being a sah is not considered a legitimate pursuit anymore...

[AliGrylls]

I am fed up of people thinking that being a SAHP is the easy option - I am a firm believer it is not an easy option. Most SAHM I know have what I would describe as quite a rough time of it. Hubbie leaving the house at 6/7 am; not getting home until 7/8 and woman is expected to do all the jobs she was expected to do 40/50 years ago, ie, washing, ironing etc - except for the fact that DH wants the children to be kept up so he can play with them and say what a good father he is.

The whole notion that being a working parent is so much harder is not true because while you are out working there is someone else looking after your children for you. You are not trying to do them both simultaneously. What is hard is trying to fit a job around your children, which is what most women want so they can enjoy their lives and their children (I think!)

A woman who chooses to SAH after children start school is not lazy, she is merely trying to redress the fact that she has spent the first few years of her children's life knee deep in nappies and sleep deprived having worked the 17 hour day that was expected of her. When her children start school she will probably be back to working 8-10 hour days that most people work.

Lastly, there is actually no shame in being a SAHP and it can be fulfilling and stimulating. It is just a question of whether one wants to treat is a proper job or a millstone around the neck. Is a job really that much more intellectually stimulating? Surely, after a few years any job loses its ability to stimulate due to the fact it becomes a process? Unless of course you are in academia or a creative job. Except for financial reasons the main reason to go back to work is to have a break from the children / have a career. Neither of which are bad reasons just please admit that this is the reason and not use the fact that you obviously believe you have the intellectual high ground over someone who chooses to SAH.

I strongly believe the above is a feminist issue and I think that being a SAH deserves the same level of respect that being a working parent gets, but it doesn't. Feminists please back up the fact that a woman has a right to choose and she should not be guilted into the modern day notion that working is all and being a full-time mother is not a legitimate pursuit.

Yes her research is extensive and supported by statistics. It's based mainly on American society although there is a lot of input from European research too. Of course there are some exceptions, and you would be one of them but here stats are quite convincing. For example

60% of gifted women turn down promotions or take positions with lower pay so as to weave flexibility or social purpose into their work lives. That 60 percent reflects the women who choose to step off the career ladder rather than are pushed off by circumstances.

Her research looks into the fact that far more men than women tend to be on the extreme ends of the spectrum of behaviour - more men are criminals, more males have learning disabilities such as dyslexia and autism and more men are brilliant. There is a lot of biological evidence to say that this is due to the Y chromosome which makes men more vulnerable to disease and death but also more likely to be genii.

i remain deeply dubious as to methodology and summation

I don't really the idea that the fact that men need to be the main wage earners stops them from doing social jobs. Surely if men wanted to do these jobs then they would attract high salaries? Yet men have just chosen not to do them and that's why they don't attract high salaries. Not the other way around.

I find it rather odd and short sighted to dismiss the life's work of a scientist just because it doesn't fit with what you believe.

lol,for millionth time dont exaggerate.im not trashing life time work?mmm no query findings,and any robust seasoned researcher will be adept at.indeed research is for dissemination and discussion

But why are you "deeply dubious" scottishmummy?

But how do we know the 60% of gifted women haven't just been so affected by their surroundings that they have decided to do what is 'normal' for women to do?

I'm not disagreeing with you as such and I'm not suggesting that every woman who chooses a traditional female role has done so because they've been brainwashed, far from it as that would be pretty insulting. I'm just musing really on how accurate any of this research canbe when we live in a sexist society.

I totally get what you're saying Berkshire and that definitely is something to take into consideration. Coming at it from a completely scientific point of view, there is a lot of evidence to suggest that regardless of cultural factors there are significant innate differences between men and women that exist across all cultures, and all situations. Society has blown these differences completely out of proportion in order to pigeonhole people and that's where the problem lies.

A very interesting natural experiment was the Kibbutzim (closed communes) in Israel during the 1970s where from birth children were brought up in a very strictly gender neutral environment and huge emphasis was placed on everyone's roles being equal. Children were looked after communally and all chores were divided equally so that there were no traditional mother and father roles. The expectation of course was that everything would be 50-50 and women would end up doing pretty much the same range of jobs as men.
Quoting directly: "after four generations of trying to enforce gender neutral family and work roles, 70 to 80 percent of the women had gravitated towards people-oriented jobs, primarily related to children and education, while the majority of men preferred to work in the fields, factories, construction or maintenance. And the longer people lived on the kibbutz the more polarized the sexual division of labour became"
Paraphrasing: Despite being given free childcare and the opportunity to work in whatever job they wanted women chose to be closer to their children and to spend less time working than men.

that is very interesting writer

So, on the flip side of making women who choose traditionally female roles feeling inadequate, we need to make sure we don't make those who dont choose a female path feel less like women.. if that makes sense..

