"If you're a sahp it's not a job"

[Lunalula]

That phrase. It gets on my nerves so much!
I'm a sahp, I see it as not a career, but yes an unpaid job because simply, someone has to do it.
If you were working to earn a wage you send your dc to nursery, school, ect. So in theory you are paying someone to look after your dc, to care for them, change nappies, feed and/ or prepare bottles/food, teach them the basics and more.
My problem is these people who say a sahp has it easy because it not a job.
I beg to differ. You don't get paid. You can't relax properly. Your children always 'need' you. Nappies changes. Bottle making. Meal prep and cooking/ feeding. Learning games. Being careful of bumps, trips and falls. The list is endless really.
Yes there is plusses which sometimes you can't do in paid work. Toilet breaks as you please. Drink breaks a you please. You can kind of do what you want if DC nap during day. You can have the TV on all day whilst entertaining DC.
So basically, yes, sahp is a job!!!

salfpans there's a lot of parents who work part time during school hours who will be doing all the sahp work on top of their paid job

I'm a sahm and I openly ask dh for a "wage".Yes I know we share money but getting "paid" when he gets paid makes me feel better about myself.Ive always worked up until having ds and rightly or wrongly i feel better about my lifestyle in general if I feel it's a paid job.The money is used for household things,activities etc not just for me personally.

I'm a sahm and I openly ask dh for a "wage".Yes I know we share money but getting "paid" when he gets paid makes me feel better about myself.

Oh god no. Asking your husband to pay you makes you feel better about yourself??

Saddest thing I have read all day

This is just a conversation about semantics. All work is a job, hoovering, washing up etc and childcare are jobs. They aren't paid employment if you do them in the course of being a sahp or outside of the hours of your paid employment. But being a sahp is your job if you are one.

Being a SAHM is the hardest job I've ever had- that's for sure

@empmalswa and @SoyDora
Of course I have ten minutes to run around with the hoover or fill the dishwasher too, but my point is that the tasks I get done are often associated with the extra work that's created by having the DC at home in the first place.

So I can hoover a room and then a child wants to do crafts or walks in with an illicit biscuit, carpet once again needs to be hoovered and so it continues. Loads more washing up needs to be done when DC are having all meals and snacks at home.

I may well have done lots of chores in the day but I am not in a particularly better position housework wise at the end of the working day than I would have been if the DC had been in childcare FT. Like I mentioned earlier, if my kids had different temperaments or napped reliably then things would undoubtedly be different.

Like in a paid job I imagine if mess was made at your work station ect you'd clean it up as you go. So as a sahm the toy mess and food crumbs gets tidied up as I go and I get them involved too. If I was at work I probably wouldn't hoover, so hoovering is done in evening or weekends

I'm not quite sure it really matters so much about the terminology job. It still amazes me how these threads go, surely we should all just appreciate each other as parents regardless
.
But anyway, I see it as the most important role I will ever and have ever had. I choose to have children as I wanted to bring my children up and be there for them in the early years, so I had my DS always knowing I would be at home with him and put my career on hold/end it completely.

My day is definitely as busy, if not more so, than when I was in work. It is relentless but you are responsible for guiding, nurturing and essentially forming your child. What is more rewardpp

Erm, it isn't a job.

Sorry it posted too soon.
What is more rewarding than being there to see your child learn new skills and develop.
But that said I am both accountable and responsible for my child 24/7 - so possibly may see it as an unpaid job.( I don't get to have the tv on all day though 😜)

Either way, I know it doesn't make me look down my nose at working mums,and I think if people are going to solely judge people as SAHM or working mums they maybe need to get out a little more.

It always makes me laugh when a SAHP(usually the ones with school aged children) harps on about their huge long list of tasks they do to make their days seem harder

Some gems I've heard include trying not to fall over, managing email inboxes, and answering the phone.

Is anyone ever going to tell them that we also manage to do these incredibly difficult tasks on top of a job

I have the best of both worlds. Or something.

I have two girls. One is four, one is nearly 18 months and wild.

I am a part time solicitor in a big corporate firm. I work three days per week and every single evening when my kids are asleep. I am trying to change this but right now it is what it is.

Working days are about a million times harder than my days at home. Probably because I enjoy the two weekdays I have with them (not including the weekends when DH is here too). We call them out girls club days we go out and about. We run errands. We go to soft play. We go to the science centre. We play games. We watch tv. Older DD does swimming lessons and gymnastics. We have playdates It’s fab.

To be fair though it has only recently become fab. When DD2 wasn’t quite walking and was highly accident prone it was so, so hard.

