Are attitudes to SAHM mothers on here overly negative?

[Anonfortoday2]

I’ve been reading through the replies to my recent post about being a SAHM, and I’m honestly just a bit saddened by how negative people are about it.
So many of the responses were filled with really extreme, worst case what if scenarios. Things like what if he leaves you, what if he financially abuses you, or what if the worst happens and you are left with nothing?
It feels a bit exhausting to look at life that way. Of course, nobody knows what the future holds, but you can’t live your life constantly planning for absolute disaster.
It's often made out like SAHMs don't have a brain cell between them, but so many of us are actually completely financially safe. Lots of couples have the property in both names, and arrange private pensions and savings accounts in the mum's own name so she is fully protected.
If anything, some SAHM setups are much more financially secure than a two-income family. So many working couples have a massive mortgage that they absolutely could not afford if they separated, meaning they'd have to sell up anyway. In real life, I actually know more working couples who stay in terrible marriages simply because they can’t afford to live in the same area on their own.
People on here only ever focus on money, but they completely ignore how much value it brings to the household. My husband deeply appreciates me being at home because it removes a massive amount of stress from his life too. We don't have the constant headache of covering sick days, school holidays, or rushing around at bedtime. It makes the whole house run smoother.
Outside the Mumsnet echo chamber, so many families are completely happy with this setup. Being a SAHM was the norm for generations, and it still works beautifully for millions of couples today. For most of us, marriage is a genuine partnership built on mutual love, shared goals, and deep trust. It’s not a business transaction where you are always preparing for a divorce.
I just find it a shame that it’s so hard for people on here to accept that some men really love and support their wives, and that this lifestyle can be a lovely, successful choice for a family.
Am I the only one who thinks the endless worry and negativity about SAHMs on here is a bit disconnected from everyday reality?

@Anonfortoday2 so you're in a good and somewhat unique position. You are (presumably) young with young kids and have several hundreds of thousands of pounds saved that is just your money - you earned it and saved it. I agree that you are financially secure. You must have been very high earning when you were at work.

Your unique position does not change the fact that on a population level it's not great if one gender absents themselves from the workplace. It just isn't. Most unemployed women don't have enough saved to buy themselves and their children a house outright tomorrow. Most women aren't better at the house and kid shit than men, and most men aren't better at earning money than women. Yet it is almost always the women who become unemployed in these situations and that is problematic.

Patently untrue

it’s unfair to assume SAHMs are just blind to reality. Many of us are financially safe with joint properties, private pensions, and savings in our own names.

This just isn’t true. Most people I know who became SAHM’s did it because they couldn’t afford childcare. They certainly didn’t have lots of additional private income and savings. And the stats around marriage and divorce, and how women typically end up in much more economically on sound positions, show that you are wrong. The only person occupying an echo chamber here is in fact you

I have posted about this before: my mum was a SAHM and I was embarrassed. Other mums did purposeful things and mine stayed home and cleaned the house and waited for us to come home from school. She went back to work when we were teenagers and it was great for us all, especially her. Different things work for different families and if being a SAHM works for you, great, it would not work for me.

Thing is op, the time when your DC are small and needy and need carting to breakfast club, looking after when they’re sick etc is actually very short. Time flies and then suddenly their summer holidays are filled with their friends and activities - they don’t want to hang out with you. They get the bus or walk to school, and they certainly don’t want you watching at sports day or other school events! And then they’re off to uni or to work and then where does that leave you? With an 18 year career gap and potentially bored and unfulfilled. I could probably have afforded sahm and my dh would have financially supported this, however, I chose to keep working and now I’m very glad of it as my DC are becoming more independent (which came round quickly). Defining your life by your role as a mother may well not feel very satisfying when you look back in 15 years or so

I just can’t understand the point of this thread. Op you will not change anyone’s mind, we are all grown ups, you need to accept many of us would not wish your lifestyle, we do not get fullfillment from soley doing the housework and child care. We understand you do. We enjoy working, you do not. That’s fine.

as much as you are constantly telling us how very wealthy you are, ramping it up with every post, I actually strongly suspect you are exactly the type of woman who should be concerned, I suspect you’re married to a middling income man, you had a low income job so couldn’t afford child care, live in a modest house, and likely have a very small pension but do have joint account access. Any property you could buy if you split would be very small indeed and assume you live in a low cost area.

of course I could be wrong, but there is something off about the tone of your posts.