I suppose in a way, it would only be in an enviornment like Kibbutzim where women could freely make choices without any kind of critisism or stigma.

I agree about not making women who choose non-"female" paths feel less like women.

Something that stayed with me in the book was the personal stories of the women Pinker interviewed. Now, I know it's not scientific and purely anecdotal but what jumped out at me was the way that a lot of women had felt they were required to repress their "feminine" side in order to be "successful" - ie that they should want to be like men and wanting to do a traditionally female job like being SAHM wasn't worthy of them. Many of them felt that rather than being pushed into female roles they were pushed into male roles that gave them a male version of success that just didn't satisfy them.

What people seem to forget is that culture doesn't just appear out of thin air, nor do people sit down and decide on culture in a conscious way. There wasn't a committee of men that sat down one day and said "you know what we'll make sure that women adore babies and want to be near them, want to have them and want to stay at home to look after them." Culture grows out of the way a group of people naturally behave. Whether that natural behaviour is right or wrong is another thing.

There are many incidents in history that have shown that you can't just decide what people should be like and then make them that way. There is an inherent human nature that influences our behaviour no matter how we might feel rationally about a situation. So, for example, communism, while great in theory, struggles hugely in practice because humans tend to be competitive animals who need goals and rewards in order to motivate them. In theory we would all love everyone to have equal access to everything but in practice without success and reward and the promise of more money or prestige we feel listless and demotivated.

We should accept that women, in general, have a strong desire to have children and to look after a family. I know this doesn't go for all women but it goes for a very large proportion of them. Girls should be given the message that yes, they can do what they like, and if that's having a family and a job that fits around looking after children that's just as valid an option as being a high flying lawyer or a CEO. Giving girls the message that they can have a huge career and still have plenty of time for a family is just untrue in today's world. Rather than pulling the wool over their eyes it's better to give them the truth - that having a family is a very time consuming pursuit that is difficult to fit around a demanding career. You need to talk to your partner early on and decide what your priority is in terms of career/childcare and be realistic about it. And yes, it's women who need to do this as they are the ones that lose out more often than men from not carefully planning ahead.

I would like to echo what HopeForTheBest said about it all changing at the point of pregnancy.

I too am the product of a very feminist upbringing - I was raised by a single mother and my sister and I were wholly encouraged to do everything for ourselves.
We were wholly independant creatures - in our house it was my mum who did all of the painting, fixing, cooking, cleaning, mending, making, building;everything. I can't recall a time where we would need a 'man' to sort anything out for us.
We followed the example she set for us and as a result I was working from the age of 13, earning my own keep, buying my own school clothes, paying for any nights out, etc.

We worked hard, respected our mother, got good grades, went to uni, started our lives. I had my own flat at 17. I was full of confidence. I've been to drama school, I've got a good degree, I worked behind bars, I worked in clubs, I workedwith sn children. I loved my very independant and focused life.

I met dh, we had ds1.

I had a terrible pg. High bp, pre-eclampsia, then a horrible emergency section at the 11th hour. A bit of a shock to the system for a young lady who had not been reliant on anyone before for anything.

I probably am a victim of my own circumstance apart from anything else, but yes, one thing I noticed, more than anything else, is how much in the way of things my own biology got.

DH got his new graduate job just after I had ds1, so of course he started on the career ladder, as I was still recovering from birth and trying to be a new mum.

I didn't realise until I got pg that most of my friends were male. The female friends I had had moved to different cities for uni etc. Once my pg singled me out as female, weaker, less able to compete etc...that was it. I was all of those things. My pg rendered me physically unable to keep up. Then there was the birth, which seriously freaked out my male friends! Then all of the emotional stuff which I didn't know how to deal with, let alone anyone else - the PND, the lonliness, the realisation that I was a SAHM.

Coming to terms with being a SAHM is maybe something I'll never do.

I have never faced a bigger conundrum in my whole life.

I do feel like I have literally killed a part of myself in order to raise my children.

