Stay at home mum of 1 child? Frowned upon?

[Spudulanky]

Why do other people/mums care?!

The child is school age.. its gossiped about.. but why??

honestly why???

Are teachers SAHM’s during the school holidays?

Following this logic an 90 year old woman who is at home is a SAHM because she has children in their 60s, with possibly grandchildren themselves.

SAHM is the term used these days instead of housewife bc of the bad connotations of the term, but its an euphemism.
A Stay at Home Dad with kids at school is an unemployed person. I think we are all the same.

It sounds like you all really are quite integral to the wider school life - and indeed the traditional curriculum if you are acting as a TA.

I completely agree with you.

I don’t associate it with being unemployed. I think choosing not to work because you don’t have to financially is more like it. However I dont agree with choosing not to work when you get benefits and are perfectly capable of working. i also dont see why people have to constantly justify too with “I do all the life admin” whatever that is. Just say, I dont need to work financially and I therefore choose not to.

There are 9 million people in the uk of working age who don’t work and many don’t claim any benefits so must be financially secure enough not to have to. This will increase as more and more people inherit.

@Pregnantandconstantlyhungry Yes, I’m basically an unpaid TA for two days a week - definitely won’t do it forever, as increasingly it does feel a bit exploitative of my skills, but I’m very aware (knowing as a governor the school’s woeful finances) that the kids would simply remain unsupported if I wasn’t there; it’s not as if they can afford to pay someone to do the work instead.

It’s not just me; there are a few of us volunteering, but I can see how the school (and the local church and other community facilities) increasingly struggles because the army of SAHs and other volunteers who have historically supported them is dwindling.

Yep I don’t disagree re employment but these are things that the mum in question has to weigh up and decide for herself.

Getting back into the workplace after a long career break is hard for sure but by no means impossible. No guarantee that they would end up on a much lower income than if they had stayed in work either depending on what their previous job was. NI, pension contributions and savings can all be kept up too. This would keep them afloat in the event of separation while they get back on their feet and wait for the divorce to go through. Don’t assume every SAHM you meet is standing on the precipice of financial disaster.

As this post has been brought up again, can I just point out that the only thing I said was ‘you must have a very narrow social life’.

I did not say the other two quotes and either you quoted someone else and attributed them to me or you made them up, but I did not say them. And when I originally responded to this post the quotes were not there, I have only just seen them as it was edited later to make me look bad.

They’re not my style.

I would have thought they were teachers on holiday, but if that’s how they want to refer to themselves then let them crack on!

While I stayed home for my children, I was also secretary for the village hall, a local Councillor and a School Governor. Hardly sitting idly at home .
I was lucky in that my late husband was completely in agreement with me, we shared finances and made decisions together. I have no regrets, and am not interested in what other people think of my choices.

@Indianajet why are you posting them on a forum then??!!!

Jesus Christ I wish I hadn't commented and now getting notifications, what a depressing set of comments.
Who cares what people call themselves. Yes maybe housewife is more accurate, but it's very old fashioned so some people don't use it. I'm not aware of an official definition of SAHM.
And who cares what people do. Kids, partners, lifestyles, volunteer work, effort levels as to housework, cooking, kids activities and etc are all different. Some people take the piss and are lazy, others are wonderwomen, this is unrelated to work.
Anyone getting this worked up about other women's choices needs to have a long hard think about what's important. Put that energetic arguing of the point to something worthwhile!
For what it's worth I could probably manage to stay at home financially but I've never even entertained the idea. But that's me, my child, my partner, my standards etc. I know I'd find it harder than working, and partly due to the assumption everyone was judging me (amongst many other reasons). Which apparently you all would.
Please, please consider not tearing down other women just because they don't act EXACTLY how you think they should, including using the EXACT right words. There's so much to be angry at in this world, women staying at home by choice shouldn't make the list. Even if they're on benefits and their house is a mess who cares, I really think we can deal with that when the other billion problems in this world are sorted.

Yep, sounds like sneery jealousy @Spudulanky

You can keep it to yourself though. Not everyone needs to hear YOUR OPINION! 🙄

You're only unemployed if you're looking for work but haven't got any. 9 and a half million people are classified as economically inactive in the UK, only about 1.5 million of those are classified as unemployed.

I still feel like why does it matter truly.. how another person chooses to live? Is it because we compare ourselves subconsciously to others? We want better ourselves?

Ultimately we want better, for ourselves and our loved ones.. and if someone, man or woman, mum/dad is perceived as doing better, living well, then we feel automatically inferior or competitive.. ??

I suppose I’m trying to understand the discrepancies. The differences and yet the similarities..

as someone pointed out, being a parent requires graft or sacrifice somewhere.. throw in a few things like multiple kids, cost of living, elderly parents, neurodivergent kids or parents, work demands..

it’s almost as though the question should be - who has the tougher / more difficult life? Whoever has it better, we dislike or become jealous of..