Either way again, it doesn’t matter, you know the truth of your life. And whether you’re as wealthy as you make out, someone who is set for life as you married rich, or in reality just someone who had a low income job where it made sense for you to stay home due to child care costs and live in a modest home within a modest one person salary and cut your cloth accordingly, it doesn’t matter.

you can’t change anyone’s mind, repeatedly arguing and then declaring you’re not, is a little pointless. You do you. Enjoy uour life. Everyone should do this.

But accept this gender stereotypical family is not something many women desire, nor would they chose, they wish equality, and it carries risk for a lot of women when you make yourself so financially vulnerable and pointing this out is not a negative.

I wasn't embarrassed of mine, I was annoyed by it as an older child.

I would have loved to come home from school to an empty house, just once as a secondary school child.

Dawdle on the way home from school, hang out with friends - you're late, why, where did you go what did you do.

Constantly supervising us around the house when we got home, nagging us. Was the same at six form college When I was doing my a levels.

Couldn't watch one I wanted on t v because there was only one. I couldn't play music as she didn't like it. If I put walk minarm or a disc man, she'd have a problem that as well as it was rude and antisocial.

Revolved her life and social life around us.

It was utterly stifling. I would just, wish she'd get out my face and a job would have done her some good as well. Mine never one went back to work.And I would have loved it if she'd done it when I was a teenager.

@PleaseDontAsk thank you, you’ve just jogged a memory for me. My kids, in their early/mid teens loved coming home to an empty house in the 1980s. DH often worked away, and I worked f/t office hours by then. DD told me only recently, and I seem to remember I worried about it at the time.

I would have loved it. It would have allowed me some independence. I wouldnt have burned the house down, or done anything wild.I just would have watched what I wanted on TV, played some music, etc.

But mum was always there and it was stifling. She ended up revolving her entire life around us and wasnt sure what to do when I went to Uni.

Only women can breastfeed. Some mothers don’t want their baby having formula milk. So in this instance, only a mother can nourish her baby.

You might choose to breastfeed, but babies without mothers who can/want to breastfeed are still able to be "nourished", so no, not only a mother can nourish a baby.

I breastfed dd until she was nearly 3. She never had formula. I never even expressed. (Well, I did try, but dd wasn't having any of it.)

That didn't prevent me from working full time, albeit in a job where I was senior enough to have leverage/demand flexibility.

Doesn't necessarily mean the mother is unable to work outside the home though. I breastfed all my children til self weaning, including tandem feeding for about 3 years and apart from maternity leave I was working full time for most of that. And women still breastfeed in countries where they have to return to work earlier - the two things are not necessarily mutually exclusive.
I think it is a factor in the reasons why most SAHP are female but probably not the main one. It is something that has been at least partially addressed by longer maternity leave and better provision for breastfeeding mothers in the workplace though obviously there's still plenty of room for improvement. But I'd be surprised if wanting to breastfed beyond standard maternity leave and being unable to do so in the workplace was the main reason not to return for more than a fairly small proportion of women. The reasons we see far more SAHMs than SAHDs are far more likely to be economic and cultural than biological.

@mrsm43s @MrsBennetsPoorNervesAreBack @AgeingDoc

I agree with all you! I was just making a statement.

My children have now grown but I stayed at home with them for the first 2 years then went back albeit PT. What I have noticed is the women I know who have spent their lives as SAHM are now a bit lost. Children have grown and rather than loving all the time they have they have lost their identity. Every single one of them wishes they had a career at this stage.

I do think it is a poor role model for daughters. I would want my DD to have something for herself, that she has achieved and that she is proud of. Life doesn’t have to be all one way or the other. Finding a decent partner who is willing to shoulder the responsibilities of child rearing and not just the financial ones is really what it’s about. A partner who values your career, as much as their own. I can’t help but be cynical and fe that those who are SAHM especially with school aged children are in that position as the alternative for them would really be having to do it all.