Part of me has died. And whether it's confidence, or something that has had to happen in order to make me a stronger woman - I'm still working it out. I am happier with it than I have been in a long time. But in myself, I am different. I am more mature, my radar is on for bullshit and fairweather friends and I am more measured in the way I deal with things.
I am however,less sure of myself, a lot lonlier and a lot more sensitive than I've ever been.

I am reliant, for the first time in my life on a man for income, the rook over my head, holidays, breaks, clothes, shoes, everything material and immaterial that I need.
What a punch in the face that has been!

I have such a strong work ethic and have so many skills and talents and I am crushed at home. Utterly crushed.

I love my children, with all of my heart and soul, I do. I love them, I love the bones of them, but I struggle with the very stigma of SAHM.

I shouldn't care what anyone else thinks, but I do. It commands very little respect and it has the ability to render me invisible. People just assume that's all I am and all I'm capable of and that's ridiculously demeaning.
I can't use childcare as we can't afford it. I would literally be working to pay someone to look after my kids. No deal.

There you go. Love my kids to death, hate being stuck at home with them, it's all my womb's fault! If he'd have had a womb, by golly we would at least have had a shot about. He's fair like that.

Biology [shakes fist at it]

:( Three little ducks. You told your story very well.

I hope I don't come across as glib, and perhaps what I have to say won't apply to you at all, but I do worry that women are convinced, wrongly, that having a family is a breeze and they should be able to have a great career and a family at the same time. As many discover, especially after a second child comes along, it is not a breeze, it is damn hard if you expect to have a very successful demanding career and children then you're expecting an awful lot of yourself. It totally is possible to do it, but the fact of the matter is that there are only so many hours in the day and something will have to lose out in the end. There are plenty of women who love their jobs and are perfectly happy to put their children in childcare, and can afford to do so. So it works really well for them and they make it look easy. But for other women, putting a child in childcare for long hours is both emotionally and financially impossible and women need to be aware that this could happen for them. There is no point in not being straight with women and then making them feel like failures when they don't sail through it all and become CEO while raising a brood of 5. Women are human, and have human feelings and most women are overcome by the love they have for their children and the desire to be part of their lives as they grow up. You just can't work a 60 hour week and still be a big part of your children's lives. It's not possible.

Writer of Dreams: That's it in a nutshell.

We are given Birth Plans, asked if we want to Breastfeed etc, as it were all without problem.

Empowering or not? Yes in some ways - it lets a woman know there are options - but takes away the 'see what happens to you' element and can be as much of a blow as a salve.

I have a friend who is pregnant for the first time at the moment and she is embracing it all. When asked how she thinks birth will go, other mothers look at each other with a wry grin as she tells us about her extensive playlist, waterbirth with no drugs and as much movement as possible.

As a good friend and as a fellow woman, I just had to say to her 'Please aim for that, it sounds wonderful. But anything could happen and you might not be in control of it.' I felt it was my duty to say something. Everyone else just smiled and nodded at her. I didn't want to be the harbinger of doom, but I know, I just KNOW if I was prepared more than I was, if I had an inkling of knowledge, of the loss of control, of the fact that my own biology might not stand up to my expectations of strength, then I might have svaed myself a whole lot of heartache.

Nobody told me that. Nobody prepared me. And from then on, I feel as though I have been reading a huge 'lift-the-flap' story where everything is trial and error and there's no way of knowing what to expect.

It is a loss of control - and it's shocked my system to the core.

I keep saying to my dh, that if I'd just been set up to raise a family, if only I hadn't been educated, told I can have what I want, told about gap years and having it all and jobs for life in which you can grow and develop...maybe, just maybe the disappointment wouldn't be so choking.

Writer do you believe, then, that WOH fathers who work a 60 hour week are not a large part of their children's lives?

I agree it would be helpful to take some of the pressure off women by not pretending it's possible to both be a fully involved parent and a fully involved employee. Something (usually a bit of both) will give.

But I also think it would be helpful if we put more pressure on men. Many men seem to think at present that "having a family" involves coming home from work to kiss the DCs goodnight. Why is that acceptable? Why are they not put under the same pressure to balance being involved at work and being involved with their family?

I think the feminists already agree with you op

"Society has blown these differences completely out of proportion in order to pigeonhole people and that's where the problem lies. "

Yes. And now they have become so accreted with traditions and time that it seems unthinkable that they are not the only way to be and people who don't want things to change feel able to insist that they Are The Ways Things Are Meant To Be.