Maybe we are all constantly just trying to prove ourselves and our decisions as worthy..

NWP non working parent

The latter sentence is a very MN thing. Of course not every SAHP is at risk of “financial disaster”. They’re at a much higher risk of it though if they have no current employment and have not for years and have not, for example, been studying or keeping up CPD for a previous role.

As I said, a financially independent or even financially stable SAHP is in a much better position. If I won the lottery (and by that, I mean multiple millions!) then heck yeah I’d be at home.

The reality is that most adults in the U.K. cannot sustain themselves without employment of sorts - or benefits if they can’t work. Being excessively wealthy is unusual and clearly I don’t worry how those people will pay the bills. That’s not to say that a working parent will automatically be hunky dory if they suddenly become a single parent but mostly they are in a better financial and employment position than those who are out of the work place. I am talking about the average Jo though.

Not sure why my comment has annoyed you so much.
My point is, let's just worry about ourselves and stop judging others.

@Hatfullofwillow
The oxford dictionary of unemployed is (of a person) without a paid job but available to work. - nothing to do with looking for work

Try and get unemployment benefit by bringing the OED into the dole office.

You can be a stay at home mum to one, your child needs you around no matter how old they are. Live your life as you please, it doesn’t matter what you do someone will criticise you for it, so do what makes you happy! I’m a stay at home mum to 4, youngest just started reception. I have no intention of ever returning to work at any point and I will spend my time however I please. I will take care of the household responsibilities and then I will walk the dog, go to the gym, go to the salon, have lunch in the city with my husband, meet with my friends for coffee and I will be completely unapologetic about it. I refuse to be grouchy and frazzled from having a job and also having to manage children, pets and the household while also trying to maintain my own friendships and my relationship with my husband. If some call me “unemployed” because of that, I don’t care. I don’t want to be a working mother.

But why does being employed make you more interesting to talk to? A lot of people's jobs are as boring as hell and it's just as boring hearing people talk about them! People who don't work still read, learn and participate in other things.

I'm in and out of employment, very part time self employed at the moment. It astounds me that people judge parents who stay at home. I do everything at home, one older disabled child still living at home. We've had no family support, husband works in a very demanding job. I do all the house repairs (we have been diying a project for years), garden, housework, family stuff. When I'm not working I also volunteer. I have a parent with dementia who doesn't live close by so I need to be able to travel to them quite often.

Someone upthread does comment that stay at home parenting can also be a refuge for people who never quite fitted in society/employment. I'd say there is a lot of truth in that, in my case. Those same people then end up being bitched about by the playground mums.

@Soldieringnonosoldiershere

Honestly, your choice to distance yourself is your loss. It's snobby, rude and judgemental but you do you. You have no idea how many potential friends you write off just because you think they won't have anything "sparky" about them because they're not in paid employment. Do you honestly think people who are, have more interesting things to say simply because they earn money? Nobody really wants to hear about your job and if you're someone who talks about it all the time outside of work, maybe you're not as interesting as you think you are. In my experience, SAHP have more time to pursue varied interests and are generally less stressed out, making them interesting to be with and excellent company.

Your choices are obviously up to you but the writing off of a whole group of people you don't know individually as dull / lacking sparky / uninteresting, based purely upon one circumstance that they have in common (ie the decision to be a SAHP) is the very definition of prejudice. You say it isn't jealousy and perhaps that is so but when your comments are so personal and unpleasant, despite not knowing any of the SAHP on this thread personally at all, it's hard to see what motivates that if it isn't jealousy. Either way, whether it's rude and unpleasant due to jealousy or rude and unpleasant due to prejudice, neither are very desirable traits in any friend of mine - which is lucky for us both, since you'd dismiss me as non-friend material without ever getting to know me anyway!

Does anyone actually give a shit about what their mates/acquaintances do for a job? I really don't care if you're a bin man or a Consultant Cardiologist or, like OP you don't work (unless your claiming for that lifestyle choice) Like do you chat about your work? I absolutely love my job, I don't want to be a SAHM but once I leave at 5pm for the day, then I won't give it a second thought until I arrive back there at 8.30am the following day. When I'm at work I'm working, when I'm at home I'm a wife and mum and 'me' and I'm definitely not going to bore the knickers of my friends and have mine bored off me by chatting about 'careers'.

Why are you worrying about how anyone pays their bills? It’s totally condescending and possibly even misogynistic given that the ‘faux concern’ is almost always aimed at women. You have no idea what a family’s financial position is. As long as they are not asking you for handouts or unfairly claiming benefits it’s completely ridiculous.

Most SAHMs I know are pretty wealthy. I don’t know anyone that would be a SAHM if it meant struggling in any way. I know you read about them on mumsnet sometimes but it’s not reflective of real life.