I didn't say everything, I said financially which is accurate. Even if they have previously contributed financially, they aren't currently and that is what makes them vulnerable unless they have their own assets which happens but I highly doubt is the majority of SAHM's.

In any case, my point was that it is a far cry from winning the lottery and isn't comparable.

rhe biggest group of stay at home mothers are working class. So it is unlikely they are independent wealthy and more likely for most it is to do with high cost childcare, and low income work. The next bucket in terms of scale is upper middle class, where they don’t need to work financially and are secure.

its why the goverment gives childcare support. To enable women back into th4 work place, they don’t do this as most stay at home mums are wealthy with fulsome careers to fall back on, they do it as the demographics show the cost of child care is prohibitive to many of them as their earnings are low.

and if not independtly wealthy, then they are fully reliant on their husband and potentially benefits to stay at home.

i am unsure why so many on this thread are trying to pretend many stay at home mothers are not financially vulnerable, and are instead a group of independently wealthy career women, some are, but it’s the minority. By a long way,

A lot of people on here have completely proved my point, and the level of projection is hilarious. Apparently, I’m lying and living in poverty now? 😂 It seems like there is a huge level of jealousy coming from a lot of people.
I’m off to our holiday home tomorrow oh, I guess I’m lying about that too, lol. I will no longer be replying to this thread. I guess none of you work anyway, seeing as you have so much time to spend on Mumsnet .Enjoy the rest of your summer, or enjoy work whichever you prefer the most and gives you more fulfilment.

Well - that went well.

#flounce

Oh dear. You appear to be a bit hard of thinking. No one is jealous. No one at all is saying that its wrong for you to be a SAHM if you are independently wealthy separately to your DH's earnings, and you prefer childcare and domestic work to other careers. What we are saying is that many women who aren't independently wealthy are taking a huge financial risk if they choose to rely on their husband's (or even worse, partner's) earning power having sacrificed their own earning power. However wealthy you are, not many husbands do hand over the many millions it would take to replace the woman's earning power and pensions for the rest of her life.

And like it or not, women do frequently get screwed over by the men they trusted to support them for the rest of their lives.

If you personally are one of the tiny percentage who does have many millions ringfenced and protected fotlr you, then good for you. But for most women it's an extrememly risky choice. Moreover, many women have rewarding and fulfilling careers which they don't want to give up to take on an unpaid domestic role. We're proud of our achievements outside of the home.

It was always going to culminate in a flounce! I think @Anonfortoday2 hoped for something else from this thread...

I think it's been an interesting discussion and I hope that women thinking about giving up work consider the points raised

I haven't seen much jealousy or projection on this thread at all tbh. I think maybe that's just wishful thinking on your part because you would like to believe that your life is somehow what others would aspire to if they were honest enough to admit it? I wonder why you might need to convince yourself of that?

The thing is, there are lots of people who probably would love your life. And if you are happy doing what you're doing, then that's great. I'm happy for you.

But it's very weird to assume that people who have chosen to take a different approach to life, or those who point out the risks of being a SAHP for those who lack the financial privilege that you seem to enjoy, must automatically be jealous of the life that you have chosen.

Can you not understand that, while some women are content and fulfilled by being SAHPs, others are genuinely happier and more fulfilled by pursuing their careers alongside motherhood?

@PinkKimonos

i know several and was one. They are pretty common, i even know 2 stat at home dads, no not gay either,

I was a SAHM until my youngest started infants school. I will always cherish that time with my children.

Never gave my pension or my husband leaving me a thought at the time. That stuff I have only ever read here on Mumsnet. Most of my friends at the time were also SAHM's (or working very part time) and it just wasn't something that ever came up, we were too busy having fun and enjoying that precious time with our little ones.

Things have changed a lot in 20 years and it's not so easy now to not be in paid work at all after having children.

I can remember getting into debates with people on Bounty at the time and I always remember this one poster who wrote that she 'see's SAHM's 'trudging' in the rain all the time and doesn't envy them at all'. I always thought that I would choose walking in the rain with my babies over being at work any day. We're all different.

Nowadays not thst many can live on 1 income. Also less common to be married, with the protection that divorce offers.