I think "loss of control" is a huge shock the first time it happens to you, whatever the triggering event. As young adults we expect life to be all about choices - and it is, of course - but we don't (perhaps can't and shouldn't?) fully understand how our choices are restrained by circumstance. Until it happens.

Our true choices are responses to uncontrollable events. It's a hard, hard lesson. I suspect women generally have to face this sooner than men, due to our biology as well as to patriarchal influences. But even the most privileged male will eventually find his 'control' challenged by circumstance, such as a failing body or bereavements.

Sorry this is more of a general post, not specifically about being a SAHM. Your thoughts, Threelittleducks, really moved me. It ties in with lessons I'm trying to internalise (rather than just 'knowing' iyswim) for myself at the moment.

"I keep saying to my dh, that if I'd just been set up to raise a family, if only I hadn't been educated, told I can have what I want, told about gap years and having it all and jobs for life in which you can grow and develop...maybe, just maybe the disappointment wouldn't be so choking."

But would you rather have not had the education and the gap year? Would you rather any DDs you had were also told not to raise their heads above the parapet and hope for more than motherhood?

And there is life beyond the baby years. It gets easier. Motherhood has added a different dimension to my life but it no longer IS my life as it seemed to be for years.

Minipie, I do think that fathers who WOH for 60 hours a week aren't a large part of their children's lives, yes. And I think in general the fact that we live in a society that expects people to work such long hours really gets to me. I think it's just wrong, in fact. Whether you have children or not, working for such a large part of every week, unless you absolutely adore the job, is just not healthy and the fact that children lose out because of it is very sad.

I agree with you that men should be put under more pressure to contribute to family life. However, the problem is you can't make people want things, and the fact of the matter is more women want to stay at home than men. I know a lot of women are pushed into being at home too, but on the whole women have a greater desire to be with children and are more willing to give up careers in order to do that. Forcing men to do it when they don't have the desire to is just as wrong as forcing women to do it when they don't have the desire to. If it's the case that men do have the desire but feel they can't because they have to be breadwinners then it would be fair to say that they are just as much a victims of the patriarchy as women are. I'm not sure that's the case to be honest.

I do believe that everyone, men and women is hit in the face at some point with the reality that their lives are limited by circumstance and that to an extent the have little or no control over what happens to them. It's a very hard thing to face and it's a human thing, rather than a man/woman thing. I think perhaps earlier generations were more willing to accept their lot, perhaps too willing in some ways. It's good to challenge things and to want more but at some point everyone has to accept that they won't have everything they want and really that's ok.

It would be better if both men and women worked say, 40 hours a week, then they could work and be a big part of their children's lives. But it does seem to be the case that men are expected to work 60+ hours and women are the ones at home because they feel that at least one parent should be there and it'snot going to be the father because of the pressures put upon him by his employer to work 60+ hours because he has a wife at home to look after the children.

It seems to me, if you are happy to take the traditional female role then you are supported (unless the man leaves you and then quite frankly you're shafted because there is nothing in place to protect women currently) but if you don't then you have to be one of these 'do has it all' women. That is what i think i find unfair.

yy berkshire

Completely agree.

Much of life is still set up around the idea that one parent (usually the man) works and the other (usually the woman) doesn't. It is harder - and often financially less well paid - if you don't fit this mould.

"I agree with you that men should be put under more pressure to contribute to family life."

Just as long however as there is no problem with the mother being put under more pressure to contribute to the finances. That isn't meant to sound quite so arsey but so many family models are:

daddy - earning all the money and away from home 10hrs a day. Rotting his soul doing a job he doesn't much care for and missing his kids
mummy - at home all day earning nothing but doing a sterling job looking after the kids and home but chewing her nails to the quick with frustration.

There needs to be a middle way.

Writer

I agree with you that more women want to stay at home than men. But, first, that isn't the case for everyone - and as berkshire says it's a lot harder for those who don't fit that mould.

And second, perhaps that is partly because we've been conditioned that way?

Lost you slightly Orm.

Are you saying that, in return for men being put under pressure to contribute more to family life, women should be pressured to contribute more financially? Or are you saying they should not be pressured to contribute more financially?

"in return for men being put under pressure to contribute more to family life, women should be pressured to contribute more financially"

That. Although 'pressured' wasn't my original choice of word. It's a burden I personally didn't relish - being by far the biggest earner I was always conscious that things would go tits up if I lost my job. 2 more moderate earners and shared housework and childcare seems infinitely preferable. We are more or less at that stage now and I am much happier.