Posted too soon. We don’t do much in the way of “structured activities” etc because they do these in nursery. DD1 is learning to write her name so we will practice that when DD2 naps, or we will play counting games etc but nothing rigorous.

Work is a fucking nightmare though. Feel like I’ve done a days work just getting the two of them to nursery on time. Then i am flat out all day so I can leave at five to get back tonthe nursery (and ignore the glares and eye rolls from my colleagues). Then once they’re asleep I am a housework tornado and then I work till midnight or so

It's not a job though. Its a lifestyle choice.
The reality is the housework and tasks that SAHP have all day to do is also done by working mums in a compressed couple of hours when a working mum gets home...
Oh and childcare can be split between two working parents plus the school or nursery so being at your kids beckon call in case they come home sick seems a bit silly argument imo. I would just take a few days off work to care for them?

It's up to the individual what they want to call themselves, if they want to call it a job. I can't see why anyone would be bothered that to me being a sahm was my job.

Surely, childcare can only be split between two parents if they are both available during the day/night. If a child comes home ill then somebody needs to be there for them, how is that silly. It's hardly being at their beck and call.

*Posted too soon - difference being you do all that but in the limited time between when they go to bed and when they wake up as you don’t have the time in the day to do it as you are working.

I’m a full time working parent to three under 9 with no financial or time support from their dad.

I win.*

Bless you. When my husband gets home at 4 I bob out to work until midnight, 7 nights a week. 4 kids here, 3 under 5. But you keep your trophy, I don't need it

@emp it's really not sad.It is a job and should be treated as such.You go to work and get paid,Wtf shouldn't I? Jealous much

It’s pretty patronising though. We just pay our wages into one account and everything comes out of that same account. No one is paying allowances or keeping track of who is spending what. I couldn’t bear being paid an allowance by my husband (who works full time). Like he is my employer or my superior.

@Leonie fair point but the money I manage goes on treats for us all,clothes etc.dh manages bills and holidays.It works for us.

I agree, but neither of those scenarios are a 'job'

Didn't say they were.

it's really not sad.It is a job and should be treated as such.

It's not the SAH but that made me sad. It was the fact that you need to get paid by your DH to make you feel better about yourself

You go to work and get paid,Wtf shouldn't I?

Well you could?

Jealous much

Jealous? Of what?

It's not a job. It's a lifestyle choice.

It can be a very rewarding and very demanding choice, but it's not a job.

Saying it's not a job doesn't devalue it. It's just a fact of life in the same way I cook our meals but I'm not a chef, I clean but I'm not a cleaner etc.

@Bumpitybumper
Sorry for delay in replying. I was at work ;)

Wasn't trying to wind anyone up, I genuinely thought that the accepted viewpoint was that working mothers have it harder. All women I know IRL who have wealthy/earn enough partners and are allowed the CHOICE to stay at home are grateful for that fact and usually feel sorry for me (not great feeling either, I don't want or ask them to feel that way!)

You do have the choice to do house work in the day or dedicate endless time to activitying your children. You may still have life admin to do at end of the day but only you and your choices make that a reality. Doesn't mean SAHP don't have shitty days of course, I've been a SAHP too I may add.

Complex additional needs of kids would obviously change the landscape of the conversation, I agree. That is truly difficult and people doing that day in day out have my admiration and my sympathy.

Your partner like most men (yes generalising) I am guessing does not take on the emotional load of running a house. Of course he would rather disappear to work every day where he doesn't have to rush home for the online shop delivery or else no one eats. If he had to do what most working mums (yes generalising) do then he may have a different opinion.

Either way this issue is clearly an emotive one for either side of the fence and we are all just doing our best. Truth be told I'm jealous that people get to stay at home with their kids and I battle guilt for not being able to. On the flip side I think SAHP are defensive about their life choices. No one wins, hopefully all our kids end up healthy and happy

Surely SAHP and working parents both work really hard it's just different responsibilities are covered at different times.

I am responsible for my child 24 hrs a day (having a child was my lifestyle choice and not of school age).
A working parent is responsible for their child for less hours of the day as their responsibilities lie within their roles at work.

I don't understand some of the narky people on here, it can come across as jealousy as otherwise why would it rile you so much what other people label their role

It's not a job. It's being a parent. People who have jobs are also parents and do all that stuff too. You might just as well say that being an adult is a job - it involves feeding yourself, looking after your home, paying your bills, doing household admin etc. That takes effort and time too, but it's not a job. I'm not saying this as an anti SAHM thing l. I was a SAHM for a while. It wasn't a job.