealous of SAHMs.Personally there are times during the day that I envy working mums,intelligent conversation,time to think without interruptions,and even the drive home by yourself in the car sounds quite peaceful to me!I chose to stay at home because I wanted to bring my children up myself and so far it is financially feasible but in no way can I afford to do the stuff she was banging on about.

Magnum - maybe you really need to discuss this with your dh - sounds like if you're not going to have much money left after childcare then it would only be worth you going back to work if you either really value your job or you would completely damage your future career prospects - there's nothing worse than working and feeeling as if you're missing out on your dd and not even making much financial contrubution at the end of the day - is there any way you would be able to curb expenditure so that you could be a SAHM?

I'm speechless! Well not quite!
I'm a London (Islington - probably makes it even worse) SAHM. We are not rolling in it. I worked bloody hard for 10 years as a staff nurse and gave up when dd was born for 2 reasons; My dh also works funny shifts so childcare would have been impossible to coordinate, and mainly because we wanted me to look after the children. It was our decision, we decided that any material losses were worth it. I never judge anyone's decision to do what is best for themselves and their situation and it makes my blood boil that someone can write with such scathing and almost hatred of women who've "let the female sex down".

Must add how much I loved my long lie in this morning after ds had me up every 2 hours in the night. Fat chance. DH had to work, so he went off bleary eyed and I had 2 to entertain all day.
BUT I LOVE IT.

I?ve just read the article and can?t believe the ignorance, judgementalism and sheer Auntie Tom-ism of Kate Stone. This woman is obviously seething with jealousy for those mothers who have made a choice which she finds invalid. She has osmosed all the mysogynistic, matraphobic attitudes of our society which determines that any work which women do, must by definition be of no value. Bringing up children, raising the next generation of human beings and ensuring that they start life with our values instead of that of the paid stranger who temporarily looks after them, is "not contributing", it's parasitic.

If children are not brought up properly, the mysogynists on the Sunday Times and other matraphobic media soon notice - they are the first to complain about rising crime, the selfishness of a generation which divorces too easily, how inadequate parents should be fined for the crimes of their children - but then they object to people who have the courage to ditch the obsession with status and making money and to do what the very people who condemn them for doing it demand - bring up their own children properly, develop strong family networks, give children the security of properly functioning relationships, and lay the building blocks for a civilised society.

Kate Stone's venom about mothers who work in the home, rather than in the cash economy, is so over the top, that I guess she's suffering from some kind of over-achiever dementia. I found it hilarious that the only stay-at-home mothers she can tolerate is those who persecute their children with endless activities, time-tabling their lives with CV skills so that they have no time to be bored and therefore creative, and poor little Nigella spends so much time on the music, the dancing, the drama, the sport et al that she develops the latest fashionable eating disorder; Stone has imbibed all the mysogynistic values of late capitalist society where nothing is of any value unless it adds directly to that quarter's bottom line.

And she's furious that there are still people out here who haven't imbibed those values and just don't give a stuff how much money she earns or how much status she has, because we're having a better life than her. And yes, in ten or twenty years time, when I'm still talking to my children, and my garden has matured, I still won't regret not spending the best years of my life in an office and trying to make up for my lack of knowledge of my children by buying them lots of things.

I'm so glad this thread is here or I would have gone to bed seething with anger. Firstly I felt pissed off with Karen Stone's narrow representaton of the SAHM. Maybe everyone she knows is rolling in money, but we're not and nobody I know is. We are public sector workers ( maybe she'd be suprised to know, Oxbridge educated)and just about manage on one salary. Secondly, there was no real reference in the article as to the child's needs. Thirdly, what gives working mothers the right to be so vitriolic and downright insulting about SAHMs and to stereotype us in this way. The number of times someone has either insulted me "oh, I couldn't stay at home, I wouldn't be stimulated enough by toddler converstaion" (ie you must be a bit thick dearie) or implied that my children are deprived because they are not part of a nursery where they will learn to socialise and be prepared for school is countless. However, if a SAHM was ever to query anything done by a working mum then she'd be an outcast never to be spoken to again.
I had to go back to work after the birth of my 1st child for financial reasons and it tore me apart. Raising children and the decision of whether to work or not is about personal choice (for those lucky people). Note there are no article about women in real financial straits who have to work or in very low paid jobs.I wish working mums like Ms Stone would just be less judgemental and offensive. Oh and her suggestion that we are letting down the feminist movement...argh... I'm so angry.

