Stay at home mums with kids at school, why dont they get jobs??

[sleepinbeauty]

Just a bit hacked off with mums at school, they moan about having no life away from their kids/ not much money, yet they all seem to refuse to get jobs or careers!
why do some women just want to do sweet FA all day when their kids are at school? They seem content for their husbands to slog their guts out at work while they drink cups of tea and watch daytime tv! Dont get it! i think its called laziness??

wow, enid, you think it's "more jammy"? that's refreshingly honest, and my opinion too! can't help feeling a little of those mums athome f/t who don'thave to answer to bosses/sort childcare/juggle trying to do too much in too short a time etc etc

wow, enid, you think it's "more jammy"? that's refreshingly honest, and my opinion too! can't help feeling a little of those mums athome f/t who don'thave to answer to bosses/sort childcare/juggle trying to do too much in too short a time etc etc

by which i am not saying it isn't a valid decision to stay at home, thinking of doing so myself.

yes its the juggling that is a fecking nightmare

and I had a very 'political' job so had to soothe egos all day so I don't miss it

Agree with Enid. Not allowed to say that on mn though - about it being jammier, not the agreeing with Enid bit

agree, but it is, it is,it is!

Staying at home is nothing like a job. I would never describe looking after my children as my "job". Or even "work". I think it's pointless to compare the two. And I hope nobody posts about it being "the most important job there is" or anything to that effect, because obviously I think it's important. I do it. I just don't think it's a job.

And I agree with Enid. If I were working now dh and I would be frazzled. I'm not frazzled. And neither is dh.

i'm v.v.v.v.v.v.v frazzled!

But, if I remember rightly from further down this huge thread, you choose to work to keep your career on its trajectory. Mine is now way off! Horses for courses.

was that Q to me? if so, yes, you're right but I'm wondering whether it's all worth it, actually even do-able right now, all seems to be falling apart rather at the moment.I seem to be cocking up in every area, quite without realising how.

wow is this one of the longest hreads on mumsnet?

Okay here goes; "why do some women come onto a supportive site like mumsnet solely to post a whinge about other women? They make sweeping assumptions about what other people do or feel or earn(who they only meet in passing) and attempt to take the moral high groun by accusing other mothers/fathers of being 'lazy'. I just don't get it! I think its called being a right cow??"

everyone else has raised the issue of finding fulfilling work which fits around the school run. Not everyone is happy for their child to go to breakfast clubs/after school clubs or can find work which makes it financially viable to do this.
Some of those mums may still have little ones at home, or an aged parent who needs caring for.
Some of those parents may be single parents
And sometimes you just want a whinge!
I've recently given up work (well redundancy but decided not to go back immediatly) to spend more time at home. I took that decision for a whole variety of reasons but it doens't stop me wishing things were different and needing a good old moan now and again about the boredom of being home alone with a toddler.
Things aren't straightforward, you can honestly and deeply believe its better for your kids/family to have one parent who is there to keep house, cook tea, meet you from school, take you to Dr appointment, turn up to school sports day, help run the PTA, act as an unpaid PA/business manager for the other parent, buy all the christmas cards and presents.... etc .... etc BUT ALSO feel slightly tired/bored and resentful about doing it all each week with little thanks and no financial reward or time off!

RTTH - exactly why I no longer work. Will do again, and trying to make up career wise by part time study. But right now, I'm after an easier life. And it IS easier!

I agree with Enid - I'm a SAHM and I love not having doorstep-sized contracts to review, tantrumming clients to placate, having to negotiate the same bits of law over and over and over...

I found my job utterly knackering without kids - I've no idea how I'd function if I worked FT and then had ds to look after in the evenings. And the only PT option on offer was working from home on Fridays - impossible to do that without ds being in childcare at the time.

i count myself very lucky indeed that we can afford for me to stay at home to look after ds.

i have a new reason for being a sahm. i will never be to busy to decorate my own christmas tree.

Well you won't hear me complaining about being a SAHM - I have a nice life

16 days since ds2 went to school and my nest became empty

Boy is this a huge thread! I work 3 days a week and ds started school last week. It is tricky juggling school and events when you work. But I prefer to work than not. That suits my family and our situation, every family is different.

What I will say is that My mum was always a SAHM because she wanted to be around for me, she was always going to get a job when I was at senior school/college etc. But it neve happenned, she lost all of her confidence.

Now I am grown up, it is my mums biggest regret. She did a greta job as a mum, but wishes she had 'something else'

i suppose some of us complain because, in my case, we're natural moaners .
It's also due a lot to the fact that either way we feel we're doing the wrong thing, doesn't it?

shall we let this thread die its death now ladies??

I prefer threads to stop when people don't wish to post on them anymore. That is the usual practice I believe!

I like this thread - it's given me hours of amusement

tee hee

SinB, all WOHM/SAHM threads end up like this.

I'd just like to share a nigella moment with you all. Scoffed 2 home-made cranberry biscuits and rang up my friend to demand that she either gives me the recipe or makes more. She said "oh, it's really easy to make, it's a nigella one". I thought of Custy and PMSL.

Yes I often think about how much higher my wage would be and how much lower my taxes would be if certain people got lives.

I wonder if women such as (not all sahm's just the ones who are taking the piss) this realise that they are the reason taxes are high and public services like the NHS suck. They cost the system so much more money than what they contribute.

They think they are doing good for their kids by staying at home but those poor kids are going to get hit with one hell of a tax burden in their adult lives for public services that the generation before them were the last to see. For example we all know that The NHS is on it's last legs. It has been abused for too long. But the next few generations are going to be paying for it through taxation, even if they don't have access to it because it no longer exists. Too many people costing the system money without putting in for way too loooong...........it is going to blow up in our faces.

I can understand staying home it if a woman has several children (the childcare costs would make it pointless to work). I can understand staying home if a woman has a child/ or family member with a disability that needs lots of care. If she has some kind of illness and cannot work, fine with me. Otherwise GET TO WORK instead of dragging my family down.

I'm running away to climb back under my rock now.

Oh dear I had better get off my fat arse and piant the dining room hadn't I

I have been a SAHM for about 6 weeks and I have just one more week left

I have always worked FT except when I have had maternity leave, so I have enjoyed a few weeks off. This thread is (as ever) brilliant I love these debates, and now I can speak from experience.

1. I do not define myself as 'someone' by the job I do. I was less pissed off with the OP than this assumption that you can only 'be' someone if you work out of teh home.
2. I am very busy being a SAHM, I have only 'lunched' once and been to the cinema once. Although I am goingto my first EVER coffee morning next Friday (mCMillans one so hopefully I am forgiven, and I will be taking wine )
3. Once you have dropped kids off at school, wlaked the dog (or I go running) showered and had a cuppa it is usually 10 - 10.30 am. I then make loads of phone calls (organiseing DH 40th, a new cleaner, buying a car, booking theatre tickets etc etc). Then I have been washing, defrosting freezers, painting the kitchen (got the dining room to do) doing teh garden, sorting the kids rooms, etc etc etc. EG doing all those jobs I never have time to do which I have been meaning to do for about 4 years!! Suddenly it is after lunch (I have to bolt something quick) and run accross teh road to pick up my kids.

You really only get a max of 4 hours, which sounds loads but isn't really.

Anyway I feel for you BleepingS as you obviously are not able to see beyond your blinkers. As to you I am a lzy person, yet I am the main breadwinner of the and have been for years. DH did suggest he could try to work more so I wouldn;t have to work full time but that's plain daft. I earn more full time than he does and he earns more PT than I ever could, so we may as well stay like we are.