I was talking to dh the other day about having another child (we have a 4 months old baby) and we realized that if we go ahead and give ds a brother or sister, it won't make sense financially for me to go back to work as all the money would be spent on childcare, hence I will have to stay home: not a choice, but a necessity!

And I know so many SAHMs who stay home for the same reason: forget about redecorating the living room or personal trainer, they save the pennies to make sure their children get all they need and still manage to live on one salary.

That article put me off my breakfast this morning

I had gastic flu yesterday so only had enough energy to write one line (and yep guess what being a SAHM I was looking after the children whilst ill- in between decorating my living room of course). Actually this article is so laughable think I'm going to email her- if she's be brave enough to leave an address.

There's no eamile address in the online version- is there on in the print version?

Having re-read the article it really is a joke. I think she obvioulsy forgets that many people don;t have a choice. Some people have to work to make ends meet and some people's circumstances mean they have to stay at home (often becuase they can't afford childcare for 2 - or heavens above they have something like a disabled child- or maybe that doesn't happen in her world).

Wish I had so many choices. I still do not understand that reference about lying in bed. or redecorating the living room. I don't understand how anyone decorates when they are looking after a young child/ren full time.

She seems very bitter, and she seems to have a ral fantasy idea of what being a SAHM entails. I laughed at the bit about shopping as well. Has she ever tried shopping with an autistic 4 year old and a toddler?

Where are the children in this article? I just don't understand where the children of the SAHM's are.

Have not managed to read article yet as I was so busy down at the gym and then I popped in Harvey Nicks on my way home for a spot of retail therapy before taking my DH out for a meal on our own! NOT! I'm a SAHM and really enjoy doing what I do the kids are a great laugh most of the time and will have left home before I know where am! so us SAHMs will eventually be able to be like Kate Stone unless we find something better to do.

I just skimmed it and agree with Jimjams - it can't be taken seriously. She seems to have taken an absolutely minute group of women (wealthy enough to afford comprehensive childcare cover without working and those who value their appearance above just about everything else) and extrapolated it to cover all SAHM's. It's completely absurd as the scenario's she describes are utterly foreign to the average SAHM. I don't know why she has to be quite so nasty and vicious about it all.

I gave up my city career only 2 months ago and the way she describes stay-at-home'dom couldn't be more different for me. Whereas then it was all snappy suits, lipstick and high heels, now it is all about manically avoiding mirrors altogether. I found combining a 'career' in a male dominated field utterly impossible with the prospect of three small children. The quality of our lives as a family and my relationships with my children have strengthened beyond belief since I left but this says nothing about the average working woman and everything about trying to succeed in a macho world where 12 hours a day in the office is the norm.

I found it laughable and she is clearly spitting with jealousy. These articles crop up from time to time, there was one in the Daily Express a couple of years ago on the same lines.

Reminded me why I cancelled my sub to the Sunday Times...the London-centric bias to all the articles is pathetic, the 'icing on the cake' was an 'article' about how in London Thursday night was the new Saturday.

I think they got me confused with someone who gives a s**t.

Fell asleep reading the article. What a silly woman!

Well she is obviously a complete arse this woman - what sort of world does she live in and how she can assume that most SAHM's are like those she has described is beyond me!

Best ignored I should think.c

Please don't let this be a SAHM v Working Mothers debate! I don't know who Kate Stone is, never seen the name before and very strongly suspect is it a pseudonym. But please don't write 'what gives working mothers the right'...she's not 'working mothers' she's one person who has written a frankly bonkers and deliberately inflammatory feature in the Sunday Times about a world that applies to 0.01% of the British population! It's certainly not true that working mothers don't get sniped at by one or two SAHMs or even their partners (!) the other day I invited a builder to come and look at my kitchen which needs a new floor and new French doors that actually open and found out he has twins the the same age as my ds who are going to the same nursery. I asked what days they were going and said ds was going on two of the same days. "Mornings only", me - "No full days" - "At his age? We think the twins are far too young to do full days." - me - "I work three days a week" - him: "oh, well we don't agree with that" !!! - suffice to say, he's not got the work. And I only work part time. I have friends with kids who work and friends who are SAHMs. I don't make a distinction, personally. And even though I do work, I still bore for England about my ds in company. I suspect the mums "Kate Stone' is talking about are school age, hence the shopping/lunching/gym lifestyle, plus they have au pairs, cleaners, housekeepers and nannies. These women do exist (my dh's ex is one!) but they are bloody rare.

Still, nice for her to be able to vent her bile in public just because some mothers don't like her (mmm, wonder why...).